# how much of each to buy????



## soton_dave (15 Jul 2009)

im going to be starting EI because tpn+ is costing me a small fortune to dose.
how much of each salt should i buy?
i want to get enough for about 6 months for a 240l tank(have the salts got a shelf life?) but dont want to get 500g of this and 250g of that and find that im way under on one and way ott on another,most of what ive read messures in tea spoons so i cant even roughly work it out in grammes,not that im any good at maths....lol

i think i read somewhere that seachem flourish can be used for the traces,is this correct as i have a bottle sat in my cabinet or am i better off buying that as a powder as well?

any advice?

cheers dave


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## ceg4048 (16 Jul 2009)

soton_dave said:
			
		

> im going to be starting EI because tpn+ is costing me a small fortune to dose.


Yeah, no kidding. I love it when rich people with dinky 20L tanks talk about how easy ferts off the shelf are to use, and why EI/PMDD is _way_ too complicated to deal with because of all that rocket science. And these folks just can't figure out why EI dosing is so overwhelmingly popular. It's too dominant, they say. Hello! Earth calling rich folks: Its cheap, easy...and it works.  

But this doesn't have to be rocket science. It's just a matter of doing the arithmetic, the same way you figure out how much petrol to put in your tank  to get you from here to Brighton. Roughly, a teaspoon is 6 grams. So for a 240L the basic scheme calls for around (two tespoons) 12 grams per week of KNO3, 3 grams per week of KH2PO4 and about 2 grams per week of CSM+B. So a 500G bag of could theoretically last you almost a year, while a 250g bag of PO4 or traces could last almost a year and a half. But you may find, depending on your particular tank, that you need to use more of any of these, or that you can get away with using less so there is no practical way to synchronize the usage. You'll just have to get over that fact. 

Flourish is a trace so there is no problem using it as long as you use enough of it, which I never bothered to calculate since I had no intention of using it. I imagine you can dose per bottle and if you see signs of deficiency just add more.

Cheers,


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## Steve Smith (16 Jul 2009)

Also account for spillage.  I dropped my NO3 whilst dosing my tanks in a bleury eyed state this morning   Thankfully I didn't loose too much, and I don't keep my entire supply in the pot I use day-to-day


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## soton_dave (16 Jul 2009)

ive read and re-read the tutorial on EI,i know i need KNO3 and KH2PO4 and traces,but is there anything else i need?

so far in the basket on fluidsensor online ive got, 
500g KN03
250g KH2PO4
250g trace 

cheers dave


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## aaronnorth (16 Jul 2009)

soton_dave said:
			
		

> ive read and re-read the tutorial on EI,i know i need KNO3 and KH2PO4 and traces,but is there anything else i need?
> 
> so far in the basket on fluidsensor online ive got,
> 500g KN03
> ...



no, some people add MgSO4 or GH booster but thats optional. You have the main nutrients covered.


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## a1Matt (16 Jul 2009)

SteveUK said:
			
		

> Also account for spillage.  I dropped my NO3 whilst dosing my tanks in a bleury eyed state this morning   Thankfully I didn't loose too much, and I don't keep my entire supply in the pot I use day-to-day



bleary eyed... pot... supply.... if you read that post too quickly it takes on quite a different meaning


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## CeeJay (17 Jul 2009)

Hi aaronnorth


			
				aaronnorth said:
			
		

> no, some people add MgSO4 or GH booster but thats optional.


I am currently adding MgSO4 in my mix because I used the Nutricalc calculator for my initial calculations and it said I needed it. Maybe I misunderstood something.  :? It also said I needed K2SO4 but that has now been dumped (on Clive's advice) and I have seen no adverse effect on the plants. So thanks for that Clive.  
I have noticed that Mg is a big percentage of the Trace mix, so it sounds like I can get away without the MgSO4, if so, I'm going to dump that too.   Just need one of you guys with the experience to confirm this please. 
If this is the case, then EI is even easier than my original concoctions of these so called 'toxic chemicals'  

Chris.


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## aaronnorth (18 Jul 2009)

chrisr01 said:
			
		

> Hi aaronnorth
> 
> 
> 
> ...




i am not dosing MgSO4 and my plants are fine, i have high GH (12d) so my water should theoretically contain enough Mg.
Some people add GH booster as it contains,
Calcium Sulfate
Magnesium Sulfate
Potassium Sulfate
Iron Sulfate

Whenever i talk about EI, i never tell people to use it, i just tell them about the macros & micros, it is quite rare that extra Mg is needed, but there is no harm in dosing it. Try stopping dosing for a week or 2, and see what happens, you can always add it bqack again


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## CeeJay (18 Jul 2009)

Hi aaronnorth
Thanks for the advice. 
I'm in the Thames Water region, which has notoriously hard water, so there's probably some goodies in there for the plants to feed off anyway.
I'm just about to mix up next month's batch so I'll drop the Mg and keep a close eye on things over the next few weeks.
Once again, many thanks.

Chris.


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## soton_dave (28 Jul 2009)

ive just mixed my first bottle of ferts so was hoping someone could double check ive got the amounts correct.
its for a 240l tank and i intend dosing 3 times a week,ive mixed up a 4 week solution.
900ml of water
8tsp KNO3
2tsp KH2PO4
and intend dosing 75ml 3 times a week,i havent got scales so based it on what clive said earlier in the thread (Roughly, a teaspoon is 6 grams).

i really am useless at maths so was just looking for someone to confirm ive worked it out correct.
for the traces im going to use flourish as i have a full bottle in the cabinet that i dont want to waste and was going to dose 5ml twice a week as per the instructions,has anyone had any experiance with this at all?as soon as the bottles gone im going to be ordering traces and mixing my own.

cheers dave


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## CeeJay (28 Jul 2009)

Hi Dave
I make your numbers just about right from what I've learnt off Clive,............ and his tutorial.
That's about the same concentration as the mix I'm using on my 180 litre Rio and the plants are positively booming. 
I'm now into my 4th month of EI and the results are truly astonishing. I just can't believe how cheap and effective it is compared to liquid ferts. 
In your 900ml of water, the 75ml per dose is spot on too.  
Now I'm wondering what all the apprehension was about before I took the plunge 
Big thanks to Clive for all his patience with us. 

Chris


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