Water and PH spikes? Please help?

Harvester315 said:

I did notice after 24 hrs of using the distilled that it only jumped .5 instead of 1.4 so that's already reassuring. I'm still planning to go to my local walmart to find out if I can get RO water. I'm pleased to find at least it's a slower rise. I actually like the concept of a ph swing to allow access to nutrients at all levels but obviously I don't want to add more ph down than necessary.

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Bareback said:

I got a RO system 5 stage 99$ off eBay / Amazon . My RO is 2 , it was 170 .

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Harvester315 said:

Thanks for that insight. I may end up doing a mix of tap and RO just for the positive qualities in each. The bad thing with my tap (like you said it varies greatly) is the ph swing in less than 24 hours was more than 1.3. Not so great. My distilled was about 1 in 4 days. And when I do my next change I will try just RO. Then I will have a solid base for 3 different water types and go from there.

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Harvester315 said:

I refuse to use ebay based on a bad experience. My account was hacked and I decided I would close it. But since I had "made a purchase" within 90 days (by said hacker) they wouldn't let me close it. Instead I had to change all my security info, and it got hacked and had purchases made again within a week. Started the whole issue all over again.

Completely irrelevant but I cannot use ebay as I no longer have nor will have an account lol.

I definitely would like an RO system but I may just wait until I move in the near future when I plan to have a larger operation anyways.

I am however pleased to report that I have had only a .6 ph swing up in the last 48 hrs using the distilled. If I get less than 1 point all week I'll be very pleased, like previously mentioned I like the concept of a swing through the range to allow more nutrient uptake.

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Harvester315 said:

Thanks for that insight. I may end up doing a mix of tap and RO just for the positive qualities in each. The bad thing with my tap (like you said it varies greatly) is the ph swing in less than 24 hours was more than 1.3. Not so great. My distilled was about 1 in 4 days. And when I do my next change I will try just RO. Then I will have a solid base for 3 different water types and go from there.

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Sanctifried said:

Honestly I would not obsess with RO so much, it has nothing to do with PH. PH fluctuates all of the time, it changes every time the water rinses through your hydroponic media. It's one of those things we all need to check(usually) every other day at the least.

The only reason i would go RO is if: 1. your tap water sucks badly, and 2. if you want to max out your ppm with pure nutrients.

There is a lot more to growing than PPM and keeping your PH perfect, don't sweat the fluctuations.. that's just what happens with Ebb and Flow and as long as it doesnt stay around 4 or 7 for too long then you're fine.

Also, PH with lower numbers is a higher PH and vice versa, so from going from 6.5 to 5.5 that would be raising the PH.

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Budley Doright said:

Actually tap water does fuck with PH due to the buffers in it, not all tap water mind you, but lots. I use well water and I have to add 3-4x the amount as I would with RO but it is stable. Took me a bit to dial it in re nutes and a few additives but it's working nicely. I would use RO but it's not feasible.

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whitey78 said:

Be on the watch for algae as well... nothing like root rot/pythium but thrives like a boss in the same conditions that our plants do, highly oxygenated, nutrient rich water, all it needs is a smidge of light to set it off... you can do I did being the seasoned (soil) grower I am... I went out n bought my first flood n drain tray for my first hydro grow and I bought a white table that holds a little water each flood in the channels after it drains that gives algae the perfect place to grow so by the time my weekly res change comes around I have snot on my pumps and hoses etc.... but what I was getting at is it'll fuck with your ph as well... usually up... down u gotta worry about root rot... but even after light proofing all my hoses n went nuts cleaning n bleaching n whatever else... it comes back to the white table being the perfect harbinger of algae so I'm gonna throw some of that weed block stuff over it n hopefully that does it.. but the algae and my hydroton (even after washing it and soaking it 9000 times) drove me ph crazy for the first couple weeks...

I've been using a hydrologic RO maker that has a permeation pump which adds back 15-30ppm of cal/mag after it strips the water of everything... still gotta add some calmag after the fact but not as much...

A bit pricey but it makes 1:1 usable:waste water which is pretty decent since RO is a fairly wasteful setup unless u buy.a decent one... but 130 gallons per day has been enough for me up till recently but I get by with it... I will eventually need to get either a second RO maker or a bigger one in general... but I have mine hooked up to a 55 gallon drum with a float valve that refills as I use it...

http://www.theperfectwater.com/Tap-Master-Artesian-Hydro-Gardener-Pro-Remineralizing-Reverse-Osmosis-Water-Filtration-System.html

I didnt notice if u we're running a sterile res or an organic setup but a sterile res product like h202 is a good investment... there's quite a few products that do the same thing but I like the h202... I run my simple 3 part nutes, blue planet but I just ran out, I use pro-tekt silica, and general organics cal mag... zero veg clones on my first run are looking good even though I am battling the algae issue on and off but plan to have it worked out....

Once you get your nute levels based on plant age/requirements and your water situation straight your ph issues will go away... if u need to adjust up, try using a silica product...down either some cal mag or a small amount of nutes when u top off... RO water is all over the place if u don't know what to expect because it has nothing to hold the ph steady so the most minute amount of ph up or down sends it way in whatever direction which is why I try to use small amounts of nutes....

But good luck man... I have more than 5 years in soil n hydro is like starting new again... I recently moved and my tons of recycled soil that needs mixing etc isn't a possibility so I decided to try hydro going from organic water only soil... talk about a hypocrite.... but good luck.... I know I need it...

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Harvester315 said:

I noticed I had a bit of slime in my first two res changes, then when I started to cover the hydroton with a mylar sheet its practically zero when I change it out, it would coat my air lines the first few weeks.




Also as far as water, distilled has a reasonable swing for me, but my tap was making it swing insanely high, and at the time that was the ONLY change I had made in 3 weeks so I know it was the water causing the PH swing.

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THE KONASSURE said:

get a big bucket or water butt or 60 to 200L waste bin

and a good air pump

ph to ph5.......... I like to add some potassium silicate then I use ph down get it to ph5, then add a water butt treatment and some bennies and trycorr I add fulvic acid too

your probably just need to use ph down and a water conditioner but potassium silicate is good stuff I use it 1st as it puts the ph up a bit

Ok so leave your water to bubble, you`ll notice ph5 in a week should end up around ph6.5 depends on your water, keep the light out of your water

doing hydro with tap water without chambering it and conditioning it for 3 days to a week or so is just silly unless you your there for 3 days when you do the res change and ph every few hours or have a big uber system that you`ve dialed in to be able to take topping up or 50% to 90% res changes

Good luck mate

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THE KONASSURE said:

you using phosphoric acid based ph down ? maybe use a nitric acid based for your 2nd ph`ing comboing nitric based and phosphoric base may stabilize out what ever is reacting

If using a citric based ph down I`d expect to have to re-ph every 1 to 4 days for sure

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Budley Doright said:

I had a hell of a time stabilizing using sulphuric acid and went back phosphoric acid at 85%, still adding 30ml per 100L, I also use an amino acid product that seems to help as well, it got rid of the leaf blotching also .

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THE KONASSURE said:

get a big bucket or water butt or 60 to 200L waste bin

and a good air pump

ph to ph5.......... I like to add some potassium silicate then I use ph down get it to ph5, then add a water butt treatment and some bennies and trycorr I add fulvic acid too

your probably just need to use ph down and a water conditioner but potassium silicate is good stuff I use it 1st as it puts the ph up a bit

Ok so leave your water to bubble, you`ll notice ph5 in a week should end up around ph6.5 depends on your water, keep the light out of your water

doing hydro with tap water without chambering it and conditioning it for 3 days to a week or so is just silly unless you your there for 3 days when you do the res change and ph every few hours or have a big uber system that you`ve dialed in to be able to take topping up or 50% to 90% res changes

Good luck mate

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