plain water 7.6ph, after nutes is 5.8. how do I raise it?

[CF89]

added water, made my 6L mix into 9L. got PPM down to 590-600. PH is reading 6.5

 

[CF89]

How old is the calibration solution? It's it the powdered mix stuff and did you mix it with tap water?

yes, I mixed it last night. yes its powdered and yeah in tap water.

 

[Aqua Man]

yes, I mixed it last night. yes its powdered and yeah in tap water.

Ok you can't mix it with tap you need distilled. So your ph meter will be wrong. You can buy a gal of distilled for like $2 at any pharmacy. They use it in cpap machines. So i would recalibrate it.

Also tap water will always have the ph rise over about a 24 hr period as the carbonic acid is released from being in a system under pressure and with organics reacting with the chlorine.

So aerate the water for several hours before doing anything to it and that will give you a more accurate ph. If your in soil ph is not going to really be to much of an issue so I would just use the tap water and add the nutrients and feed. The soil will buffer the ph.

 

[CF89]

awesome. tons of good info and tricks you just taught me. thank you very much. I feel like im overthinking and overcomplicating it. didnt do ANY of this stuff last grow and they turned out just fine, yielding almost 4 oz of nice bud per plant.


ill get some distilled water today and play around just for peace of mind and report back.

thanks again, appreciate it. will share this knowledge one day!!!

 

[Aqua Man]

awesome. tons of good info and tricks you just taught me. thank you very much. I feel like im overthinking and overcomplicating it. didnt do ANY of this stuff last grow and they turned out just fine, yielding almost 4 oz of nice bud per plant.


ill get some distilled water today and play around just for peace of mind and report back.

thanks again, appreciate it. will share this knowledge one day!!!

No problem. We often try to do to much and create issues. Granted many things can be improved but first we need to get the basics down and then we have a starting place for comparison when we do make those small changes to try and improve our results. 99% of the stuff you see ppl claim is like i used this and it made a huge difference but they also changed 6 million other things lol.

Best advice is get things working then make small changes one at a time and evaluate the results.

 

[CF89]

thats so true. my first grow was simple, basic, and went great.

I got cocky and tried getting a little fancy with this one and its been shit so far. the LST is hurting them, the fans seem to be hurting them, ive got bug problems, the extra fertilizers might be causing burns, the smart pots are super annoying, etc... so its pretty discouraging.

should of just kept it a simple seed in a bucket with basic fertilizers thats never seen scissors.

 

[Flexnerb]

I am in soil.

why would I want to adjust my water first? my water is fine plain, then nutes brings it down, then add ph to bring it up?

or do I take my plain water, get it super high (to like a ph of 9) then let the nutes drop it down to 6 or so?

My ro water is 6.5. No buffer ph gets really low. If i add ph up first it doesnt drop all crazy.

Maybe im doing something wrong?

Growing in oudoor pots.

 

[Aqua Man]

My ro water is 6.5. No buffer ph gets really low. If i add ph up first it doesnt drop all crazy.

Maybe im doing something wrong?

Growing in oudoor pots.

Nope you are right. But his is tap water at 170ppm so unlike your RO water it should have enough alkalinity already.

Marijuana pH Levels for Growing Weed: A Basic Explanation

OK I'm going to do my best to explain PH since its something that is for the most part greatly misunderstood and can be confusing to new growers and even experienced growers alike. This will explain why we need both ppm and PH meters to give us informed information about PH This will be a...

www.thcfarmer.com

 

[Flexnerb]

Do you know what your 170ppm is comprised of? Have you done an alkalinity test? 170ppm if your mag cal carbonate heavy yeah your water is damn near perfect. But if youre bicarbonate heavy its not going to buffer the ph as good. If im wrong someone explain how please. I get my ph to 11 add nutes in, its at 6.3 to 6.6 usually 6.4ish...i use ro water...the way i look at it is you put OH in and the ferts have hydrogen in them that replaces the OH abundance eith hydrogen helping balance the ph. Tipping it more to where you need it? I think thats how it works. My ph up is potassium hydroxide 45%

Your water has me confused. I think its bicarb heavy

I am in soil.

why would I want to adjust my water first? my water is fine plain, then nutes brings it down, then add ph to bring it up?

or do I take my plain water, get it super high (to like a ph of 9) then let the nutes drop it down to 6 or so?


Dr B. If i use ro water then i should buffer before adding nutes right? Or no?

In hydro I believe that's the preferred course of action. Its called alkaline buffering and it helps prevent pH drift. I do it to a lesser degree in peat.





Distilled water?

I wonder what your waters alkalinity is?

tap water: 170ppm

after all my fertilizers: 860-900ppm.

tap water + salt trick: gauge said 220ppm x10. so 2200ppm?

distilled water: too expensive/hard to get.

 

[Aqua Man]

Do you know what your 170ppm is comprised of? Have you done an alkalinity test? 170ppm if your mag cal carbonate heavy yeah your water is damn near perfect. But if youre bicarbonate heavy its not going to buffer the ph as good. If im wrong someone explain how please. I get my ph to 11 add nutes in, its at 6.3 to 6.6 usually 6.4ish...i use ro water...the way i look at it is you put OH in and the ferts have hydrogen in them that replaces the OH abundance eith hydrogen helping balance the ph. Tipping it more to where you need it? I think thats how it works. My ph up is potassium hydroxide 45%

Your water has me confused. I think its bicarb heavy

Read the link I provided also I would never add nutrients to a solution with a ph of 11. Thats a huge issue you have there imo

 

[Aqua Man]

But if youre bicarbonate heavy its not going to buffer the ph as good

If your bicarbonate heavy it may buffer the water too much. Meaning it will be to stable in hydeo and may over time build up in soil altering the ph potential.

Based on ppm most of the time you can assume whether tap water is suitable or not. Of course a water report always helps bit if you look at my article and random water reports you will see its almost always the case within 100-200ppm there needs no adjustment. Now that depends on the additives and nutrients but generally speaking the alkalinity provided in that ppm range is suitable.

 

[Flexnerb]

Read the book understanding ph managment for container grown crops..paul fisher and bill argo...

I will read it again

 

[Flexnerb]

If your bicarbonate heavy it may buffer the water too much. Meaning it will be to stable in hydeo and may over time build up in soil altering the ph potential.

Based on ppm most of the time you can assume whether tap water is suitable or not. Of course a water report always helps bit if you look at my article and random water reports you will see its almost always the case within 100-200ppm there needs no adjustment. Now that depends on the additives and nutrients but generally speaking the alkalinity provided in that ppm range is suitable.

I thought bicarbs were salts that effected the medium ph a lil while increasing ppm/ec

Carbonates i thought were the exact opposite..where they raise the ph and so muchppm/ec.ahh shit!

I got an ec meter to fuck with the ppm

I always ph my pots with my soil stick soil ph meter to pay attention to drift. I dont see a lot ofvdrift going on...

 

[Flexnerb]

Flowable lime they said

 

[Aqua Man]

I thought bicarbs were salts that effected the medium ph a lil while increasing ppm/ec

Carbonates i thought were the exact opposite...ahh shit!

I always ph my pots with my soil stick soil ph meter to pay attention to drift. I dont see a lot ofvdrift going on...

Soil doesn't have a ph it has a PH potential. Only soluble elements affect ph and say something like lime will break down and slowly become available/soluble over time giving a long lasting ph buffer. This is why lime is added to soil. Its not the soil that has the ph its the water in the soil.

 

[Aqua Man]

I simplified this in the post I made... not sure if you read it but in that post and responses in the thread there is a lot of information that breaks it down.

 

[Dirtbag]

Honestly I'd either use a little potassium silicate in the water before adding nutes, or just feed them at 5.8. That starting water is as perfect as it gets imho. Soil has enough buffer you dont need to be so exact and 5.8 is pretty close to ideal. I fed a few plants 2 crops ago that were in pro mix using a hydroponic res set to 5.7ph, and the plants grew amazingly well.

 

[Moshmen]

tap water: 170ppm

after all my fertilizers: 860-900ppm.

tap water + salt trick: gauge said 220ppm x10. so 2200ppm?

distilled water: too expensive/hard to get.

Where ya at ? It’s 89 cents a gallon at every grocery store here. Best way To ck ur metere

 

[CF89]

Where ya at ? It’s 89 cents a gallon at every grocery store here. Best way To ck ur metere

Calgary. its doable to check the meter, but to be watering my 4 plants with distilled water every time would get expensive at $4 every 2 days + the fertilizers. I didnt realize it needed to be distilled to calibrate the meter. I thought he was referring to distilled for the plants.

 

[Moshmen]

Calgary. its doable to check the meter, but to be watering my 4 plants with distilled water every time would get expensive at $4 every 2 days + the fertilizers. I didnt realize it needed to be distilled to calibrate the meter. I thought he was referring to distilled for the plants.

Nah ur tap should be good for watering the plants he just uses the distilled to calibrate your meter