Proper PH is ????

[steve1600cc]

Ok have my JR hooked up and after Calibration my PH is 5.85,so I'm wondering should everything be dead?after nearly 6 months of not knowing do I thank Neptune?What number am I aiming for as a Constant?
All the general stuff I guess where am I at now?
Thanks as always!!

[tico mike]

Your PH is not that low. You have to calibrate the probe first. Get some calibration fluid and then see what it is.

[wes]

calibrate it again. if you have a test kit, test with that too. I've never seen pH that low, so I would highly doubt that's accurate. before you do anything else, test again and verify it with an outside kit.

[steve1600cc]

lol Ok I'll try the Solution's again...should be done by next Year I'm hoping.

[steve1600cc]

:hammerhead: Around 7.6 in other test I have,did the Calibration according to instructions on the JR and still comes up with 5.82...not sure what's going on.
Happy New Year by the way..LOL

[steve1600cc]

The Instructions only leave one thing unclear to me"Go to the Setup:pH Setup menu. Enable or disable temperature compensation depending
upon your requirements."I'm not sure what I do here do I disable or do nothing?
I guess since that's all I can do I'll have to try it...

[RaysReef]

oh my...5.85 ph !?!?! Gotta be off, everything in the tank is pretty much dead. I'd bring my PH tester but you a ways away...8.0-8.3 is a good ph range

[steve1600cc]

Out of the box it was at 8.6 then I tried to Calibrate it and here we are,everything is Living so something in the unit...actually I'm sure it's me.LOL

[steve1600cc]

OK now with some Sleep and Sobriety I have Correctly adjusted my JR..LOL
Currently at 7.85 which is consistent with another Independent test I have.
So again is this OK or should I be higher?How do I get there?

[hypertech]

I think most people like to see their pH around 8.2-8.4.

You can raise it with two part or kalk. You'll want to do it slowly though.

[David Grigor]

As mentioned in the other PH thread. If your alk is at or above natural salt water levels. 7.0DKH +. Then what you are seeing is excess CO2 to supress the PH.

To raise, you can use kalkwasser, macro algae during lit during night time, fresh air from outside.

All of this is only temporary if the CO2 levels in your house are up because the water will equalize with the atmosphere to bring it back down. This is a pretty typical situation during the wintertimes with the house closed up.


Here is an article that explains and gives ideas to increase which I pretty much summarized:

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-09/rhf/index.php

I personally use Kalkwasser to keep the PH elevated. Now that you have a Jr. you can automate this and have a pretty good redundant system to keep it constant.

However, if your CA and Alk levels are good you will likely be find with PH as is. When you keep your PH increased it does help with calcification so it is a nice goal to have if you looking to maximize growth.

[sun-n-fun]

I think before I started trying to make adjustments, I'd try to either:

A) get someone to bring over a meter they know to be calibrated
B) bring your meter over to someone's tank (maybe even a store) and check their ph with your meter
c) retest with a standard ph testing kit.

Just because you've now got a number that is theoretically possible, I'd hate to start making adjustments only to later found out the meter was still off. Particularly in light of the huge swings you've mentioned (8.6 down to 5.8).

just my $0.02

[morty]

It could be you have a ground loop issue with your RS-232 connection, if a PC is connected to the Jr., try disconnecting it and see what the reading does. If that ends up being the problem, you can get a serial cable isolator from Neptune.

[mattb]

Don't waste your time worrying about pH. If your alkalinity is correct, the pH will be in range based upon CO2 levels. If your alkalinity is fine, do NOT add anything to try to raise pH! Sure corals calcify at faster levels at higher pH. But with an alkalinity that is fluctuating constantly based upon trying to influence pH, this fluctuation will slow calcification.