What pH is everyone's tank at?

[purplegorilla]

My pH is swinging from 7.8 to 8.0 during the day. I have tried very hard to get it to 8.2-8.3 but eventually it would drop to my previous level. I did all the searching that i could and the Co2 is keep popping up. The sump is down in the basement (800 sf) with a 5000cf fan running to the outside constantly, the tank is up in my library that is connected to rest of the house with no doors. So in short, I know I am not having problems with Co2.

What elses can I do besides dumping bunch of buffers. Even with buffers, it woudn't stay at that level.

 

[tnyga]

8.1-8.3 That is in the middle of the MH light cycle

 

[mwitten]

Swings between 8.2 and 8.4 over the day. Sometimes it goes as low as 8.1, but that usually means I need to shake my kalk reactor, or add some more. If it swings more than about .2/day, I check my alk.

Might be a good poll...

-Mike

 

[FutureInterest]

If my house is ventilated my ph stays at around 8.2. Once I buffered my tank up to 8.2... my wife vented the house and my ph hit 8.6! So now I vent the house regularly...

My ph is maintained in part by kalkwasser. Its my primary calcium and alk source as well, and I supplement with two-part every day.

 

[victor626nj]

7.8-8.0

 

[cameron]

Mine sometimes hits 7.9 but that usually indicates low alk on my tank. I try to keep it around 8.1 or 8.2.

 

[jmaneyapanda]

Dont worry about it. Unless your pH is dipping to the 7.6 area, dont fix what aint broken by trying to reach some advertsied numbers. If it is stable and reasonable (which 7.8 to 8 is), then I would say leave it. If you insist, I would go with kalk as Jin has mentioned.

 

[cmjazz89]

Mine is stuck @ 8.2 Couldn't change it if I tried ;-)

 

[purplegorilla]

Man, am I and Victor the only one that is low? I have kalkwasser, and just recently set up my Calcium reactor.

 

[victor626nj]

i gave up trying to raise it lol everything is stable and doing just fine so i leave it alone

 

[skriz]

usually steady around 8.2

I have seen it drop to 7.8 randomly, but I don't do anything about it and it goes back up...sorry that's not much help

 

[flyingarmy]

7.9-8.3

 

[glxtrix]

who knows.....I never test mine.

 

[schwaggs]

Don't kill yourself adjusting pH. If your tank is happy, that should be your indicator. There is a good chance whatever you are using to measure pH is somewhat off. I recently changed pH probes and gained .1 pH. Both probes were calibrated, for some reason one reads higher pH than the other....

How is your Alk, Mg, and CA?

 

[olds350racer]

Mine stays pretty steady at around 8.0-8.1. About 1.5 ago I fought and fought to trying to raise it. The only thing I accomplished was creating pH swings. I figured best to leave well enough alone and stay with the stability versus the numbers.

 

[darren24]

I test mine every blue moon and it is around 8.1.

 

[purplegorilla]

Well, I calibrated my probe again yesterday and did another pH reading and it was completely different. So I got decided to put on a brand new probe that i bought a while back. This time the reading is 8.2. That just to show you, old probe sux the big one. How old do the pin point probe lasts and how often do you calibrate it?

 

[cameron]

I calibrate every 6 months or so as mine tend to drift that often. I also run two pH probes in my tank. One on my AC3 and another on one of those cheap monitors.

 

[schwaggs]

purpleGORILLA;111949 wrote: How old do the pin point probe lasts and how often do you calibrate it?

I have never been a fan of the pinpoint probes. I have better luck with the Milwaukee probes, plus they are CHEAP!