ORP Sudden Dips - Graph Included.

[DipSpit]

So usually my ORP sits in the mid 300's for ORP but have recently noticed these sudden "dips."

They are not necessarily at the same time every day and don't correspond to a dosing time.

See below:

All fish are accounted for and water chemistry raises no alarms.

ORP is very hard for me to understand and I may be missing something.

Thoughts?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Unless you add something to the water then (such as an iron supplement or fish food), I expect it is electrical interference.

 

[Hooloovoo]

I'm afraid I don't know the answer, but mine was doing something very similar until just recently. ORP would just suddenly crater and immediately bounce right back up. I could never really find any events that seemed to correlate though. My best guess was that the probe was picking up some interference from something.

 

[DipSpit]

Unless you add something to the water then (such as an iron supplement or fish food), I expect it is electrical interference.

Will clean probe, re calibrate and report back with results.

The ORP is so subjective (as to meaning) and hard for me to understand I am about to just hide the display in fusion and forget about it.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I had the equipment, but didn't think it was worth using.

 

[Hooloovoo]

Will clean probe, re calibrate and report back with results.

The ORP is so subjective (as to meaning) and hard for me to understand I am about to just hide the display in fusion and forget about it.

I'm not sure that's such a bad idea. I glance at mine from time to time, but I have no clue what to do with that info. Sure wish there was a way to probe for Alk instead. That would be really useful.

I actually watched a Youtube vid (Melev's Reef) the other day where he was interviewing a guy at MACNA who was showing off a device he invented to give ongoing Alk readings. Essentially it just drew out a sample of tank water, added some reagent from a reservoir, and provided a reading on a programmable schedule (up to once every 10 minutes I believe he said). After each reading, it expelled the reacted sample and rinsed itself out using a reservoir of RO/DI. He rigged it somehow to report the results to an Apex controller through one of the pH probe ports. Seemed like a neat idea, but I would have serious doubts about getting something like that to work reliably on a long term basis. Didn't look like something that would be out on the market anytime soon anyway.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I Seemed like a neat idea, but I would have serious doubts about getting something like that to work reliably on a long term basis. Didn't look like something that would be out on the market anytime soon anyway.

Some are:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/kh-guardian-automatic-alkalinity-controller-my-experiences.288011/

 

[Engloid]

Watch your chart when you feed. I noticed mine would dip sharply every time I fed.

I recently began dosing nopox, and can see a very clear pattern with the timing of dose and the spikes. It takes about 50 minutes after dose for it to spike, then it drops somewhat quickly afterwards. You can see in the chart that I had it a bit erratic at first, then was spiking very high, then has settled down as I cut back the dose just a little bit. I know everybody says not to worry about ORP, but just seeing it spike so high worried me enough that I cut dose. In a couple days, the spikes began to not be so high. As they drop more, I will probably slowly increase the dose until my nitrates and phosphates get to where I want them.