Brett S
Valuable Member
So most of the time the pH of my tank ranges from about 7.95 at night to 8.1 during the day. It might be a little lower than I would prefer, but it’s in the good range and I don’t really worry about it. The problem is that about every two weeks I have additional people staying in my house. And the additional people create additional CO2 and during the time they are there the pH will drop considerably. During those times it will range from about 7.6 at night to 7.9 during the day. And frankly, if it ranged from 7.6-7.9 all of the time that might not even be so terrible, but I feel like the fluctuation is not ideal where the water stays between 8.95 and 8.1 most of the time, but then every two weeks it drops to 7.6-7.9 for a few days.
I’m trying to decide if this is enough of an issue that I should do something about it... And if so, what should I do about it. I normally dose soda ash for alkalinity, but I’m wondering if switching to dosing sodium hydroxide during the times when the pH would be low might help to keep it more stable.
Alternately I could try to use a CO2 absorbing media for my skimmer intake during those times, but I’m not super fond of that idea due to the ongoing cost of media for it.
Running my skimmer intake to the outside isn’t an ideal solution because my tank is on an inside wall, so there’s no good way to get a line to the outside. Additionally I tried that once before and I really struggled with keeping my skimmer tuned. It seemed that the air pressure inside the house and outside the house was different and as the pressure changed the skimmer tuning would need to be adjusted.
So after all that, what do you think? Should I just stop worrying about the pH drop and the instability or should I do something about it?
I’m trying to decide if this is enough of an issue that I should do something about it... And if so, what should I do about it. I normally dose soda ash for alkalinity, but I’m wondering if switching to dosing sodium hydroxide during the times when the pH would be low might help to keep it more stable.
Alternately I could try to use a CO2 absorbing media for my skimmer intake during those times, but I’m not super fond of that idea due to the ongoing cost of media for it.
Running my skimmer intake to the outside isn’t an ideal solution because my tank is on an inside wall, so there’s no good way to get a line to the outside. Additionally I tried that once before and I really struggled with keeping my skimmer tuned. It seemed that the air pressure inside the house and outside the house was different and as the pressure changed the skimmer tuning would need to be adjusted.
So after all that, what do you think? Should I just stop worrying about the pH drop and the instability or should I do something about it?
