I’ve been doing a lot of reading on PH and while opinions seem to vary quite a bit the general consensus is 8.3 is the ideal value and swings are part of the deal even naturally in the ocean.
Currently I’m hitting a peak of 8.55 and a low of 8.25. I’ve been making a lot of adjustments trying to minimize my ph swing but nothing seems to be doing much.
I started off by dealing with low ph and it just seemed to keep gradually dropping till I was hitting about 7.5 overnight. I ran an airline outside but didn’t seem to be recovering to my target still barely breaking 8 during the day. Which prompted me to setup a brs c02 scrubber which boosts my ph to a range of about 8.15 to 8.35 which to me felt ideal. After that I decided to recirculate my skimmer which had little effect on ph.
That’s when I decided to take down my led light fixtures and switch to metal halide with reef brite bars. The very first day I saw my ph shoot up to nearly 8.6 when I shut them down. I scheduled my skimmer to turn off an hour before my halides kicked on to allow the ph to dip a bit before hand. That got me to a high of around 8.5 and low of about 8.1. I did not realize the impact switching to this light setup would have on my overall ph.
To give myself some adjustment I decided to add a motorized ball valve to my skimmer airline to allow me to run my skimmer and bring down the ph a little at the same time. This got my high up to 8.55 and my low to 8.25 where I’m at currently. I can’t seem to keep my setup from going over 8.5 which from my understanding isn’t good.
I’ve considered running the scrubber bypass back indoors where I have several dogs, kids etc and my ph issues originated from and maybe adding a 2nd valve to make sure absolutely zero air can make it through the scrubber. Also considered an air pump in addition to the bypass to try and keep the ph from spiking as much. Just not sure any of these things will stop the ph from rising so high.
Now I’m not 100% my ph being so high is a problem. Alternatively I could accept the swing and try to use the scrubber bypass to lower my ph more overnight so when it does spike it’s not as high. With the leds my ph was a more gradual climb and this seems more like an abrubt spike which I’m not sure if that has a negative effect on things. Everything is just so stable in my tank and this is the last thing I have to mess around with just trying to figure out my next moves or if this is even worth pursuing.
Currently I’m hitting a peak of 8.55 and a low of 8.25. I’ve been making a lot of adjustments trying to minimize my ph swing but nothing seems to be doing much.
I started off by dealing with low ph and it just seemed to keep gradually dropping till I was hitting about 7.5 overnight. I ran an airline outside but didn’t seem to be recovering to my target still barely breaking 8 during the day. Which prompted me to setup a brs c02 scrubber which boosts my ph to a range of about 8.15 to 8.35 which to me felt ideal. After that I decided to recirculate my skimmer which had little effect on ph.
That’s when I decided to take down my led light fixtures and switch to metal halide with reef brite bars. The very first day I saw my ph shoot up to nearly 8.6 when I shut them down. I scheduled my skimmer to turn off an hour before my halides kicked on to allow the ph to dip a bit before hand. That got me to a high of around 8.5 and low of about 8.1. I did not realize the impact switching to this light setup would have on my overall ph.
To give myself some adjustment I decided to add a motorized ball valve to my skimmer airline to allow me to run my skimmer and bring down the ph a little at the same time. This got my high up to 8.55 and my low to 8.25 where I’m at currently. I can’t seem to keep my setup from going over 8.5 which from my understanding isn’t good.
I’ve considered running the scrubber bypass back indoors where I have several dogs, kids etc and my ph issues originated from and maybe adding a 2nd valve to make sure absolutely zero air can make it through the scrubber. Also considered an air pump in addition to the bypass to try and keep the ph from spiking as much. Just not sure any of these things will stop the ph from rising so high.
Now I’m not 100% my ph being so high is a problem. Alternatively I could accept the swing and try to use the scrubber bypass to lower my ph more overnight so when it does spike it’s not as high. With the leds my ph was a more gradual climb and this seems more like an abrubt spike which I’m not sure if that has a negative effect on things. Everything is just so stable in my tank and this is the last thing I have to mess around with just trying to figure out my next moves or if this is even worth pursuing.
