Help needed. extreme low pH high alkalinity high nitrate high phosphate

[champion6sigma]

Just bought two 455 cfm fans . Placed one in entry way of house, outside of main front door. Placed one in center of house facing back door to back yard. Opened 3 windows. PH increased to 7.67 in 10 min. Hoping within 2 hours i see even more improvement. Going to do a deep cleaning of home, dust, floors, everything.

 

[champion6sigma]

typo.

4500 CFM

 

[champion6sigma]

I got up to 7.75 now...about almost 1.5 hours run time.....

Wife came home have to let dogs move around closed the front door, turned off fans. Hoping to resume again soon.

 

[champion6sigma]

Fans back on I'm at 7.7 opened sump stand doors.

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[champion6sigma]

Noticing I am getting dust and gunk in aquarium (open top)

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[champion6sigma]

Not sure exact time. Few hours of open doors, have one fan now shooting fresh air into home. Moved other fan to different room. Opened windows there.

Talking to friends in Canada they can't believe I'd have a co2 issue ...but they don't know about tanks or how I came to this conclusion. They say I should rent my own equipment to test air. Find locally here in Texas. They don't think homes r built this tight and without breathing. Trying to explain we maybe have one back door open 10 min out of 24 hr day. 3 years of that ...it makes perfect sense to me our air is stale and bad

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[champion6sigma]

I'm at 7.83...last i checked.

I just realized that on the aeration test ...its supposed to be about an hour with a stone with a cup of water....

I'm showing a great increase (from 7.5) of the entire tank...my volume is change many times per hour in tank......

I'd like to think my testing is conclusive on the fact that there is a CO2 issue in home. I will need to work on sustaining the better air quality at this point....

Keeping my calcium and magnesium and other parameters in order. Maintaining my filters on the hvac central air. Getting some air purifiers for house. Possible modification to hvac. Possible additonal exhaust//intake system....

 

[champion6sigma]

I'm shutting down the fans now...closing windows for night...doors of course. Since pH is doing so great right now at night time....good chance it will go up higher as the air is improved in home (should last a while i hope)...and as fish become more active during day...

4500 CFM for maybe 5 hours I should have gotten a great deal of fresh air in house...More than any sort of exhaust or open windows could have accomplished...in a day.

 

[Happyschneider]

That sounds promising. Keeping my fingers crossed.

What kind of system are you using for heating the house and making warm water? I don't want to worry you but are you sure that system is not releasing any co2 into the house?

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[champion6sigma]

Everything in home is electric. No gas appliances...we don't even have a gas line....which makes us one of the least likely homes to have to suffer from CO2 issues.....so this is unfortunate. There always possibility its combination of just poor air from not enough infiltration of outside air....as well as a combo of other things....undetermined thus far.

Before I got the extensive CUC I did have sand algae issues, I had dino....had bunch of bubbles coming from surface of rock and sand....air pockets...but once CUC was in...and after I started following some advice from members here on my magnesium....doing some good size water changes to get my alkalinity down from my ignorant use of ph buffers (back then).....theres not any visible signs of an issue...I've got just a tiny amount of bubble algae on two rocks. I got three emerald crab a day ago for that...unfortunately I've not seen them since addition. They are small and must be in the rockwork. My anemone I'm feeding mysis while its bleached...hoping to see color on it again in next few weeks.

I'm unaware what else could be causing pH..

what i'll do tomorrow is run all my salifert tests.

My pH stopped at 7.85 and I just noticed it went down to 7.83. House has been shut for few hours ...

I was hoping even if it didn't improve it would sustain at its high mark of 7.85.....

My skimmer been making excess bubbles. Thats all I have in the collection cup is bubbles...no real gunk....I'm not sure if thats significant of anything...

Or if I'm using too large of a skimmer for my tank if maybe thats somehow affecting water....or maybe the pump on the skimmer is not working well....

or there could be that stray electrical issues you asked about...

I'm wondering if I can get my alk down to just avg alk....I can use the buffer I have (just enough to get pH up) and I wonder if that will allow it to stay up consistently once my alk is perfectly within normal range. I'm still above it last time I checked. Tomorrow I'll get a fresh reading....

 

[Blue spot]

Hey champ. Hope your doing well. Just thought I had better let you know (in case you do add it) I've just turned my co2 scrubber off! Found out it can be linked to algae blumes ! sorry to give you duff information but I've only just found out that the concentrated oxygen co2 level can give this problem although it does raise your ph level. Back to the drawing board for me aswell then.

 

[champion6sigma]

Hey champ. Hope your doing well. Just thought I had better let you know (in case you do add it) I've just turned my co2 scrubber off! Found out it can be linked to algae blumes ! sorry to give you duff information but I've only just found out that the concentrated oxygen co2 level can give this problem although it does raise your ph level. Back to the drawing board for me aswell then.

Thanks. Doing OK today. Been busy with family. My grandmother's bday.

That's too bad about the scrubber. I had read more on them and they have helped a lot of people , but they do have their costs. Sorry to hear about the algae.

Theres my current shot. Ph made tiny drop overnight still way better than past history. I was able to open front door and get some fan air flow for maybe 1.5 hours. I got back up to 7.85 before I closed house again. I don't know if 7.85 is max I can get to with the fresh air without additional additives or supplements or if just need more time to displace the air in home. I'm guessing if I could aerate house for 24 hours straight with both fans circulating I might be able to make a bigger impact.

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[champion6sigma]

Did ALK test and its my best reading in months. Was a 0.45 on salifert. I'm finally in the 8's! Weird how the salifert instruction sheet a 0.45 is slightly lower than the neptune auto fill in for salifert....

PH is at 7.78 presently....after previous night which was hovering around 7.82 (highest of day 7.85 it went back to 7.85 during day (was able to open doors and had fan on just for a small amount of time) then returning home late evening....started doing a slight drop to its current 7.78. Hoping it goes no lower and evelates back up to 7.85 at least.

I'm wondering if now i'm at the point where i need to do another 5 or 10 gallon alk change with some cheap(er) salt (don't know what my dd2 salt is really doing to my levels)

wait until alk is dropped slightly below normal....and then do a buffer (now that I know how it affects my tank) and raise my pH and alk at same time....and THEN that combined with some temporary air fixes on my part until I come up with the permanent air exchange displacement solution...then my pH will be high, stay high, and I can just work on maintaining magnesium...calcium...and periodic checks of alk...

I don't think with the little I have...dosing is an important thing for me yet.

Plus resume my dd2 reef salt once the levels of water are right...since this salt should replenish anything the tank needs hopefully.

I guess what I'm saying is that maybe my bad home air has been neutralized and that the my 7.85 pH high reading is the best the tank can do with the help of just fresh air....and that like many others who are low from reasons other than air...a supplement or buffer is needed?

 

[champion6sigma]

My other thing I'm thinking of is getting some sort of a CPU type cooling fan that takes out hot air....somehow placing one in tank....a quiet one...and keeping that going to expel inner sump air from tank...and perhaps placing one in rear of sump behind stand openings to push air in....something like that...maybe my stand is so enclosed that it needs some circulation....

my hose for the air stones is too small to fit over hose from skimmer line...maybe I can still try to run something outside stand through stand openings in back...

Plan is still to get an air purifier to be used in main living area with tank...

This upcoming week will be scheduling an air service/ac company to check out system, attic, circulation...etc...and I'll see if they can do air quality testing or if i should rent something to test air...

but unfortunately( for the testing) I've already been displacing air so much in two days that even if I did do a test monday or tuesday....the readings have to be off.

Over the two days even in limited use i pushed millions of cubic feet..based on the calculations of the 4500 cfm over a few hours....

Thats more than I've done all year 2016 probably from just having the doors open to let the dogs outside every now and then.

 

[Happyschneider]

Sounds like you are making progress!

Don't worry about pH 7.85 that is good enough! pH varies a lot, for the health of your animals, the other parameters seem to be more impartant, at least as far as I read on here. Maybe you will not have the fastest grwoing SPS at that level, but there are beautiful tanks just using softies...

It will be interesting to see what happens now that you will have more air circulation. Maybe the pH can raise even further. In any case, I would strongly recommend not to add any pH buffer where you do not know what is in the mix. Buffers are a strange animal and you don't want to add something that might keep your pH in check but messes with any of your other important values.

The fan for your stand is an interesting idea to further improve air condition around the skimmer intake. Could work but you run the possibility that you will have more evaporation from your sump! Can't you get an adapter for your skimmer or a bigger hose? that would allow you to move the skimmer intake outside which definetly would improve your situation as it seems from your experiment with your fans!

 

[champion6sigma]

I tried a tunze fan last night . Ph dropped to 7.72 over night . Fan didn't help in fact not sure if it made it worse since previous night we didn't have low ph drop much and I didn't use fan.

So this morning around 10 or 11 turned off sump fan, turned on fans opened doors a few windows got to 7.89 now at 2:20 pm. In few hours have best reading ever!

But I had to raise ac temp so ac doesn't turn on and try to offset hotter outside air. Tough part of Texas. I think I can resume once house cools down or this evenjng when cooler outside. We had rain last night and was cool, not sure if that affecting ph.

Talked to a technician he thinks we should just aerate house all week. Then do periodically

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[champion6sigma]

Amazing how air quality affects tank. I've added no supplements or water changes since a simple 5 gallon one about 6. Or 7 days ago


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[champion6sigma]

Guys not sure what to think. My ph was 7.6 last night. I put my intervention of home air on hold. This morning around 11 am I addedsome rodi water. Opened back door and turned on one fan and the tank jumped to 7.9 it's been rising steady I only had fan on about 2 hours. It's still rising. I did a 10 gallon water change on Tuesday night. I cleaned my mp40's and skimmer completely with vinegar water and took them apart on Tuesday. I added some purple up every other day just a little.

I don't know why such a high jump from last night.

I still want an hrv device but I'm still amazed at today current reading with minimal intervention today. Wife had a bedroom window open for a while yesterday. Was nothing noteworthy.



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[ljosh]

These numbers look promising