Are PH swings ok if consistent and moderate?

Dextereef · Mar 16, 2015

I've been running an APEX for two months now and I have been seeing a consistent day to night swing in PH of 0.26. Is this something I should be worried about and should try to eliminate or is this ok? Tank had been running for over two years and all other params have been stable. I have to dose Kalk through ATO or the PH would be below 8. Thoughts?

rayn · Mar 16, 2015

Do you run a sump or refugium light on a reverse cycle? Or I have read lately of some just leaving it on 24/7. That may help take the swing out.

pickupman66 · Mar 16, 2015

I see no issue in this. now do that in less than an hour, yea you have issues. i have had very successful tanks with this PH fluctuation.

beaslbob · Mar 16, 2015

pH swings happen is the ocean and IMNO the swing itself is not all that important.
What is important is 1) what is causing the swing and 2) if the swing itself is stable.
For instance, if the pH swing is because under lights on the algae is consuming co2 and returning o2 that is better then a constant lower value where co2 is constantly higher.
Even with a much larger swing if something goes bump in the night and the algae steps up preventing ammonia cycles and returns pH (and everything else) back to the original pH complete with swing, that is a stable operation and highly desirable. Even it the PH swing is "high" (whatever that is).
my .02

Randy Holmes-Farley · Mar 16, 2015

Dextereef said:
I've been running an APEX for two months now and I have been seeing a consistent day to night swing in PH of 0.26. Is this something I should be worried about and should try to eliminate or is this ok? Tank had been running for over two years and all other params have been stable. I have to dose Kalk through ATO or the PH would be below 8. Thoughts?

Daily pH swings are no concern, as long as the low end does not get too low (below pH 7.8 or so).

walkabout · Mar 18, 2015

My tank crashed when it went below 7.8 lost everything now my apex helps me with this and it doses a little alkalinity when pH hits 8.15 and stops dosing at 8.16 and then through out the day the pH is around 8.27 to 8.30 ....got to love the apex and my hardness stays around 8.78 ppm to 9.27 ppm

Randy Holmes-Farley · Mar 19, 2015

walkabout said:
My tank crashed when it went below 7.8 lost everything now my apex helps me with this and it doses a little alkalinity when pH hits 8.15 and stops dosing at 8.16 and then through out the day the pH is around 8.27 to 8.30 ....got to love the apex and my hardness stays around 8.78 ppm to 9.27 ppm

You have a 0.01 pH unit tolerance on the dosing?

walkabout · Mar 19, 2015

The apex only comes one maybe four times at night and runs about 1 1/2 min to 2 min and that is dosing 1.1 ml every minute, I do not have a lot of stuff in my tank yet so the demand is not that high and I test every 3 days