Confused between High Range PH and Phosphate

[Roy Aditya]

Hi All, Hope all are doing well. I am very much newbie in Saltwater hobby and have a 75 gallon tank for last 4 months.

I have two clowns,
one coral beauty angle,
three choromis , one Royal Gramma Basslet ,one Six Line Wrasse and two cardinals

and all are doing fine. I have two test kit in API, 1- High Range Ph and 2- Phosphate test. So what are the differences between two. I started a BRS dual reactor two days ago with little (lower than recommended settings) GFO and Carbon.

Today seems like, High Range PH shows very less in API kit (7.4 or less),and API Phosphate shows almost nothing. Should I take out GFO and keep the carbon only?

I have a large refugium with Cheto and live rock.

Appreciate your help as usual.

 

[Agiron86]

From my limited knowledge, they are independent of each other.

Ph is the balance between acidity and caustic. It’s a scale from 1-14. 7 is considered neutral while 1 is the most acidic and 14 is the most caustic.

While phosphate is part of the nitrogen cycle.

From my understanding you want your ph around 8-8.3 and you ph as close to 0 as you can get it.

 

[Fudsey]

GFO is for the removal of phosphates from the water, Carbon is for the removal of other chemicals and helps keep the water clean. Neither will have a large impact on your pH but carbon can strip the water as well. CO2 is usually the factor in low pH. With you having a fuge, I wouldn't expect CO2 in your system to be high unless your local house air is high in it.

Is your fuge on a opposite lighting schedule? If not, I would put it on one.
Does your skimmer have access to outside air? This will raise your pH if it doesn't.

EDIT: could also be a bad test kit too....

 

[WWIII]

The API phosphate test cannot distinguish phosphate at the levels we want keep them at in our tanks. I would recommend Hanna ulr phosphorus checker for that.

Ph of 7.4 is low, but isn't something I would worry about right now. Do you plan on keeping corals?

 

[WWIII]

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