Top off water low ph?

Jdgreef24

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I checked the ph of my top off res. Tonight and it came up at 5.6 with a digital checker. I go through a lot of top off each day. How does that happen? Is that something I should address? RODI is supposed to be like 7.
 
You would be surprised how low the pH of stored RO or even bottled distilled can get.

Its CO2 causing it....if your meter is on the ball. Thats pretty darn low though even for CO2 saturation. More like sektzer water.

Before doing anything drastic I would take a cup of this water and set it outside with some agitation for awhile. Then remeasure. This should result in a pH darn close to 7.0 with pure water. If not, you either live in a volcano or your pH meter is out of whack.

If the pH bumps back to 7 then you need to get some fresh air bubbling in your watee resovoir, or use kalk. 5.6 seems suspicious though.
 
Yeah I’ve tested a couple more times. I’ve yet to clear out the ATO since the tanks been set up. It always reads 0 tds and is clear so I don’t bother. The same digital reader is giving me the same ph that the Apex gives my tank so I can trust it to some extent. But yeah 5.7- 5.9 in the ATO. The RO in my mixing station is 6.5 (in the garage, stagnant) I think I want or plan to dose kalk separately. Can co2 concentrate or creep up in water?
 
Complete non issue. Adding a small amount of water with low pH to a highly buffered solution like seawater won't have any measurable effects on the pH at all.
 
It is a total non issue. Aerating it is unlikely to remove CO2. It may actually add it. since that is how it got there in the first place.

Even more confounding to many folks, if you take totally pure RO/DI water at pH 7 and add it to aquarium water at pH 8.1, the pH of the aquarium water rises!

pH is not as simple as it might seem. lol
 

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