Air stones

[jeff1961]

Can to much air bubbles, cause pH to go up to fast, I am using 1 gal bucket, and I notice when use a 12 inch stone my pH sky rocket up in about 2 days, I switch to a 6 inch air stone and my pH stay steady for about a week, and I also switch to cfl 23 watts for veggie growth, plant doing much better, third time around, any info will be great, thank you

[Madman960]

I have also noticed a rise in ph with higher air levels. Although, I would never have thought to try a large airstone in a small reservoir.

Happy growing.

Madman

[NebulaHaze]

Yes, dissolving oxygen into the water will raise the pH. You can experiment by taking the pH of a bowl of water, whisking it for a few minutes, then measuring the pH again. It used to drive me nuts because I couldn't figure out why the pH kept going up after mixing up my water. I tend to put water into my reservoir on the low side around 5.5 since I know the aeration will likely make it go up at least a little. Giving all the nutrient water a really good shake before measuring the pH helps reduce the difference. However, if you have high CO2 levels in your air (like some growers will supplement with CO2), then aeration can actually lower the pH (since dissolved CO2 reduces the pH of water).

[jeff1961]

I be dam ! Thank a lot, that's been my problem every since my first plant, everyday it went crazy up, I couldn't figure it out, this 3rd plant seem more healthier,since I went to a smaller stone. Again thanks a lot.

[GanjaGed]

Truthfully I always checked and adjusted my PH the next day. I know, from checking that after nutes my PH will be in an acceptable if not perfect range, esp. considering it's only for a night. This way my nutes are fully incorporated and the water at it's normal oxygenation. I also prefer to adjust small amounts by adding nutes rather than PH up/down.

A healthy res will stay pretty stable with a slow upward trend.

I found over time that often swinging PH is due to PPM problems. Not so much being out of range for the nute schedule but for the strain. Nute schedules are generic avg. recommendations, you can pretty much grow any particular plant by them and grow it well but if you get it dialed in for the strain everything runs smoother.

That's just me everyone does it different.