Cloudy nutrient solution and pH won't go up

700mg potassium silicate
9.25g calcium nitrate
5g potassium sulfate
4.15g Bloom Booster
5.31g magnesium sulfate
490mg micros

I've been trying to use this mix for flowering but the water always comes up cloudy a few hours later and the ph is nosediving down at all times. I put 60ml of ph up (potassium carbonate) in 15 gallons of water and ph went from 5.7 to 5.8 and 2 hours later it's at 5.6. Not sure how that's possible but I've always used this mix but at lower doses and have never had a problem. Also this mix comes out to 1750ppm but it should be 2400 ppm. I don't even know what to do anymore if I'm unable to ph my water and I'm sure the cloudiness messes up the nutrient ratios.

Anyone here have experience with high ppm feeds? This is my first time feeding this heavy. The plants are eating it up but if the nutrient solution is going to be this complicated then I'll have to go organic.

I've had no personal experience with potassium silicate powder (yet), but I've read that once mixed with water you need to pH it down to 8.0 or lower to avoid polysilicic acids which cause cloudiness, then add your other chemicals. Here's the page which spurred further reading:

As pH rises to above 8.0, the form that silica takes in solution changes from non-reactive, non-ionic monosilicic acid, to reactive, ionic polysilicic acids that react with other minerals and precipitate out of solution, giving a cloudy appearance.

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zebracake said:

700mg potassium silicate
9.25g calcium nitrate
5g potassium sulfate
4.15g Bloom Booster
5.31g magnesium sulfate
490mg micros

I've been trying to use this mix for flowering but the water always comes up cloudy a few hours later and the ph is nosediving down at all times. I put 60ml of ph up (potassium carbonate) in 15 gallons of water and ph went from 5.7 to 5.8 and 2 hours later it's at 5.6. Not sure how that's possible but I've always used this mix but at lower doses and have never had a problem. Also this mix comes out to 1750ppm but it should be 2400 ppm. I don't even know what to do anymore if I'm unable to ph my water and I'm sure the cloudiness messes up the nutrient ratios.

Anyone here have experience with high ppm feeds? This is my first time feeding this heavy. The plants are eating it up but if the nutrient solution is going to be this complicated then I'll have to go organic.

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Ditch the potassium silicate now! Buy food grade silica or something with the major source being silicone dioxide. Apply foliar. Silica is more easily absorbed through leaves than roots.

If using dry nutrients consider buying a magnetic stirrer and a 2000 milliliter glass beaker along with a set of stir bars. Follow any directions regarding mixing such as mixing A&B together and C&D together before mixing it all together for feeding. This is extremely important. Not the stirrer but the mixing instructions.

Thanks for the response guys. I ended up ditching the potassium silicate altogether but my water still gets cloudy within 5-6 hours. I don't even know what to do anymore. The only solution to this problem I can think of is mixing nutrients 4-5 separate times a day. This shit makes no sense it never happened with my veg formula that was 1300 ppm. Are high ppm feeds guaranteed to get cloudy no matter what you do? I can't figure this shit out it makes no sense at all whatsoever. I'm using half dehumidifier water half r/o water. Maybe I need to replace the filter on my dehumidifier? I'm using 0.7ml per gallon of 35% peroxide so the water should be clean. I'm going to mix nutrients with distilled water to test if there's a difference.

What order do you mix them in? Do you completely dissolve your mag sulfate prior to adding your cal nit? If you mix them all at once you'll get precipitate.

Thanks for quick reply. I dissolve each nutrient powder in water before adding. I start with monopotassium phosphate (bloom booster), potassium sulfate, micro nutrients, calcium nitrate, then magnesium sulfate. Water is constantly circulating and is covered from the light. The water is crystal clear after mixing. I mix before I go to sleep & by the time I wake up it's cloudy. This never happened until recently so maybe the water isn't sanitized 100%? Thinking about getting a uv sterilizer or hypochlorous acid but like I said I'm using peroxide so idk how it's not sterilized.

zebracake said:

Thanks for the response guys. I ended up ditching the potassium silicate altogether but my water still gets cloudy within 5-6 hours. I don't even know what to do anymore. The only solution to this problem I can think of is mixing nutrients 4-5 separate times a day. This shit makes no sense it never happened with my veg formula that was 1300 ppm. Are high ppm feeds guaranteed to get cloudy no matter what you do? I can't figure this shit out it makes no sense at all whatsoever. I'm using half dehumidifier water half r/o water. Maybe I need to replace the filter on my dehumidifier? I'm using 0.7ml per gallon of 35% peroxide so the water should be clean. I'm going to mix nutrients with distilled water to test if there's a difference.

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Bacteria, fungus, etc., in the water? I boil all my RO drinking water because it tastes better. You could boil your dehumidifier water as a test, along with your RO water, which is known to be microbiologically dirty: organisms and bioslimes grow on and in the membrane, they are basically impossible to entirely remove no matter the cleaning procedure.

I put predissolved calnit in non-boiled RO water first, then Masterblend, AMS, Epsom, trace element mix, KOH. The last two chemicals I store as 1000x liquids, the former are all dry powders. Each are dissolved first in their own small amounts of often-hot tap water. When I've checked the pH seems stable during storage over more than a week before use.

when adding any Si product it should always be added first. always. then it should be allowed to stabilize, bring pH down if needed, and then add your other inputs.

Are you using silicon and ph up?

2400ppm!!! thats insane. Even 1750!! What scale? tdsx500 or ppmx700. = 3.5EC ?? No wonder you're having trouble.

zebracake said:

700mg potassium silicate
9.25g calcium nitrate
5g potassium sulfate
4.15g Bloom Booster
5.31g magnesium sulfate
490mg micros

I've been trying to use this mix for flowering but the water always comes up cloudy a few hours later and the ph is nosediving down at all times. I put 60ml of ph up (potassium carbonate) in 15 gallons of water and ph went from 5.7 to 5.8 and 2 hours later it's at 5.6. Not sure how that's possible but I've always used this mix but at lower doses and have never had a problem. Also this mix comes out to 1750ppm but it should be 2400 ppm. I don't even know what to do anymore if I'm unable to ph my water and I'm sure the cloudiness messes up the nutrient ratios.

Anyone here have experience with high ppm feeds? This is my first time feeding this heavy. The plants are eating it up but if the nutrient solution is going to be this complicated then I'll have to go organic.

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Ca and SO4 ions are poorly compatible and lead to the formation of gypsum. It is he who falls into a white precipitate.
Ca(NO3)2 + K2SO4 + MgSO4 = CaSO4
Theoretically solubility in water 2g/l
Depending on the other components of the solution and Ph may be lower.
Maybe potassium silicate somehow affects, maybe not, I don’t know.
You need to either replace K2SO4 with KNO3, or reduce the total concentration.

Like others mentioned, calcium nitrate should go in after everything else and potassium silicate is supposed to go in first. It might not be an issue at the lower concentration you usually mix up. If you want the ph to be more stable you might need some more ammoniacal nitrogen, if there’s none in your feed.

zebracake said:

Thanks for quick reply. I dissolve each nutrient powder in water before adding. I start with monopotassium phosphate (bloom booster), potassium sulfate, micro nutrients, calcium nitrate, then magnesium sulfate. Water is constantly circulating and is covered from the light. The water is crystal clear after mixing. I mix before I go to sleep & by the time I wake up it's cloudy. This never happened until recently so maybe the water isn't sanitized 100%? Thinking about getting a uv sterilizer or hypochlorous acid but like I said I'm using peroxide so idk how it's not sterilized.

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For giggles i duplicated his mixing order, which is backwards btw and nobody called it out. Left the mix out and turned cloudy. Never had a mix go cloudy like that, nvr mixed nutes out of order either...so interesting.


Ph was at 6.8.

I found out what the problem was. So I mixed again without using my 300 gph pump and it didn't come out cloudy. I mix 18 gallons at a time. I think the pump is cycling the water so quickly that it's allowing salts to come into contact with one another I guess? The ph still comes out low but it remains stable once I add ph up.

thefullspectrum said:

2400ppm!!! thats insane. Even 1750!! What scale? tdsx500 or ppmx700. = 3.5EC ?? No wonder you're having trouble.

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My previous grows never went over 900ppm but I would let the grow medium dry out a bit between waterings. If you keep it wet at all times you can push the plants to their limit.

Has said:

Ca and SO4 ions are poorly compatible and lead to the formation of gypsum. It is he who falls into a white precipitate.
Ca(NO3)2 + K2SO4 + MgSO4 = CaSO4
Theoretically solubility in water 2g/l
Depending on the other components of the solution and Ph may be lower.
Maybe potassium silicate somehow affects, maybe not, I don’t know.
You need to either replace K2SO4 with KNO3, or reduce the total concentration.

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I'm sure this has something to do with it. The nute mix I'm using is the same ratios as athena flower formula, which is high in sulfur. The high sulfur is supposed to give bud more flavor. This is my first time using it so I'll know in a few weeks if it's worth it.

mudballs said:

For giggles i duplicated his mixing order, which is backwards btw and nobody called it out. Left the mix out and turned cloudy. Never had a mix go cloudy like that, nvr mixed nutes out of order either...so interesting.

View attachment 5070686
Ph was at 6.8.

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I'm kinda new to mixing raw salts. Are you using potassium silicate? Should I do calcium nitrate first or last? Right now I'm doing monopotassium phosphate, potassium sulfate, micros, magnesium sulfate, then calcium nitrate. I want to try adding silicate again now that I know my pump is the culprit.