PH/EC Problems in NFT System

R

reallycoolguy

Active Member
Hey guys,
first of all I want to say that english isn't my native so I am sorry for any grammatical mistakes and spelling mistakes.

So I was growing in earth and rockwool for six years now and just recently moved to substrateless hydroponics (NFT).
I had some problems regarding my DO level which I got all fixed. Now I got some PH/EC problems.

My tap water has 0.8EC (I dont know the PPM because I dont understand the different scales and stuff, here in europe most of us the EC/us/cm) so it is pretty hard to begin with. I can't mix my nutes properly because of my hard tapwater. I add 1/4 of the required nutes and I already are at 1.4EC :(.
Will a reverse osmosis system be the solution? I could just mix 50/50 tapwater with RO-water and then I should be fine right? Are there any other solutions?

PH Problem:

My PH keeps dropping rapidly. I think it is because of my f*d up EC. I read that if the EC is to high/low the PH drops. Is that correct? What other possibilities are there?

I hope someone can help me, because if I dont fix this my plants will die soon :(
 
reallycoolguy said:
Hey guys,
first of all I want to say that english isn't my native so I am sorry for any grammatical mistakes and spelling mistakes.

So I was growing in earth and rockwool for six years now and just recently moved to substrateless hydroponics (NFT).
I had some problems regarding my DO level which I got all fixed. Now I got some PH/EC problems.

My tap water has 0.8EC (I dont know the PPM because I dont understand the different scales and stuff, here in europe most of us the EC/us/cm) so it is pretty hard to begin with. I can't mix my nutes properly because of my hard tapwater. I add 1/4 of the required nutes and I already are at 1.4EC :(.
Will a reverse osmosis system be the solution? I could just mix 50/50 tapwater with RO-water and then I should be fine right? Are there any other solutions?

PH Problem:

My PH keeps dropping rapidly. I think it is because of my f*d up EC. I read that if the EC is to high/low the PH drops. Is that correct? What other possibilities are there?

I hope someone can help me, because if I dont fix this my plants will die soon :(
Click to expand...
It's your tap water, ro will make your pH much more stable.
 
reallycoolguy said:
Do I have to add any additive for carbonate hardness? I only add GHE Flora Series, CalMag, Enzymes and some fulvic/humic acids.
Thank you for the fast reply :) @macsnax
Click to expand...
No you don't. Just watch for calcium and magnesium deficiencies. When your base water doesn't have it (RO) you need to add a little more than if you were working with tap water, especially if you're growing under LED's.
 
I would get an RO filter.

If thats not an option, you should use the Flora Hard Water Micro, it has less calcium.
 
If you use RO water then you will want to add 5mL per gallon of calimagic (thats my preferred calmag as it has less nitrogen).
 
So I used 50:50 tapwater/Ro water and still have the same problem. Even worse then before. I dont know what is going on. Should I go full RO water? I heard that the GHE nutrients are the problem.

My plants are slowly dying i am really worried :(
 
Do you have massive amounts of bubbles in your system (DO).

I would have to throttle down the bubbles or my pH hit low 5. Finally I took the air out and left a mixing water pumping the res per a Canna reps advice. System was stable after that.

Just my experience it may not apply to this. :-)
 
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