My Tap Water... Does My Head In

[dave_paton]

Ok here are my tap parameters

(API liquid test kit)
PH: 6.8
KH: 0
GH: 3
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 0
Ammonia: 0

My problem here, KH!!!!!!
I have posted a thread before about buffering it up and came to the conclusion the adding crushed coral was for me. i have done so ( about a 20c piece in the palm of my hand) into one of my filter baskets.

So far it has increased my KH to 3'..... and raised my ph to around 7.4 or so. This about 3 weeks work trying to get the KH to increase by adding a little more coral each week. But it has done more to my PH than KH, which i did not want it to do.

Is their any way i can add something to the water to increase my KH without increasing my PH

The PH being at 6.8 is good, it suits my tanks stocking.

Please help!!

Just before i tried adding some bicarb soda to a bucket of water and to see what it did. BINGO i added the perfect amount to get the KH to 10*....... tested for PH........ 7.6+ ahhhhhhhh kill me now as this is the only thing i cannot work out!

Any advice would be much apreciated, Thankyou

Dave

 

[Miss Wiggle]

increasing the KH will increase the pH......

remind me where you are dave, are you still cycling, with or without fish?

 

[dave_paton]

Miss wiggle thanks for the fast reply. i am now cycled, have been for around 3 weeks or so. and cycled fish in. Is it ok that it makes my ph go up? i just got into a panic as i thought 7.4 was high?

 

[Miss Wiggle]

7.4 is not far off neutral, it's fine for most fish, what fish do you have?

 

[dave_paton]

Hmm ok its just cause my tap is 6.8 which the guy at the lfs said was ideal my fish are

4 gold barb
10 neon tetra
2 bolivain rams
1 3 spot gourami

Is it still ok?? and will the ph continue to rise if i leave the coral in there??

 

[Miss Wiggle]

the pH will stabilise, 7.4 is fine for the fish you have, if you want to drop it a little lower then just gradually remove some of the crushed coral. Your KH doesn't necessarily need to be at 3, just make gradual adjustments until the pH is where you want it.

 

[dave_paton]

hmm ok then,, the only reason i wanted my KH to go up as i read somewhere if i have a low kh my ph will crash at some stage. Is this true?? i would hate for my ph to crash one day and have a tank full of dead fish

 

[Miss Wiggle]

when you're cycling the high ammonia levels will drive down your pH (ammonia is acidic) which can lead to a pH crash. If you have a KH of 3 or more then this should prevent a crash from happening during cycling, so if people are cycling and have a KH of 0 we often recommend that they buffer this up to prevent a crash from happening.

However when the cycle is finished there is no (detectable) ammonia in the tank so nothing to drive down the pH therefore no reason to suspect it might crash. However with a KH of 0 it's still a subtle balance and even the slightest blip in the tank could cause the pH to crash however this is relativley unlikley whereas during cycling it's pretty much a dead cert.

So if your KH is 0 I would recommend buffering it up to maybe 1/2 so you have some sort of safety net against pH crashes, but you probably don't need to go as far as buffering up to 3.

So if you want the pH a little lower (your fish will prefer it a little below 7, however it being at 7.4 will do them no harm) then you can gradually remove some of the crushed coral so that the pH and KH drop slightly.

Hope that makes sense.....

 

[dave_paton]

AHHH i see the light now... That makes now the world of sence. When i was cycling and had no knowlage of what KH was i had 0. And yeh when i had my ammonia levels my ph was driven down to below 6, just how far ill never no as my api tester only goes down to 6. Thanks for all the help miss wiggle you have been great, again.

Also nice post on setting up a fish tank from scratch, should definatly get pinned

cheers

 

[Miss Wiggle]

no probs

 

[Bblou]

what on earth is kH?

 

[Miss Wiggle]

have a read of the link in my sig 'pH and KH'

KH refers to carbonate hardness, it gives the water it's buffering capacity, it's basically what keeps the pH stable, if your KH is too low you can find the pH swings and is unstable so sometimes you 'buffer' it up with crushed coral or baking soda.

it's good to have a basic understand of it so read through the link, but unless your pH is fluctuating then you'll probably not need to worry about it.

 

[Dave Spencer]

when you're cycling the high ammonia levels will drive down your pH (ammonia is acidic) which can lead to a pH crash.

Ammonia is alkaline and will increase the pH.

Dave.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

when you're cycling the high ammonia levels will drive down your pH (ammonia is acidic) which can lead to a pH crash.

Ammonia is alkaline and will increase the pH.

Dave.

now you've got me confused, what is it during fishless cycling that drives the pH down then........... is it the nitrate?

 

[davefish]

now you've got me confused, what is it during fishless cycling that drives the pH down then........... is it the nitrate?

KH drops as a result of nitrification. I guess a lot of nitrification is happening in a fishless cycle so KH can drop quite a bit. Therefore you are left with less buffer and are more prone to have a pH crash. Hence people in soft water areas often have problems with fishless cycling because their pH crashes and kills a lot of their bacteria, and they aren't testing for KH (and maybe not pH) so they don't notice the problem.

Something like that anyway...