raising pH with baking soda

[oscar89]

Can anyone provide tips for using baking soda to raise pH?

[freddie40]

First of all, baking soda will lower PH, washing soda will raise PH temporarily.

You shouldn't be using either to play with PH as they affect alk. Make sure your CA, ALK and MG are correct first. PH is caused by high CO2. Open your windows up and see what happens. Check the chemistry forum for more answers.

Dave

[miwoodar]

Listen to Dave - make sure your calcium, alkalinity and magnesium values are in range. Also make sure you have enough circulation to degas your CO2 and that your house doesn't have excessive amounts. Here is an article to help explain low pH problems:
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-09/rhf/index.php

This article provides an awesome summary that will help explain when you would want to tweak your calcium and/or alkalinity:
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/nov2002/chem.htm

Regarding baking soda though - I have used it a lot to tweak up my alk should my alk become low relative to my calcium. Jdieck's calculator will help (http://reef.diesyst.com/). Enter your current parameters and your desired parameters then enter the product you want to use to jump between the two (baking soda or washing soda). It will tell you what precautions to take.

[freddie40]

I almost forgot. I drip Kalk every night to replace my ALK and Calcium. Kalk is very high in PH so this keeps my PH in line. You may want to give it a try. Works good and is very cheap.

Dave

[Thurge]

I nearly crashed my tank with Baking soda, not knowing what I was doing. I litterally pushed the Alk of Salfert's chart. Fish didn't seem to effected but not one invert survived.

Cheapest and easiest first remedy would be to put an air pump on your tank. This forces excess CO2 out raising the Ph, if that is the problem, if not it won't do anything but add some O2 to the water.

[miwoodar]

Baking soda is a great, cheap additive for raising alkalinity. If he reads the articles and uses the calculator he'll be fine. Dumping in baking soda (or any product that impacts calc, alk, MG, anything) without determining where your tank needs to go is a bad idea.

Thurge - I would like to say that I've never just dumped an indiscriminate amount of product x in my tank...but I wouldn't be telling the truth. In my early days I did it all that time and often put myself in situations like the one you described.

[freddie40]

Been there done that :(

Dave

[oscar89]

Thanks for the advice. I added an airstone awhile ago and that helped some, but I may need to add another. I also started a Ca reactor on Sunday to keep the Ca up and that is likely the cause for the recent drop in pH.

Oh the joys.... :-)

[Thurge]

:)
I was testing, just not for the right thing.
Also I prefer the term unmeasured over indiscriminant. :D


One air stone should be enough. You do need CO2 in the system for macro algae and corals.

[miwoodar]

New calcium reactor? It's very likely the CO2 then.

Dragonslayer's advice and spreadsheet on tuning helped me get mine up and running:
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=334587

[Zooid]

ok, now that everyone has correctly told you not to add baking soda to take care of PH......
If you do need to add it to increase the alkalinity,
1. Bake the baking soda in the oven for about a half hour at 350.
2. Boil some RO/DI water.
3. Mix very small amounts of baking soda at a time because it will really fly all over the place when you add it to the hot water.

Let me reiterate, DON'T add baking soda to manipulate pH.

[miwoodar]

Zooid - baked baking soda is washing soda. Either baking soda or washing soda can be used to manipulate alkalinity. Jdieck's calculator will help you determine how to use each for any particular system.

[oscar89]

Just checked Alk... 21dkh. How do I lower it w/o lowering pH?

[freddie40]

just don't add any baking soda or washing soda. Maybe turn off your CA reactor too.

Dave

[oscar89]

Turned the Ca reactor off Monday morning. Thanks for the advice on the baking soda. The pH was up a little this am. This hobby can cause you to lose sleep... :-)

[Zooid]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10657373#post10657373 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by miwoodar
Zooid - baked baking soda is washing soda. Either baking soda or washing soda can be used to manipulate alkalinity. Jdieck's calculator will help you determine how to use each for any particular system.

You're right Mike, I just trusted baking soda more because it's a food product. I've heard of people using washing soda that had perfumes and it wasn't pretty hehe.

[68RUSTANG]

I have used Arm and Hammer washing soda (king soopers laundry detergent area) with no problems. Glad you tested your water, it's amazing how things can get out of balance and really create problems.

[miwoodar]

21!!! Wow. That is roughly where the effluent from my calcium reactor runs. I'm surprised you haven't had a snowstorm event.

What's your calcium then?

[oscar89]

ca is 340 and the alk is 19 today. the water was a little cloudy yesterday, but has cleared up today.

[miwoodar]

Maybe you already had a snowstorm precipitation event. Every time this has happened to me the inhabitants have been A-ok but I've had to clean every pump and heater in a vinegar bath. Last time it happened (thankfully a few years ago) my tank turned so cloudy I couldn't even see 6 inches in. It was gone in 6 hours though.

You're in zone three...
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/nov2002/chem.htm

[rkl303]

I would try hooking up the return line for the calcium reactor to the skimmer thus excess CO2 is forced out in a hurry way before it reaches anything in the tank...although that makes drip count hard.

[oscar89]

Thanks for the help. The alk is 13 and Ca is 300 and pH is 8.07. Ca and pH still a little low, but Alk is much better. I think I will try a Kalk drip to bump up pH and Ca next week.

Good idea on the Ca reator return, but I'm not sure I could do that and still have it be a gravity return. I will have to give it some thought.