Help

[96GTRagTop]

So my tank has been sitting lifeless for about 4 months. I can't seem to get anything to live in it. I've pretty much narowed it down to my ph being off the charts, and a corrupt ph test kit.

what can i do to manually lower my ph?

[Playa-1]

what are your water parameters?
Everything that you test for.

Has the tank been cycled?

[96GTRagTop]

ph is off the charts
amonia and nitrite 0
nitrate 10

tank has been cycled for over 6 months

[ChrisKirkland]

What type of additives and salt have you been using?

[96GTRagTop]

i beleive my ph booster was dumped into the tank months ago....
it went issing, everything died, and my ph is skyrocketed

[ChrisKirkland]

I would do several large water changes adding nothing but the salt until the PH turn to normal. PH will never rise on its own without any aid, on the other hand it will drop on its own without the aid of additives.

[96GTRagTop]

how long do u think it would take for it to drop on it's own unstocked?

[K' Family Reef]

you might start out by...
taking a water sample to the lfs and ask them to test everything... salinity, ph, etc etc etc... obviously something is wrong and a good place to start is to take a water sample in to be tested by folks who do this everyday... oftentimes these home test kits are not easy to ready and quite often misread by beginners and advanced aquarists alike.

if your tank has been cycling for 6 mos
then its probably something that once identified can be easily corrected and you will be on your way to a happy reef!

good luck.

regards

[Playa-1]

I would do a 100% water change and then retest your water parameters. Then I would take a sample of water in to get a lfs to test it and compare what their results to yours.
I would not suggest that you add anything to the tank water in an effort to manipulate ph.

What is you salinity and how are you testing for it?

What is your water source for the tank and are you filtering it with anything?

How are you testing for ph?

What is your ALK reading?

[ChrisKirkland]

If you do a 25% water change everyday for a week (7 days) then it should return to normal.

[crvz]

how do you define off the charts? without an accurate measurement of pH (with a probe, in my experience, not a test kit), it's hard to give any decent recommendation, but I'd start with water changes.

[96GTRagTop]

i use petco premade saltwater for my tank

my test kit is apt i beleive, and when i say off the charts i mean it turns purple instantly, and when all five drops are added its a deep color

i use a hydrometer to test for salinity and it's a 10.23

[96GTRagTop]

will doing a 100% change restart my cycle?

[Playa-1]

It should not start a new cycle as long as you don't leave your live rock out of the water for any length of time. You could also just do a few very large water changes over several days. I suspect that the buffer was overdosed and your alk is very high.
Have you PH tested the water that your using for water changes and the water that your using for top-off water?

By the way, it's usually best to figure out why your having ph issues and deal with the root cause as opposed to trying to manipulate the ph number with buffers. The buffers will throw off the rest of your chemistry after a while.

[96GTRagTop]

like i said, i'm 90% sure of what the problem was. I had no intentions of adding a chemical to lower the ph, but wanted to know if there were other techniques besides water changes to lower the ph... like turning the light off for an extended period of time.

I'm going to do a 13 gallon swap tomorrow and another 13 gallon swap on Fri... will update then

[Playa-1]

Well I was referring more to why the ph got screwed up in the first place as opposed to dealing with the problem you have now.
I would suggest larger water changes then 13 gallons,
Maybe a couple of 30gal and test your alk before and after. 13gallon changes is like whizzin on a forest fire trying to put it out
:lol: