Runaway PH and EC climbing...

[Dirt Farmer]

Hi all, in the middle of getting my roots wet here with my first attempt at hydro and I've got issues I can't control...

I've got a 41 gal res, using sensi a and b bloom series, superthrive, and calmag... Up until a week or so ago I was using AN grow, micro and bloom without problem, however since switching I've been totally unable to control my EC or PH.. both seem to climb constantly....
I use tap water around 60-130 ppm... have used the calmag once, and it was only a few days after my water change, EC and PH were already going nuts so don't think that has anything to do with it but I could be wrong for sure..

I can adjust the PH, using ph down, and get it around 5.5-5.6 and 2 hours later it will be 5.8 and two hours after that it's 6.2 or so.... and keeps climbing... every morning it's up to about 6.8 or as high as 7.2 also, other than adding PH down, and topping off with water I'm not adding anything else the last 4 days or so and EC has gone from around 1000, to 2900+ the last check.... there's no algae or anything else I can see that would cause it to keep rising like that....

They're consuming about 3 gals a day from the res... and I top off daily.... but never had an issue before could go for 12-15 days easy on a water change and the girls were all happy...for reference I'm using about the same system as what 420fied built in this journal..

4inch PVC Aero/NFT 4x5 SCROG - 1200 Watts

The plants at this point don't seem to be too bothered with the ph changing constantly but I'm sure that won't last if I don't get this corrected soon... Any help\advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[MedScientist]

Rising ppm is usually caused from too much evaporation from the res. Is it 2900 EC before or after you do the H2O Top Off? I would assume before, and when you Top Off, it is probably close to 1000 again? If this is the case, cover the res? As the EC changes, the ph will drift. If you can keep the drift between 5.5 and 6.3, the plant will have access to ALL nutes, and should grow Fantastic!

Good Luck +rep

 

[Dirt Farmer]

Meds, thanks for the reply, but no I'm going through about 4 gals a day, and the ec doesn't drop more than 100-200 at top off... the entire system is sealed so evap isn't an issue either...the amount of water I'm losing daily is increasing slowly, as it should for the size\# of plants etc that I have... the 2900 was after top off yesterday... today we're at 3200...but I haven't topped it off yet...but will likely remain above 3k...

If I get time tonight I'm going to shut the whole system down, back-flush it and do a complete water change... the whole process takes about 2 hours so don't know if I can do it before the weekend.... PH is also still climbing every 3-5 hours or so...

Still pretty stumped as to what could be causing it to climb so fast... Thanks again for the help Meds.

 

[MedScientist]

Well, of course it couldn't just be an easy solution. What I would do just to verify it is not the new nutes and/or your measurements is to... Mix up a 5 gal nute solution using the same ml/g, and check the ph and EC. Then add an airstone and bubble it overnight and check again. When I tried using Hygrozyme, I would get similar ph rises when it was oxygenated. I cant account for the EC rise, have you inspected the roots?