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Anyone have experience with Blue Labs ph controllers or similar?

B

bigganjabud

^^ plus rep for him

Myself u got a blue lab combi meter (white box with two probes)

Was a bit more expensive but tbh it's lasted longer than my last three
 

BasementGrow

New member
Never tried that particular model but the blue lab guardian I have has been working flawless for 2 years aside from replacing a couple probes.
 

dansbuds

Retired from the workforce Bullshit
ICMag Donor
Veteran
you can't go wrong with bluelab meters ! well worth the extra $$$ ! pens , handhelds or the monitors
 

getpulse.co

New member
We use Bluelabs personally, mostly for convenience as the probe is always in the reservoir. That said, we've tested the accuracy of those cheapo yellow ones and they are just as accurate. As overbudjet mentioned -- because the probe is always submerged in nutrients, it seems to absorb some sediment over time and needs to be replaced every so often.
 

Bobby Boucher

Active member
I have a couple newbie q's that probably belong in the new growers section.. but I figured I would post them here for convenience.

So.. Long story short.. I belong to unfortunate minority of folks who have mysteriously sinking ph in hydro, and I installed one of these bluelab PH chasers into my system yesterday. From dwc to rdwc to biobuckets to UC and back again to single cell dwc for the past few years, living or sterile.. PPM always goes down.. Along with the ph.


I've posted about this a zillion times over the years and have done my due diligence in trying to methodically change one variable at a time to no avail. The one thing I HAVEN'T tried in many years is chasing my ph with ph up or down.. as the general consensus I've gathered is that chasing is poor methodology.. Regardless.. the machine is downstairs chasing away..

So, I figured I would ask you guys.. ONE more time.. a couple of stupid rambled questions.. Exactly what is wrong with chasing? How much ph up per gallon is too much? Should I be setting the machine to sweep from 5.6 to 6.3 over a weeks time and then dump and refresh? Or should I just allow my ph ghost to take me back to 5.6 and set the machine to climb again? Set to 5.8 and forget it? What kinds of problems/deficiencies do you think I might run into constantly pumping ph up into my solution?

And.. I donno.. that's all I can think to ask right now. FWIW the plants are in 5 gallon single cell biobuckets with 3.5 gallon reservoirs running dmzone. Each bucket with its own res. No slime or stench.. Just heavy ph drops in flower.

TIA.
 
C

Chipleader

So guys i come with a lil question
i have just bought a new EC /PH meter ( blue lab guardian ) i have calibrated ( 4 and 7 ) setting up and everything
But i wonder why it give me a measure different from my old ( more 10 year old ) hanna ph and ec meter i have caalibrated also in same time than the new one

Do you think its normal to have slight difference between meter ?



Bobby boucher : IMHO if you ph go down during flowering its probably because your plant have drink all water ... and not all nutz at all ... so add water and keep ur EC same or lower ..
 
Last edited:

Bobby Boucher

Active member
Bobby boucher : IMHO if you ph go down during flowering its probably because your plant have drink all water ... and not all nutz at all ... so add water and keep ur EC same or lower ..

I've been growing the same variety for.. a very long time. PPM always stays constant or goes down. If it ever shoots up, which isnt often, it only gets a chance to shoot up 10-20 pts before its diluted back down with RO. This doesn't explain the full point drops.

So.. it's not how much food is in the water.. To the best of my understanding, it is the availability of each nutrient, along with individual varietal needs. If you feed a baby strawberries and cream, and it only eats the cream, the overall acidity of his leftover meal goes down, no matter how much you do or don't feed him.. You gotta convince that baby to eat his strawberries along with his cream by making them more available to him.

At least, thats how my simple ass understands it.

Anywhos, to anyone interested, the ph controller is dumping enough ph up into my res to scare the hell out of me. Based on my previous experiences chasing the ghost, heavy doses of ph up or down have only brought heartache. I'm starting to believe now that it wasn't the ph up causing lockouts, but rather the large and irregular swings. Even with daily ph maintenance, I would get full 1.0 drops.

The again.. wtf do I know.

Anyways, garden looks better than ever. Day 27.

picture.php
 
C

Chipleader

wooot can't wait to see them in full bloom :D
ps could we have picture of your ph controller ? wich kind of model do you used ?
If you use the blue lab controller could you explain or post a picture how did you setting it up ? especially where is the probes :D
 

Bobby Boucher

Active member
I had to set my system up to recirculate to utilize the controller, which is something I really didn't want to do. I took the extra step of giving each plant its own "control bucket". Even though it entails a bit more work and equipment, I rather enjoy the safety net. Terrified of losing my whole crop and not having my meds.

So, I have 2 tents ~10' apart up against a back wall in my crawlspace. Each tent only has one plant. In between the tents up against the back wall, mounted into the concrete, is the controller. Directly below the controller sits a liter of ph up, along with 2 control buckets, one for each plant. Inside of each control bucket, lies a little 1500lph water pump, which pumps through 3/8" tubing into the tents, and straight down into the top of each plant bucket. On the back of each plant bucket, I've installed a 3/4" uniseal at the desired water level line, and ran 3/4 pvc at a slight angle back to the wall and back to the control buckets. Modified single-cell Big-toke style "biobuckets" which I run "dead" with dmzone..

I run my tents "flip-flop" style so, as long as I don't want to buy another ph controller, or connect my whole system together, I have to MANUALLY move over the probes and the ph up line from one controller bucket to the other, twice a day, which is kind of a pain with my shitty neck, but it only takes 10 seconds.

It is the bluelab model. I think it was 450usd on amazon.

My camera aint charged.. I might photograph the setup later. I still feel real pukey. Brie and whiskey don't pair so great...
 

Bobby Boucher

Active member
So.. yeah. My yield was 1/3 of what is has ever been in the past 10-15 years.. LOL.

Sigh.. for every ounce of nug i got like.. a qp of trim.. The chase continues..

Ambient co2 in check, temps check, air pumps are properly sized, new RO system, pearly white roots, zero slime.. The ph stays in check with the bluelab chaser but it goes through a shitload of ph up. It's sucked up ~30 ml this week to keep up with 15 gallons I've added back to my 10 gallon res in the first week of flower, and it seems to be to be going through it a lot quicker these past couple days..

Stumped.. Only feeding the girls ~580ppm atm and they've been eating everything I feed them.. but I'm assuming that the ph up will soon begin to lock things out again.. Bout to have to start dumping and refreshing the buckets and res every week again..

le sigh!
 

Wingnutt

Member
BlueLap pH and PPM pens are a great bang for your buck. I run a rather large operation and these are my go to meters. I've used the larger fancy brick style ones with the corded probes - both BlueLab and Hanna. When it comes to reliability and durability - the pens take the cake. The pH pen does have a glass bulb on the bottom that is rather thin. As long as you take care when cleaning and don't drop or bang it around it will last for years. They are waterproof as well. I wouldn't suggest letting it float around your container but the peace of mind if it falls in is nice.
If it starts acting weird, put a new battery in it. Had a few meters I thought were trash that only needed fresh batteries. Don't use the cheap shit, name brand. Calibrate it monthly and they last forever. I expect 2 years plus for a ~$90 tool that I use a dozen times a day, every day. And they come with a one year warranty that good stores will replace on site. I've had one break within the year warranty - that was their fault - in over 7 years of Blue Lab pen use. Current pen is almost 3 years old. Easy calibration and cheap cal solutions as well, way easier than Hanna.
 

Bobby Boucher

Active member
Yields are back on track. Smells are flavors are as good as I've ever seen from my garden.

If you are one of the unfortunate souls who suffers from mysteriously dropping ph, a ph controller might not be the cure-all you are hoping for.

The solution for me has been mixing my RO with tap to >100ppm, topping off with tap (ph 8) every time I see my ph dropping along with my ppm, and only using the bluelab controller as a failsafe. Setting it to 5.8 while always trying to manually maintain a ph of 5.9+ with tap and proper feeding. I've diluted the ph up to prevent precipitation and graduated the bottle that it gets pulled from so I can accurately monitor how much is getting pumped in. I've also increased the size of my external res to 10 gallons.

Once the doser starts sucking hard on the ph up, I dump. If the bicarbonates from the tap water are winning the battle on their own, I leave it be. My 16 gallon system seems to have a 7-14 day lifespan before it just starts suckin real hard on the ph up bottle, which locks things out pretty quickly.

That is all.
 

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