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Water quality for hydro

Snypie

Active member
Hi folks,

I need some advice about water quality in hydro. My tap water varies between 0.67EC and 1.0 EC. In the winter months it is lower. I made a water analysis in late summer when the EC was 0.9:
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]PH: 7.02
conductivity: 901 [FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]μS/cm
sulfate: 111
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
nitrate: 25,1
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
nitrite: 0,47
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
NH: <0,05
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
KOI : <0,5
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
all hardness: 210 CaO
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
m-alkalinity: 5,17 mmol/L
chloride: 54,8
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
phosphate: 0,06
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
calcium: 91,6
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
iron: 7,9
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]μ[/FONT][/FONT]g/L
potassium: 2,76
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L
magnesium: 34,8
[/FONT]
[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L[/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]manganese: 3,4 [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]μ[/FONT][/FONT]g/L[/FONT][/FONT]
sodium: 28,1 [FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]mg/L[/FONT][/FONT]
[/FONT]

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]When i measure the PH it is higher. Out of the tap it is 7.3-7.4, but if i leave it stand it goes higher 8.0-8.5. I need a lot of PH down, double the amount which is written on the back of the bottle. Usually 0.6-0.8 ml/l.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I tried mixing tap water with various amount RO water, but with no success.[/FONT]

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Next round i want to try the NFT.[/FONT]

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Can you give me advice on water and nutes? I mean what kind of water source should i use. Tap water with hard water nutes, or RO water with CalMag and soft water nutes.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]What is your opinion?[/FONT]
 

Andyo

Active member
Veteran
water/nutes

water/nutes

RO water/and rain water
use a 2 part nutrient like general hydroponics there is plenty of calcium nitrate and magnesium sulphate in it ! forget the cal mag thing
Idealy water pressure for RO needs be 50 lb/sq inch +
A prefilter would be a good idea and a spare one.A
 

Snypie

Active member
Thanks for the reply. I have an 5 stage RO filter system. It is originally a 3 stage (sediment filter, active carbon filter, RO membrane) which i supplemented plus 2 filters (kdf filter and a micron filter). It gives me 10 ppm filtered water. I get 5 liters of water in one hour. Probably need a pump.
To the nutes. Are you referring to the flora duo series as a 2 part? I have some flora series. It is a 3 part.
 

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
Yep, get a booster pump so you're working with 80psi. 10ppm is fine to work with, I actually don't mind up to 14ppm. After this you can start getting noticeable pH changes, depending on whats coming through.
 

Easy7

Active member
Veteran
Depends largely on what fertilizer. If using pure blend products and those that go along with that, you can use city water usually.


It varies a lot from area to area. Chlorine won't hurt a thing, it's in fish products and kelp. It's in the ocean.
 

Gazoo31

Member
At a 1.0 ec you need to look at R/O. I topped out at 1.4EC total. Look into maxibloom it’s got a decent bit of cal mag already.
 

Andyo

Active member
Veteran
NFT

NFT

Might do better in NFT with Growth technology Ionic nutes,im sure the standard is for soft water.A
 

Snypie

Active member
I received the NFT system. It is not the usual GT series. It is manufactured by the Nutriculture but probably an older modell?!
It is 90x90 cm and 30 cm high and can hold 70 liters of water. It has a hole where you can replace the water and measure the Ph & EC (Wilma style). It comes with a MJ 500 pump so i will replace it with an adjustable one. I will cover the correx with mylar.
I will start the seeds in rapid rooters than move to 4" grodan rockwool.
I have home some GHE flora series for soft water (3 bottle -> micro, grow, bloom).
I can't decide how i use them. All the 3 part or just 2 (micro & bloom) for lucas. The GHE is a bit different than the GH but i saw a few journals using GHE for lucas.


What do you think?
 

Easy7

Active member
Veteran
Hard to find the perfect hydro system as well. There is a hydro system, platinum hydroponics. These would be great if deep water culture. Keep it simple, but fast.
 

eyes

Active member
Veteran
Thanks for the reply. I have an 5 stage RO filter system. It is originally a 3 stage (sediment filter, active carbon filter, RO membrane) which i supplemented plus 2 filters (kdf filter and a micron filter). It gives me 10 ppm filtered water. I get 5 liters of water in one hour. Probably need a pump.
To the nutes. Are you referring to the flora duo series as a 2 part? I have some flora series. It is a 3 part.

If your water source is a well, you will definately need a pump. Anything less than 80 psi through that r.o. membrane is a joke.Not to mention all the water you are wasting if your not recycling it and reusing it. Most residential r.o. systems just dont produce enough water in a short amount of time with waste ratios upwards of 4 waste to 1 product or permeate water.

If you have the money invest in a good r.o. unit that is 1000 gpd. Sounds like alot, but when its cold, like now, you only get 70 percent capacity at that 80 psi
I run a residential unit and your talking way over an hour to fill a measely 5 gallon bucket.

I mix ro and tap to 150 tds. this way i know there is plenty of calcium and in the mix. been using the 6/9 Heads formula.with the 1 gram per gallon of magnesium.
im running hydro and coco containers and use the same tds mix water for both systems.

I know hydroponic research makes a formula for hard water. . May want to contact em with your water analysis and ask em if their formula will work.
 

Snypie

Active member
I contacted with GHE and Ionic. GHE gave me a decent answer:
your water presents several difficult points:



  • Ec is high: more high is Ec, less space you have to give a proper balance of nutrients. For example if Ec goal is 1,5mS, and if you start with a water Ec of 1mS, you have very few space for fertilizer. And if you plan to get higher Ec, this will be a risk of burn.
  • this water contents competitiv ions such as Cl-, Na+, SO4--: these ions will compete with usable ions of the fertilizer. In recirculating hydroponics system, these ions will accumulate and create induced disbalance.
  • this is a very hard water in Ca++ and Mg++
  • NO3- is very high too, this is problemaic for a good end of flowering, to get a proper deficiency in N and get plants yellow. Also, this level of NO3- is possibly a sign of agricultural activity around and pollution of the tap-water with NO3- means also possibilities of pollution with other agricultural products like pesticide, herbicide, fungicide... which are not always under obligation of analysis in tap-water.
This is normal that the pH is high, and the difficulty to down it is directly caused by the carbonate. You will need more pH down than with soft water. Advantage of carbonate is that it will remain stable.


Best would be to use R.O. water. You could stabilize this R.O. water with a little bit of this tap-water (until you have a start Ec of 0,3mS for example) but better would be R.O. water stabilized with MineralMagic: like this you will avoid any polluant coming with your tap-water.

https://www.eurohydro.com/mineral-magic-back

Mineral Magic contains silicate (enforcing cell walls), carbonate (stabilizing pH) and calcium.



In this configuration, use one of our SoftWater formula: there is enough calcium/magnesium in these formulas to work with R.O. water: no need of supplement CalMag (use of this kind of supplement has to be very specific cause it can cause a disbalance of the nutrient solution, for example an induced deficiency in K)


I hope that this points will help you,






Ionic gave shitty answer, probably he doesn't understand the question:
A quick look at the water, yes, its hard water. Nothing alarming to see. But I would have some concerns over the Chloride levels. My preference would be to use R/O water with 10% run off added to stabilize the pH
 

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
What's this "to stabilize pH" junk? I've been reading about this for years and it's bunk. R/O is pH ""Neutral."" Which means it's only going to hydrate what you already have going. It will not influence pH other than through dilution. (less nutrients per water means lower ppm and higher pH)


  • There is zero need to 'buffer' r/o, unless you're using very low quality nutrients without buffers.
  • You **want** cannabis to have a full pH swing through the 'healthy' range in the root zone. (see my sig)
  • R/O is a pH of 7 and a ppm less than 14.
  • There is no need to 'buffer' it so you can get a meter reading
  • There is no need to add tap water for 'calcium' or 'magnesium,' since these should already be in your nutrient profile
  • If you have issues with pH it is **not** the r/o water, it is everything else you're doing

Seriously, it's time for the nonsense about r/o and pH to end.
:tiphat:
 

andl

Member
What's this "to stabilize pH" junk? I've been reading about this for years and it's bunk. R/O is pH ""Neutral."" Which means it's only going to hydrate what you already have going. It will not influence pH other than through dilution. (less nutrients per water means lower ppm and higher pH)


  • There is zero need to 'buffer' r/o, unless you're using very low quality nutrients without buffers.
  • You **want** cannabis to have a full pH swing through the 'healthy' range in the root zone. (see my sig)
  • R/O is a pH of 7 and a ppm less than 14.
  • There is no need to 'buffer' it so you can get a meter reading
  • There is no need to add tap water for 'calcium' or 'magnesium,' since these should already be in your nutrient profile
  • If you have issues with pH it is **not** the r/o water, it is everything else you're doing

Seriously, it's time for the nonsense about r/o and pH to end.
:tiphat:


the thing is...


if youre using pure R/O or distilled water you simply got nearly no ions to bind with so if you put just a tiny drop of ph+ or ph- into (acid or base) you shoot the ph up or down A LOT, thats why people say you should use water EC 0.2-0.4 best.
thats why they mix a little bit of tap water into.


also if youre watering your plants with pure R/O /distilled water you will kill your plants (whitout nutes of course), just look for osmosis....
and pure distilled or R/O with nutes will shoot ph down hard.


i live in a country where water quality is very good, we got ph about 7.2-7.4

and EC 0.2


and thats the pure tap water, in fact when i m growing in coco i need to use a little cal-mag supplement but youre right thats not because the nutes doesnt contain enough cal-mag or anything else less, its just the fact that



i have the false nutrients for my tap water because theyre counting with EC 0.5+ easy, in their scheme.. (tap water)


PS: well i dont know if there were especially nutes for R/O water which could balance the whole ph system
 
Last edited:

andl

Member
the thing is...


if youre using pure R/O or distilled water you simply got nearly no ions to bind with so if you put just a tiny drop of ph+ or ph- into (acid or base) you shoot the ph up or down A LOT, thats why people say you should use water EC 0.2-0.4 best.
thats why they mix a little bit of tap water into.


also if youre watering your plants with pure R/O /distilled water you will kill your plants (whitout nutes of course), just look for osmosis....
and pure distilled or R/O with nutes will shoot ph down hard.


i live in a country where water quality is very good, we got ph about 7.2-7.4

and EC 0.2


and thats the pure tap water, in fact when i m growing in coco i need to use a little cal-mag supplement but youre right thats not because the nutes doesnt contain enough cal-mag or anything else less, its just the fact that



i have the false nutrients for my tap water because theyre counting with EC 0.5+ easy, in their scheme.. (tap water)


ok sorry i need to quote myself because i found this hydro scheme one of the best i ve ever seen, which means it fits in to my expierences as close as possible.


i use it for coco,not the nutes just the scheme for EC, PH and so on i also like in this scheme, cause they tell you to use diffrent mixtures depending on your tap water EC, but just have a look:
 

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Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
the thing is...


if youre using pure R/O or distilled water you simply got nearly no ions to bind with so if you put just a tiny drop of ph+ or ph- into (acid or base) you shoot the ph up or down A LOT, thats why people say you should use water EC 0.2-0.4 best.
thats why they mix a little bit of tap water into.
This makes zero sense. Your water does not need ions to bind with. In fact, there are a number of common tap/well water elements which bind to your nutrients. This puts them in a state your plants cannot use. Not helpful.

What happens when you use clean water and add nutrients? You get clean nutrients which behave the same way, every time they're in the same conditions.

also if youre watering your plants with pure R/O /distilled water you will kill your plants (whitout nutes of course), just look for osmosis....
and pure distilled or R/O with nutes will shoot ph down hard.
Sorry, but I've been using r/o for over 15 years with hydro and cannabis. Of course your pH drops like a rock, it's **supposed** to because you're adding nutrients. This is what pH "up" is for. I have a 1 quart bottle of GH pH down, and I've had it for about 5 years now. That's how little pH down I use. lol (read the pH link in my signature...)

i live in a country where water quality is very good, we got ph about 7.2-7.4

and EC 0.2
Great water for vegetables, and I would still use an r/o machine.

PS: well i dont know if there were especially nutes for R/O water which could balance the whole ph system
There is no imbalance with r/o, only missing information in the grower's education. R/o works with all nutrients.
 

Growcephus

Member
Veteran
I would argue that the "best" option is to go with RO water, as it's a clean slate and you can add your nutes and ph it as needed.

As an experiment, I would try using your tap water with a plant or two, with nutes, and without adjusting the ph. You might be surprised to find your plants do fine, and you can save yourself time and money by not having to ph it and just add your nutes.

Luck, regardless.
 

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
Yes, the cleanest cannabis comes from starting with clean water. Only add what's going to be used. I'll skip the tap water experiment, I know cannabis too well. ;)
 

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