Water ph level changes in hours

[swe666]

I have a bucket with plain tap water that has been conditioned to the ph level I want, around 5.5-6.0 and when I came back approximately 12 hours later, the ph level had changed to 7??!? Why is the ph level changing when only a tiny fraction of the water has evaporated? Maybe I am missing something obvious but I cannot see what it is.

[BioloGyMaJor]

alrighty ill take a shot at this one based on past situations but im not sure if my two ideas are 100% correct.


But if i had to take a shot at it, i would say its either


a) your tap water ph reading was 5-6.0 when there was a large amount of chlorine in the water. but after the chlorine dissolved the pH spiked for this reason.

or

b) water is a really efficient chemical. maybe the pH lvl was checked at first when water was put in, but over the 12 hour period the water went through a simple Diffusion process. diffusion is the movement of particles from an area of high concentration equalize to an area with lower concentration in order to balance itself and reach equilibrium. therefore your initial pH measurement could have been bogus.


if i were you, i would try to keep a nice growth chart
and write down your readings and temperatures and other stuff and over a series of time you could solve your problem with consistencys


holla back whoooop whoooo

[Yero]

carbonic acid coming out of solution? lol i have no clue man

[swe666]

Thanks for the response, I think there may be too much chlorine in the water based on what I've heard, but I need to test it to confirm. The tap water has ph 7 so I lowered it and then it jumped back up so its weird

[BioloGyMaJor]

i know that in my 7 gallon res the pH will jump to about 6.5 sometimes for no reason. my plants are in seedling stage and i havent even started feeding them, but when i check the pH its always higher then it was. i think its the amount of oxygen in the water or certain acids get disolved or dilluted in the water.
just get some pH down. and your set. you can get it at walmart for aquariums i think api makes it