two pH questions

[sivic]

I just redid my 55gallon tank with a big piece of driftwood and eco complete substrate. My question is i read alot about people having pH crashes after having eco complete in. How long would it take to notice the crash or would it be apparant from the beginning? Also i read around that driftwood naturally lowers pH, how long does that take to notice?

The reasons im wondering this are i have all my fish in an old hexagon aquarium while i planned to wait out the crash in my 55 gallon. But my pH has been stable for the past 2-3 days at pretty much the same level as its always been without the driftwood or ecocomplete. Does this mean i shouldnt experience a crash or does it mean it might not happen and i can safely put my fish back in. Im going on vacation on monday for a week so i need to figure out if im going to put the fish back in or leave them where they are.

 

[reiverix]

If I remember correctly the problem with a large batch of eco was that it was raising the pH and KH rather than lowering them. This would buffer your water making a crash very unlikely. I remember some posts a month or two ago where eco was raising the KH almost instantly. I just set up a small 20g paladarium last weekend and used two bags of eco. My water is testing fine.

 

[sivic]

so should it be safe to put all my fish in? or should i just let it sit a week?

 

[phanmc]

Like Reiverix, I've only heard of a certain batch of Eco-Complete raising Ph and Kh, not causing a crash. And like Reiverix, I've just used 2 bags of Eco-Complete without it messing with the water parameters. If it did raise or lower the Ph, you'd notice it almost immediately.

 

[sivic]

So what about driftwood? You've both informed me about the eco complete, so that takes care of that question, but how long would it take to notice a drop from the driftwood?

Would be be worse for the fish to be dropped from a high pH in the other tank to a different pH in the new tank? or would it be better for them to be in it while it slowy changes?

 

[phanmc]

Whether your driftwood affects your water parameters depends on your water's Kh. If the Kh is high, you're probably not going to see any change in Ph. If the Kh is low, you should see a slight drop in Ph within a day (depending on how big or how much driftwood is present).