Ph and ppm

Does anyone have any recommendations for a good ph and ppm meter? I will be running a 4 bucket RDWC system with a wall of controls for temp and humidity control, I am open to using a manual style meter, however am somewhat of a digital freak so having something that shows my readings at a glance would surely hold an advantage. The big one is quality and reliability, I don’t mind calibrating my meters but really don’t want to do it every time I turn around and not have faith in my meter like now. Anyone out there using a system they are super happy with? Just wanting some feed back from the crew

ph Hanna Instruments HI98103 is like $35 and it works. Regardless of price they are all going to break within a year is my experience/luck so I stopped buying the expensive ones. If you are only running a 4 bucket system I would not invest in tools that are meant for larger systems.

DaFreak said:

ph Hanna Instruments HI98103 is like $35 and it works. Regardless of price they are all going to break within a year is my experience/luck so I stopped buying the expensive ones. If you are only running a 4 bucket system I would not invest in tools that are meant for larger systems.

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Ok I appreciate that, but I am always considering if I upgrade, how do you feel about the ones that simply have a probe in the water 24/7? I don’t like the ones that automatically adjust the ph, I’m always thinking worse case and it dumps a whole jug of ph up into my plants due to a malfunction. But do like the idea of reading at a glance

Hippieryan said:

Ok I appreciate that, but I am always considering if I upgrade, how do you feel about the ones that simply have a probe in the water 24/7? I don’t like the ones that automatically adjust the ph, I’m always thinking worse case and it dumps a whole jug of ph up into my plants due to a malfunction. But do like the idea of reading at a glance

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Have you ever tried one of these units with the probe made by blue lab that only requires calibration once per month? Or is it a waist of $500 bucks

I haven't used them. I've run 100 gallon systems plenty of times but the hand ones always were fine. I am all for speeding up everything with gardening but never felt the need to speed that up for some reason.

DaFreak said:

I haven't used them. I've run 100 gallon systems plenty of times but the hand ones always were fine. I am all for speeding up everything with gardening but never felt the need to speed that up for some reason.

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Much appreciated, I am the same and don’t mind doing it, in fact I enjoy it, I just am on the toad a lot and know with my wireless camera I could view the readings, which is a bonus when I’m away,

Hippieryan said:

Much appreciated, I am the same and don’t mind doing it, in fact I enjoy it, I just am on the toad a lot and know with my wireless camera I could view the readings, which is a bonus when I’m away,

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Lol, what would you do if you saw it was off? Some things are better not knowing.

I have the Hanna groline combo meter with the cord and probe and love it, was my most recent meter purchase. I think it was a couple hundred bucks. I also have the blue lab combo meter with the two probes. It worked good for years, the black wire attached to the pH probe frayed over time and I had to replace the probe a few times because of that. Meter worked great tho.

I had an older Hanna combo meter before these two and really like the one probe design so that's why I searched for this one. The Hanna is also easy to calibrate as it has a quick cal solution that calibrates everything with one solution. The blue lab is prob not hard if your good at technology. I honestly had the store calibrate mine the majority of the time when I went for other items.

I really love the idea of having it show a display all the time. But the more I think about it and posts I have reviewed, I’m not sure if this is possible. I would be installing this in a RDWC system and with constant flow of water I’m not sure if I would be getting accurate readings. Can anyone give me some feed back on this?

Hippieryan said:

I really love the idea of having it show a display all the time. But the more I think about it and posts I have reviewed, I’m not sure if this is possible. I would be installing this in a RDWC system and with constant flow of water I’m not sure if I would be getting accurate readings. Can anyone give me some feed back on this?

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Sorry I should have put this in my initial post, I just remembered now that I had saw something about readings in even water with a air stone in it?

I'm sure it's possible they make inline ones that can be installed into a pipe that has moving water. I've seen em used with the dosatron system and I believe they were blue lab brand.

Blue Lab guardian or combo meter. Neither one cares if the water is circulating.

Cinco said:

Blue Lab guardian or combo meter. Neither one cares if the water is circulating.

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Holy crap they don’t give that girl away do they, not that I expect a cheap price tag, usually when you get a good product, you get for what you pay for

If you grow in soil or coco, do yourself a favor and get a pH meter that will read soil and liquids like the blue lab soil pen.

Renfro said:

If you grow in soil or coco, do yourself a favor and get a pH meter that will read soil and liquids like the blue lab soil pen.

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I just grow in water,, not much of a soil guy

Hippieryan said:

I just grow in water,, not much of a soil guy

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Cool beans. My favorite and most used pH meter is my Apera. I have the PH60S (Spear Probe) but their PH60 for liquids only is just as good. You get the extra point of precision and the meter stabilizes the reading faster than my blue lab or other's.

Whatever pH meter you get, make sure to store the probe in the KCl storage solution. Most problems people have with quality pH meters is due to improper storage of the probe between uses. You can make your own KCl solution on the cheap if you are so inclined.

You would think they would make some bad ass pen with a real storage solution cap. I basically want a bottle of the stuff as a cap.

DaFreak said:

You would think they would make some bad ass pen with a real storage solution cap. I basically want a bottle of the stuff as a cap.

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Apera PH60S. the spear probe cap holds a good amount of solution, screws on with an o-ring seal. I carry it in my pocket a lot and it doesn't leak.

Pictures show that probe being used for sushi, cheese and oranges. Can it be used in pro-mix?