# I gave up on Ph meters



## zem (Feb 28, 2015)

I am today officially the unluckiest Ph meter consumer in the world. It is the 3rd defective meter that i have bought through my years of planting. I yet have to succeed in testing my ph with a meter. first one was a milwaukee, electrode was dead, i had it changed, the new one was the same, it worked when the shop gave me a new one, but it must have had a very long shelf life so it just died too, and i could not return it. second was a Hanna combo meter tds/ph which also did not properly check the PH. by then i had my hand on a very good TDS meter which is still operational. so yesterday i received a delivery of a PH meter, from a local company, a new brand that they had, the name will mean nothing to you as i'm sure that it is not international, anyway, it is autocalibrating and comes with 3 buffer solutions a very nice packaging and so I was very happy, until I tried it, and BAM! it wouldn't read anything right and it would not calibrate and the guy had previously told me that it was the last in his stock. I couldn't wait to resend by mail, this morning i drove there, they opened and found the faulty circuit inside! got a full refund and came back here, feeling nauseated from what had happened.

I took my Sera PH drop test and tried it on the buffer solutions, it is great! i tried heating and cooling the buffers and the color change of the Sera drops is still perfect. I know that this color reading is more accurate than these electronic PH testers, any pocket ph meter, i just don't trust them any more. I know that most growers swear that ph drops don't work, and I have tried at least 3 other brands that fail miserably in any reading. Sera is German, and is damn perfect. I swear by it, it is flawless, the change between 5.5 and 6 is difficult to detect only for a complete color blind. If I had to buy a PH meter I guess that it would be from their brand too. (yes they have ph meters too)  I think that a pocket PH meter would not read as accurate after the first few months. I think that many growers think that they can read their PH when really they are off the correct ph level. I don't know what those Germans added to their drops, to make so much change in color with ever 0.5PH change. 6.0 is plain yellow and 5.5 is plain orrange, and i mean lemon yellow and orange orange. i never miss to hit the orangish yellow which should be anything between 5.6 and 5.8, and which is what I want and need. If I had not been able to get this accuracy with these drops, then I guess that I would not have been able to grow such great consecutive grows of weed and all kinds of veggies, with only one reliable method of H testing and that is Sera PH test drops.


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## Dman1234 (Feb 28, 2015)

I also find these things to be completely unreliable, I have bought them for anywhere between $30 to $90 dollars and if they work at all it is short lived, im thinking i have to go big and buy a bluelab but with so many failures I cant imagine spending that kind of money only to have it fail. Very frustrating.


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## zem (Feb 28, 2015)

Exactly Dman. try this, https://www.sera.de/en/products/in_category/einzeltests-5589/product/sera-ph-test.html it will serve as a great backup way to check PH and to me it serves the full purpose. I actually use 2 drops in 2.5ml most of the times and not 4 into 5m because i have 8 res's that i have to keep checking, and i don't even shake the drops bottle as recommended by the manufacturer and they NEVER failed me. I mean NEVER. if you're dropping it into the same solution, it will keep changing into the exact same color no matter how many times you try. put 100 samples next to each others and compare them, the color will be the same. take the ph pens, and read, i bet that the reading will vary way more. I have concluded that Sera drops are more reliable that most ph pocket meters. I would probably only change if I ever go commercial, otherwise I am fully happy with this cheap reliable method, a dropper mini bottle that i can throw anywhere, it has a great safety cap, never leaks, never expires, i get it for 6.6$ it serves me for more than a year, and i have all this testing to do, before that, when i only grew weed, and no veggies, it would remain for years. i am on the 4th bottle in 12-13 years growing because at first, they would never finish lol. i would get the second before the first had finished, and compared the change in color after years on my shelf, and again, it was always the same so no apparent expiry or degradation.


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## Dr. Green Fang (Feb 28, 2015)

Bluelab is amazing  Hanna's are finicky, but heard good things about Milwaukee...sorry about your unfortunate events. 

Snag yourself a Bluelabs pen, and call it good. These things are amazing.  I want to get the $300 one that tests all the things.


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## zem (Feb 28, 2015)

and how long is the expected lifetime of a blue lab? I will not buy these online, as it seems that they are not refundable and you have high risk of faulty items. eseasongear state that they will not refund an open and tried meter, or international orders. i think that if i buy a blue lab, that i will get a faulty one too lol


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## Kraven (Feb 28, 2015)

I got me a Chinese knock-off a couple of years ago, cant break the thing, it's dead on or if it needs calibrating it calibrates nicely. I do it once a month and only have to adjust it two or three times a year. It was $7 USD and it does not even have a brand on it, it's just yellow and it looks cheap. I guess I got all your mojo Zem. Hope I don't have your kind of troubles when I have to get a new one. Better luck :stuff-1125699181_i_


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## Locked (Feb 28, 2015)

I have had this meter for probably 3-4 years now and it still works great. All I do is replace the Probe like once a year. Probe costs like 35 bucks. 

http://hydrobuilder.com/ph-hand-met...ZKCYnptCQ1HVB-SpcXmyEs2T7A_UaXTa9LhoC1Nbw_wcB


View attachment sm100_big.jpg


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## zem (Feb 28, 2015)

Kravenhead said:


> I got me a Chinese knock-off a couple of years ago, cant break the thing, it's dead on or if it needs calibrating it calibrates nicely. I do it once a month and only have to adjust it two or three times a year. It was $7 USD and it does not even have a brand on it, it's just yellow and it looks cheap. I guess I got all your mojo Zem. Hope I don't have your kind of troubles when I have to get a new one. Better luck :stuff-1125699181_i_



oh man I wish that my story with ph meters was so happy. a 7$ ph meter that worked for 2 years, I would love t see its pic. never seen a 7$ph meter lol


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## next (Feb 28, 2015)

I'm with Hamster Lewis, I have a Milwaukee MW101, only had it a few weeks but seems to be working great. The reason i'm with Hamster Lewis is that it has the same type of electrode. The others i've tried don't seem to last very long..


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## Joe420Camel (Mar 1, 2015)

I feel ya zem!!
my pH has been off and my plant was NOT happy!!

My solution was "more" not better.

Obviously these things aren't dead-on accurate so with 3 or so "samples" I can get a feel for where the average pH is and move on from there.

good luck!!
:48:


PS 
how did/do you keep the "yellow ones" wet?
I put storage solution in the cap like the rest but it all wicks-out, evaporates off and leaves the dissolved (salts?) behind. 

View attachment PICT1217.jpg


View attachment PICT1245.jpg


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## The Hemp Goddess (Mar 1, 2015)

Zem, if the strips are working for you and the meters are not, use the strips.  Not every grower is going to use the same methods.  Part of learning to grow is learning what works for you.

Could you provide a link?  The only ones I could find only tested from 6.0 to 9.0 and is sold as an aquarium supply.


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## zem (Mar 1, 2015)

The Hemp Goddess said:


> Zem, if the strips are working for you and the meters are not, use the strips.  Not every grower is going to use the same methods.  Part of learning to grow is learning what works for you.
> 
> Could you provide a link?  The only ones I could find only tested from 6.0 to 9.0 and is sold as an aquarium supply.



THG not the strips, but a certain brand of PH drops and that is Sera made in Germany. I tried many drops, none worked and I mean none. this brand is flawless, i actually tried cooling the solution in the fridge and heating the other on the radiator, then tested no change in reading. this is it https://www.sera.de/en/products/in_category/einzeltests-5589/product/sera-ph-test.html this is from their main company, they don't do retail but you can find it on ebay or elsewhere, i get mine for 7$ from local aquarium store. they have a ph meter that looks great, but pricey, in the 200s


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## zem (Mar 1, 2015)

i just looked at their website on the upper right you can enter a city and it will look up all retailers that have their brand, and it seems like there are many retailers in the US that have it


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## Kraven (Mar 1, 2015)

Here they are, got both at the same ebay knock-off seller. When they came they just came with the covers and a small screwdriver to calibrate. I bought some 7.0 and like I said about three time's a year I have to calibrate, it get's off by .1 sometimes. Have used it against a few others ( friends) and our readings are always the same. I think I just got lucky. I bought them about 2.5 years ago when I wanted to start pH'ing my tap water and nutes while in soil. I switched over from stored rain water. Only thing I have had to do is replace the batteries about 3 months ago.


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## zem (Mar 1, 2015)

Joe420 the one that i got and returned is almost exactly as your middle blue pack one exact same just that it's orange where yours is blue with auto cal button and a good blue package. trash...


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## zem (Mar 1, 2015)

kravenhead i think that you did get lucky and you're also probably doing something right in maintaining them


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## Kraven (Mar 1, 2015)

zem said:


> kravenhead i think that you did get lucky and you're also probably doing something right in maintaining them



Only thing I do is rinse them after each use and put the storage cap on. I heard somewhere you were supposed to keep them in a 7.0 solution but I figured it would be my luck the it would wick up the water into the electronics and kill it  so I have just tried to keep it clean, and that's all I do ?


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## Dr. Green Fang (Mar 1, 2015)

I rinse before and after in a red solo cup of water that I change out every few days. And then I store in 4.0 solution in the bottom of another red solo cup. I store my PPM meter in straight water as well.


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## Kraven (Mar 1, 2015)

Hmmm never stored mine "wet". Seems to me the humidity alone could eventually cause erosion in the circuit board especially if there are dissolved salts in the ambient air? I'm really curious now, which is the best way to take care of them?


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## Dr. Green Fang (Mar 1, 2015)

Bluelabs are waterproof, along with a bunch of other meters.
General rule of thumb is;  "If it dries, it dies."   I've heard to never ever let the electrode dry out. The circuit board should not be around the area of the electrode I do not believe, regardless of waterproof / non-waterproof :aok:


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## next (Mar 1, 2015)

my ppm meter says to store dry, ph meter wants to be kept wet.. depends on what you have, I usualy check the instruction book or the manufacturers website


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## Locked (Mar 1, 2015)

You don't want the ph probes to dry out. I don't store them in solution because I use my ph meter almost everyday.  I just make sure the last thing I ph is my water and then flick any excess water off and cap it.  Been doing this forever and my probes usually last close to a year.


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## sopappy (Mar 4, 2015)

I'm going to jump in here because I have started to see consistent results and nothing, I mean nothing ticks me off more then taking a reading and then 5 minutes later taking the same reading and the number is different. I actually lost it and threw my last $90- meter against a wall. Dumb. 
Now that I'm trying hydro, I dropped $200- on a this Milwaukee. I calibrated as instructed and pried off the knobs as they were too easy to nudge.
The cap holds a bit of water and the orange sponge thing (I almost threw it away) to keep it wet. 
The probe has two slits in the end and I rinse it by letting water flow through the slits and the flip it over to flow the other way through the slits and I keep doing this until it reads the pH of my tap water 8.7 then I take a reading, it takes a couple seconds but it will stabilize and I trust that number.  
I do that rinse under the tap every time, before and after every reading.
It is CONSISTENT.
I figure when I don't see my tap water at 8.7, it'll be time to re calibrate.
I always have water in that cap that fits snugly over the probe.
I suppose this looks like a plug for the meter, it isn't. I'm just thinking that rinsing is critical and I do notice it takes awhile longer to get to 8.7 if I've used it in a nutrient solution.

I just wanted to add that temperature plays a role in this too. I was perplexed when rinsing one day: Global warming and all, the tap water was so cold, I thought it might damage the probe so I turned both taps on for the rinse and found I was seeing 8.4 and thought okay, here we go, more voodoo... and then I turned off the hot and it moved to the usual 8.7 

View attachment meter 001.jpg


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## zem (Mar 5, 2015)

hey there sopappy, if it makes you feel better, I think that the throwing it against the wall gesture was fully justified


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## sopappy (Mar 5, 2015)

I must confess, it is very satisfying in the moment especially when the pos explodes into all those pieces but then the remorse over the 90 bucks kicks in and I generally feel pretty sheepish cleaning it all up.


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## zem (Nov 11, 2016)

sooo, old thread, I just wanted to update it and tell you how i solved my ph problem, and that is by buying a brand new bluelab ph pen, it was just above 100$ over 1 year ago, the other day, i was hopeless from it, i thought it was so slow to give a reading that it must be almost dead, so i decided to go a bit more thorough on the cleaning with toothbrush and dish soap, then calibrated and hydrated it overnight, i was so surprised to see it back to its original speed, actually i can swear that it was never that fast  I consider every day above 1 year on a probe to be a good lifetime, and i think that this probe will last a while longer. It is a very high quality piece and i love it.


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## yarddog (Nov 11, 2016)

thank you zem, for the info. i am using an el-cheapo yellow one, i have an old one that was getting very slow. i'll give cleaning it a try.


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## sopappy (Nov 25, 2016)

zem said:


> sooo, old thread, I just wanted to update it and tell you how i solved my ph problem, and that is by buying a brand new bluelab ph pen, it was just above 100$ over 1 year ago, the other day, i was hopeless from it, i thought it was so slow to give a reading that it must be almost dead, so i decided to go a bit more thorough on the cleaning with toothbrush and dish soap, then calibrated and hydrated it overnight, i was so surprised to see it back to its original speed, actually i can swear that it was never that fast  I consider every day above 1 year on a probe to be a good lifetime, and i think that this probe will last a while longer. It is a very high quality piece and i love it.



Maintenance dudes, maintenance. After every session, I swish my probe around in vinegar and rinse it under the tap. I take good care of my Milwaukee too, I store the clean probe in de-mineralized or distilled water.


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## zem (Nov 25, 2016)

sopappy I worry that vinegar might hurt the probe, also it is not recommended to store in distilled water, the right storage solution is normally KCl but i don't know the effect of any if these


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## Hushpuppy (Nov 25, 2016)

I have 2 containers full of water. one is a solo cup of straight water that I use for rinsing my probe. The second container is a measuring cup that I keep Kcl solution in for storing my pen. I never put my cap back on anymore. I just keep it in the cup of Kcl solution when i'm not using it. I rinse and dry off the extra water every time I pull it out and then rinse it again before putting it back in the "storage" cup. This has proven to give my pH pen long life and accuracy. Doing this method, I only have to recalibrate every couple months.


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## Budlight (Nov 25, 2016)

I've used a combination between a try  metre and a Hannah pH pen I've had both of them for about six years use the trimeter off and on but I have used my Hanna consistently whether it was for growing or in my hot tub never used anything to store them other then dry them off and put the cap back on the Hana  The trimeter I've never had to clean it or put a cap on it to store it and has always worked well the  Hanna  was great too until I dropped it and broke the glass bulb but it is only 50 bucks to replace  still in replacement of the house or not I've been using one of these cheap yellow ones they were a pain in the *** to dial in but once you get it dialled in  Took me about a half an hour seems like the little adjustment knob on the back kept moving seems to work pretty well you just have to turn it off and on in between each reading


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## sopappy (Nov 26, 2016)

zem said:


> sopappy I worry that vinegar might hurt the probe, also it is not recommended to store in distilled water, the right storage solution is normally KCl but i don't know the effect of any if these



so far, so good re the vinegar but it gets rinsed under running water immediately
I use de-mineralized when there but will settle for distilled, again, seems okay so far, been months
what is KCl ?

nevermind, I keep forgetting it's 2016
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CJIDH7Y/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I'm not sold on that stuff. I read a comment about a build-up on the probe after awhile.
I don't think my vinegar wash or de-mineralized will hurt anything.


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## sopappy (Nov 26, 2016)

Hushpuppy said:


> I have 2 containers full of water. one is a solo cup of straight water that I use for rinsing my probe. The second container is a measuring cup that I keep Kcl solution in for storing my pen. I never put my cap back on anymore. I just keep it in the cup of Kcl solution when i'm not using it. I rinse and dry off the extra water every time I pull it out and then rinse it again before putting it back in the "storage" cup. This has proven to give my pH pen long life and accuracy. Doing this method, I only have to recalibrate every couple months.



I just read a comment about that stuff evaporating fast, watch you don't end up with a dry probe. I found mine like that, sitting in a dry jar, freaked. But it seemed to have survived. 
Every time I've gone to calibrate mine, it's been okay. Do you find you actually have to adjust every 3 months or are you just confirming?


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## zem (Nov 26, 2016)

my bluelab pen is now 14 months old, i use it several times per day, which i think keeps the probe active, and it is working like a charm


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## Hushpuppy (Nov 26, 2016)

Mine is a Bluelab pH pen. It actually has a calibrate reminder that tells me once a month or so to calibrate it. It is rarely off by more than a tenth. 

The Kcl(potassium chloride) does climb out onto the pen a lot because it precipitates as the water evaporates. I just rinse the precipitate off each time and periodically add a little fresh water back to keep the pen well submerged.


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## Hushpuppy (Nov 26, 2016)

If you look close at the center of the pic, you can see my Bluelab pen sitting in a measuring glass. You can see some of the potassium salt climbing up the side of the pen. I ignore it until it gets a little thick then I rinse it off in the red cup that is sitting in the tape roll. Tape rolls are great for keeping cups of water from getting knocked over  

View attachment IMG_20161116_134036453_HDR.jpg


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## Hushpuppy (Nov 26, 2016)

Red cup in foreground is solution from the rez that I was fixin to check. Yeti cup is mountain dew, my other addiction. 

I just have to keep repeating to myself... don't drink from the red cup :doh:


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## sopappy (Nov 26, 2016)

Hushpuppy said:


> If you look close at the center of the pic, you can see my Bluelab pen sitting in a measuring glass. You can see some of the potassium salt climbing up the side of the pen. I ignore it until it gets a little thick then I rinse it off in the red cup that is sitting in the tape roll. Tape rolls are great for keeping cups of water from getting knocked over



the tape roll trick, cute, but I still see evidence of spills there 
I am frankly amazed I haven't electrocuted myself yet,
water and electricity... what was I thinking!??!?

I'm not sitting my probe in that stuff, I bet it's planned obsolescence.
What is the ppm when it's sitting in that solution. I bet it ain't zero.
I don't want any parts on my probe in storage.

wow, I got 4 bags out of this tiny deceptive little nugget


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## sopappy (Nov 26, 2016)

Hushpuppy said:


> Red cup in foreground is solution from the rez that I was fixin to check. Yeti cup is mountain dew, my other addiction.
> 
> I just have to keep repeating to myself... don't drink from the red cup :doh:



Rosebud is partial to Thrive, 
I don't eat, drink, or smoke near the plants. I used to use a painters jump suit but that just got silly.


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## zem (Nov 27, 2016)

HP I have the same pen, strange, I never knew it has a calibration reminder, i went well more than a month without calibration, under it inside the tin is some storage and calibration fluids inside closed containers, which give the container weight, i have it all wrapped in a sandwich plastic bag so to minimise evaporation 

View attachment 20161127_070720.jpg


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## SHOT (Nov 27, 2016)

Dam zem, hardluck. I really miss u and miss this forum but for now i'm searching for a good seedbank that accepts credit cards from my country&#55357;&#56834;&#55357;&#56834;. Best of luck


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## zem (Nov 27, 2016)

hey Shot, long time, how have you been? My problem with ph is now solved and my luck changed but thanks. I guess you can pay with most major cards like visa and master? Attitude, Seedsman, are a couple i know of


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## zem (Nov 27, 2016)

hp, let me ask you, is it possible for you to give me the tds or ec reading for the bluelab kcl storage solution? for 13$/100ml, i guess it is worth to diy and get a decent amount. dry kcl is cheap, i would like to do that but im out of kcl solution, using ph4/ph7 buffers mix at 5.8, i use that for storage, would help to know ppm even ph of brand new kcl solution


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## SHOT (Nov 29, 2016)

I was busy studying and working. Now i have more time to grow. The bad thing that there's not any website that accepts credit cards from my country for now. I will see what should i do...


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## zem (Nov 29, 2016)

SHOT said:


> I was busy studying and working. Now i have more time to grow. The bad thing that there's not any website that accepts credit cards from my country for now. I will see what should i do...



Shot, take a look http://www.seedsman.com/en/payment-information
This company offers every kind of payment possibility including cash, money transfers, prepaid visa cards, bitcoin, and all except paypal. They also have a huge variety of seeds, you can contact them by email, they reply to your demands


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## SHOT (Nov 29, 2016)

Lets give it a try &#55357;&#56833; thank u


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