Another PH meter thread. Latest ideas, current shopper.

[tea tree]

Pay day is coming. Time for another ph pen. My first pen was a 20 dollar hanna that I have never gotten to work. Lol, I try and try to calibrate it but I cannot get it. I may be retarded. It might be a peice of crap.

For now I have been using the ph strips. I just checked and the strip came back a funny color. Almost green. That means high. IDK could be old paper.

But I need a ph pen really. It sucks if it says off I am not one to be happy with adding all that acid everyday. But I got to do it.


Any ideas? I am looking in the 60-80 dollar range. I found the ph3 a nice 65$ pen that has 32 dollar replacement probes at american agriculture a hydro store.

Also there is nice one on ebay about the same price, 70$ that says it has replaceble glass and has temp readings too and looks nice.

I am leaning toward the PH3 which is the nicest with readily available replacemnt probes.

Anybody have any ideas?

Anyody get those 20 dollar millawakee pens to work? I also hate those screws that cali. I broke mine on my tds pen the first time and even tho she works she is always 300 points below. lol. THe 70 dollar pen on ebay comes factory calibrated and has push button calibration. That has me sol. I would love to ust put her in the water and check with baited breath I am not at 8.

I noticed a few chlorotic leaves recently and now am in a bind. I got away with being lazy for so long. lol.

 

[tea tree]

the HM model looks like it self calibrates! It is 79 on ebay with free ship. Plus HM makes my tds pen which is a clockwork function. Never needs calibrating. I check and she is always 300 under. I broke the screw lol. Works just fine, just add 300. control wizard makes the ph 3 and yu need a screw to cali. 63 dollars.

 

[tea tree]

bumpity bump.

what would really help would be too know if replacing the glass or the probe is that important. The ph3 is more primitive I see but it has the probe for sale at the same hydro store for 30 dollars free ship and you just unscrew the old one and screw the new one on.

The other has a glass ball of course and it says that I could change it out but they dont offer it readily. I could prob email around.

Funny thing is I dug out my old hanna and tried it. It read water at about 6 and coffee and water at 5 and my buckets both at 6.2. It could be right. I was a little worried about high ph!

I cant find my buffer solutions so I fig I threw them out,

I might have confuses about what point cali it used. One or two or even three like the HM does. Shit. At the time that info was not readily available in all that i read! Just a lot about keeping the meter in solution.

The HM cones with a sponge of 4.0 solution to put in the cap! COol. But my hanna i have kept in a drawer. lol.

Any comments?

 

[tea tree]

got some more info from reading.

I am now looking at the milawaukee ph52 and the ph53. The ph52 calibrates to x.x and the ph53 does x.xx for 10 dollars more. They both auto cali and have replacable electrodes. The company looks pretty good and reputable but I dont know.

Does anyone have any experience with milawaukee and these meters?

 

[tea tree]

alright y'all I am about to buy a meter. My old one is dead and strips are gone, lol, so the laziest hydor grower in the world needs to buy a milawaukee ph 52 or ph 53. The diference is 15 bucks. One meter does the .1 deal and the other does the .02.

So I only need to know 5.8. But is the .1 accuracy good enough? I remmember earl writing something about needing a .02. DO I ?

Please help. I would love to save some money. I have always relies on the nice strips and luck. My previous meter never worked right at all

 

[fatman7574]

alright y'all I am about to buy a meter. My old one is dead and strips are gone, lol, so the laziest hydor grower in the world needs to buy a milawaukee ph 52 or ph 53. The diference is 15 bucks. One meter does the .1 deal and the other does the .02.

So I only need to know 5.8. But is the .1 accuracy good enough? I remmember earl writing something about needing a .02. DO I ?

Please help. I would love to save some money. I have always relies on the nice strips and luck. My previous meter never worked right at all

Earl is a dimwit. He posted how great his Mmerican Marine Pinpoint Meter with a 0.1 resolution was the so great and that it was the most accuratte avilable as it had an accuracy of 0.01 pH points. I told him that he was wrong that it required a pH probe witha 0.01 resolution to supplya accuracy of 0.01. He went ut and bough a 0.01 resolution pH probe and now tells everyone they need a 0.01 resoution or accuracy pH meter.

Unless you are a scientist or a chemist doing a research proju ect on growing mj or you are using a pH contri oller yu do not need the level on resolution and accuracy prvide by a meter and probe czpable of of a resolution of 0.01 pH points. when the tyical allowable swing in pH adjustments is from 5.6 to 5.8 why worry about 0.01 ph points for that 0.2 pH point swing when u your adjsuting the pH by hand.

 

[tea tree]

thanks dude. i was about to ask you that same question in my five gallon dwc thread. i am prob then going with the milawaukee ph52 or the ph55. the black or the white one. it is weird they got seperate lines for these as they are almost the same and the same price but the white one tells temp too. they both have atc and auto cal which i have read is pretty reliable. i almost am looking at the milawaukee sm101 but as you said it is just too much for my needs really. The pen type looks good enough and easier to store in a cup.

i had a hard time finding to many reviews about anything about the diference except that the ph56 got a lot more press. mostly beer sites where the ph 53 and 2 are in good use. one guy had cali probs. HM makes my tds meter and she is indesctructable. but i read two reviews that there 80 dollar meter broke. i still trust it but for 50 bucks i can get the ph52 or ph55 with temp reading and it reads to the 5.8 like i need.

yeah i was about to order when i had a chore materialize. so + rep I sure as hell need every 10 spot these days.

by the way my camera memory card disapeared so no dwc slh update pics as of yet.

 

[fatman7574]

The difference between an ATC meter and a meter that simply give a pH reading and a temperature reading is that the ATC (automatic temperature compensation) meter adjusts the pH to allow for any temperature differences that occur. Usually the temperature in a hydroponic system does not vary enoughfor ATC to be needed. Also an ATC meter needs you to use a pH probe with a built in temperature sensor or a separate additional temp probe to actually use the ATC feature. There are also pH meters that will read the temp but not make an automatic temperature compensation or tsome meters offer both choices. Either way lower end meters (those under around $100) usually supply a cheap gel filled 0.1 reolution probe that does not include a built in temperature sensor. They often advertise what the meter is capable of doing but are deceptive in that they usually hide the fact that you needed a special probe or an additional temperature probe for all meter functions to work. whic will be at an additionalost as an option.

 

[tea tree]

check out the milawaukee ph53 and the milawaukee ph56. These are both hefty pen types that have unscrew replacable electrodes that in the case of the ph56 and 55 at least you can see the temp probe and the replacement probe is 32 bucks or so. So now a day pen meters have readily available replacemnt parts and included peices. i can see the square mters and the pen of cord deals getting confusing. as for the atc I know milawaukee has the sheet with the temps and the ph cali changes that you must make. atc is standard i found out now mostly. i also hate the screws so auto cali is cool cuz my shitty hanna was a punk to work with. screw variety. never read right.

 

[DivinePower]

I run the Hana 98129 and have never had a problem with it. Easy to calibrate and use. I'd recommend it to anyone!

 

[calilivin]

I bought the Milwaukee ph600 and after a few day started noticing plant problems. I diagnosed it as high ph even though I was running my ebb & grow at 5.6. So I bought some buffer 7.0. Come to find out my ph was 6.7 and not 5.6. Thanks a lot quality controler R

So if you buy a Mil 600 and the operator ID says R you might want to recalibrate it Other than that its fine.

 

[TheBoozer]

I bought the Milwaukee ph600 and after a few day started noticing plant problems. I diagnosed it as high ph even though I was running my ebb & grow at 5.6. So I bought some buffer 7.0. Come to find out my ph was 6.7 and not 5.6. Thanks a lot quality controler R

So if you buy a Mil 600 and the operator ID says R you might want to recalibrate it Other than that its fine.

I'm not sure the model but I use a Milwaukee PH reader that be found online for 20 bucks. It's black and yellow. I have two of them due to dropping one in water to many times and it stopped working. I let it dry out and it works fine now. It's pretty accurate as far as I can tell. When I first started with it it had to be calibrated every 2 to 3 days but now it seems to only need to be calibrated every week or two.