Will using vinegar to reduce my pH be harmful for my plants?

I have a DWC cloner I built. I know the pH has to be in the 5-6 area, but I can't find any pH down anywhere in town. I've heard of people using vinegar to lower pH, but will using as much vinegar as it takes to get pH down to that low be harmful to my clones?

I always use vinegar and its fine in dwc. Dont need too much either i use a capful to drop each 1 PH in about 25l of water

Sweet, thanks!

whoskii said:

I have a DWC cloner I built. I know the pH has to be in the 5-6 area, but I can't find any pH down anywhere in town. I've heard of people using vinegar to lower pH, but will using as much vinegar as it takes to get pH down to that low be harmful to my clones?

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You can adjust a solutions pH down with any acid. It's finding one pot can live with in solution for our tasks. Ask about citric acid. Comes dry in powder form and is mixed with water (we use RO in medicine). Virtually anything compatible with human life is not going to harm pot chemically. Citric acid is cheap, safe and easy to store. It is one of the components of pH Down along with phosphoric acid and and ammonium fertilizer component. Vinegar is OK but don't think it isn't strong because it's in your kitchen cabinet.

i have never used vineger for ph down i buy ph down at the pet store but i heard it has no buffering qualitys so it wont relly last long from what i heard i hope im wrong though good luck

I had very poor results using vinegar. Don't kid yourself about its buffering capabilities though. Used in hemodialysis to acid clean dialysis machines nightly by circulating through the circuits that handle the acid/bicarb mixtures used for dialysis. Plain old store bought vinegar.

stickyicky0420 said:

i have never used vineger for ph down i buy ph down at the pet store but i heard it has no buffering qualitys so it wont relly last long from what i heard i hope im wrong though good luck

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Yep i find i do need to adjust it daily sometimes but I have done grows right through using white vinegar and never had issues with it.

That's good to know, I have used it my self, so far no problem but my scale only goes to 6.8 and up to 8.3.