# Water paramater testing.



## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

Hi All,

I have read a lot on the forums and elsewhere, but just want a quick confirmation that I am buying the right things before I spend any money please. My tank is not yet set-up, that will be happening in the next month or so after a house move takes place, but I want to have everything I need before I start.

First up, I know I need to measure PH to do my profile, so the intention was to invest in a decent Hana PH pen as Clive and others have recommended these in other threads. I have my eye on these:

http://hannainst.co.uk/ph/pocket-water-resistant-ec-ph-and-tds-low-range-tester.html

http://hannainst.co.uk/ph/pocket-water-resistant-ec-ph-and-tds-high-range-tester.html

Do I need the high range or the low range version please?

I chose this pen as it also measures TDS and I see people talk about the TDS regularly, so figure it's something it will be useful to be able to measure. If I can measure TDS, do I also need to buy something to measure GH and KH? I frequently see these figures discussed, but I also see people say not to waste money on test kits, so do I need to go buy something like the Nutrafin GH\KH test kit, or is there something more reliable I need to measure these or do I just not bother at all?

Am I right in the belief that all the testing and monitoring I will need is covered by the above items plus a drop checker?

Thanks in advance!

Wisey.


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## Julian (3 Jan 2015)

I dont think it's worth spending that kind of money on something you will only use for a few days to get your CO2 in check. Not sure what benefit a TDS meter will have either, these are more for Marine tanks I thought?

I'd recommend the cheap £6 yellow pH pens from ebay. I bought one the other day and it does the job well. Not sure how long it will last though.


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

Reading through other threads, people say that the cheap Chinese PH pens from ebay are crap and you can't rely on the readings.


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## Julian (3 Jan 2015)

Not if you invest in calibration fluid. I've been checking mine every day for the past 4 days and it hasn't needed re-calibrating since the initial setup.


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

In this thread:

http://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/ph-pens-and-low-kh.33920/

Big Clown says that that the cheap Chinse pens are rubbish compared to his Hanna one and Clive recommends the Hanna too.

If measuring my PH is important to get my CO2 right, then I want to know I am measuring it as accurately as possible and I really don't believe that something for 6 quid from ebay is going to give me as good a result. No offence intended, but I trust Clive on this one and would rather invest in a decent Hanna pen. My main question on the Hanna pens was do I need the high or low range version and is the TDS meter worth having?


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## Andy Thurston (3 Jan 2015)

My yellow one couldnt be calibrated after a month and i lost faith in it. So i bought the hi 98129. I could have bought 2 decent meters that would cover ph/tds for about £60 but i couldnt find anywhere that sold replacement electrodes for those 
If your planning on keeping shrimp the meter will be used fairly frequently too


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

Thanks, I'll probably go with the 98129 as well then. Initially I will probably only have Amano shrimp, but may want to add other shrimp later.


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

Just looked up on Scottish Water website and my tap water In Aberdeen is soft, 2.08 German Degrees. Looking forward to testing and seeing what fish will suit, I quite fancied a pair of some sort of dwarf cichlid as feature fish, so with my soft water it sounds like that might work.


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## Andy Thurston (3 Jan 2015)

You might end up adding to that for amano and cherry shrimp and to stabilise your ph pen reading
My kh is around 4 and takes a moment for meter to settle


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

I don't understand enough about all this yet, have been reading but a bit baffled by the science. Was intending to wait and test to see what my water parameters actually are before I do much more research, so I can tailor my research to what I actually have to work with.


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## Andy Thurston (3 Jan 2015)

With a kh of 2 and probably low tds around 30-40ppm 
My tap kh4 tds 70ppm  i've had moulting problems with shrimp mainly cherrys with my tap water


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

I was hoping to just see what came out of my tap and choose appropriate fish, but I do want Amano's to deal with algae, so I guess I'm going to have to understand the science and alter my parameters in some way. I was hoping to keep it simple, but I suppose this forces me to learn and understand how this all works which is no bad thing.


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

Does this mean that keeping Cichlids that like soft water is not possible with Amano's?


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## Julian (3 Jan 2015)

Wisey said:


> In this thread:
> 
> http://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/ph-pens-and-low-kh.33920/
> 
> ...



I'm not disputing that the hanna pens are better and will last longer. I'm saying in all likelihood you will only use that pen for a period of a few weeks at most. I'm fully prepared for my yellow pH pen to die in a couple of weeks but at least it will have done it's job and for a fraction of the cost. I don't agree with the statement that they are not accurate, as I mentioned before, it reads the correct results when placed in pH 4 and 7 calibration fluid. 

May want to check what the shelf life of the Hanna pen is, most expensive probes only last around 12 months.


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## stu_ (3 Jan 2015)

IMO if you're going to try Apisto's, then Amano's are probably the only shrimp that'll last.
I've kept _A.Borelli _with them,as well as _Nannacara Anomala._
The problems with cichlids is that they can get a bit tasty when they have young.
There's also Oto's to consider instead of shrimp.


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## Wisey (3 Jan 2015)

My plan was a combination of Amano and Otto as the first fauna in my aquarium, then once they were settled in, I wanted a shoaling group and some sort of feature fish. Apistos or Kribs or Rams or something like that. I'm open to other suggestions, I just fancied giving the Cichlids a try as I knew my water up here was going to be pretty soft.


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## dw1305 (4 Jan 2015)

Hi all, 





Wisey said:


> My plan was a combination of Amano and Otto as the first fauna in my aquarium, then once they were settled in, I wanted a shoaling group and some sort of feature fish. Apistos or Kribs or Rams or something like that. I'm open to other suggestions, I just fancied giving the Cichlids a try as I knew my water up here was going to be pretty soft.


 Definitely go for _Apistogramma _with soft water. I've never kept Amano shrimps, but _A. cacatuoides _decimated my Cherry Shrimps. 

You can keep any of the _Apistogramma_ species, but have a  look at _A. baenschi or A. panduro._

cheers Darrel


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## Wisey (4 Jan 2015)

Thanks Darrel, I like the look of both of those, especially A. panduro. Quite excited about the prospect of cichlids, it will make me re-think a lot of my plans for the tank, I have twice as much Dragon Stone as I will be able to use, so I will try and create some caves within my scape. I'll have to rethink my other tank makes as well.

One question that has not been answered from my original post is how I go about measuring GH and KH, do I just use the basic test kit for this? Re-reading James' sticky post in this board he states that the test kits for these are good, so I assume the Nutrafin GH/KH kit is what I need, right?


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## GlassWalker (4 Jan 2015)

I've got one of those cheap yellow pH pens. Calibrates and keeps calibration ok. Readings take ages to stabilise if not used for a while though (up to minutes), so you need to keep the tip submersed for a while until it stabilises. I don't know if this is only the pH stuff reacting, or if there is a temperature effect.

If you want freshwater TDS, get one that covers a range of at least 0 to 500ppm or thereabouts. For indication, crystal red shrimps are supposed to be best kept under 150ppm, and my tap water is in the ball park of 350ppm.

For a low cost KH/GH kit, I've used the API combo pack. Out of the box they measure to 1 degree steps, but if you increase the sample size you effectively increase resolution. If you will be targeting a low KH (say less than 2 degrees), you might look elsewhere. There I use a Salifert kit, which has a table to about 0.3 degree steps and you can interpolate if needed.


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## Wisey (4 Jan 2015)

Thanks, I will take a look at the Salifert ones.


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## GreenNeedle (5 Jan 2015)

I use the Salifert kit for KH and the JBL kit for Ph.  Don't use them often.


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