Any current kristalon users?

[967]

Just wondering if there's many others out there using yara kristalon dry nutrients?

How do you like it? Opinions on where it could be improved e.g I believe it to be too low in iron so I've been running brown 50/50 with a masterblend clone nutrient. Also my pH comes out low so I have to up it instead of down it like I'd been doing the decade or so prior. Has been suggested to me that mono ammonium phosphate might help here, but I haven't really got that far

How do people find it compared to jacks, masterblend, whatever other cheap dry shit is out there?

Ratios, EC levels, additives or whatever else people might wanna share about their grow...

Or am I one of very few using it in a country where jacks isn't available lol

 

[power puff]

i use their brown with calcinit and some epsom.
50/50 rainwater/tapwater makes my ph around 6.

 

[967]

Tap water here in NZ is like 35ppm or something so is missing the carbonates that buffer it in other parts of the world I'm guessing. It's no big deal really I just use potassium carbonate.. hydroxide wouldn't keep it stable or I was using it wrong or something. With equal parts calcnit or higher it's good, gets low when I start lowering the calcnit mid flower

 

[Ca++]

Potassium and Calcium both prop up your pH. Potassium carbonate has more chance of staying in the tank.
I thought the Brown was pretty high in K. Perhaps you need some chalk to harden your water up.

 

[967]

It is high k, 31.5 elemental. Which did have me considering calcium carbonate instead of potassium carbonate but the K just seemed to be the better option from my research. Another reason MAP seems like it could be beneficial.. bring P up so I can lower base slightly, lowering K slightly which I'm adding back with the K carbonate anyway

I had P deficiency on my first run with it. But was also struggling with potassium hydroxide to keep my pH up, so deficiency could've been the result of a low pH grow

Haven't calculated how much K I'm adding with it, but if Calcium carbonate is fairly effective I might be convinced to trade it out...

 

[967]

I should add I run a low EC, partially as that's what my main strain likes but also ran masterblend clone at that for my first dry run and did much better than any liquid grow I'd done, targeting 1.2 which is actually what the directions say funnily enough. Kristalon is 4.8 P vs 7.8 P elemental with masterblend...

Perhaps I should be running kristalon at a higher EC to circumvent this issue... I'm a small scale grower just getting his toes wet with this shit

Nowhere near optimal environment/lighting etc most of the time so I can't blame my issues on nutrient profile alone...

Two 4 plant vert donuts running a 600W HPS and a 315W CMH each if anyone gives a shit . Yeah I'm old school lol

Shit veges as good as anything else I've tried. Flower game needs a little work...

 

[maggiemay]

This is what I do but I'm no expert seems to work for me

50 / 50 for veg but add 15 gram of calcium sulphate to my 60 litre tank to keep calcium high in my cheap coco keep 50/50

3 weeks flower then I add 4 parts kristalon 1 part magnesium sulphate 1 part mkp and 3 parts calnit

5 weeks down to 4 parts kristalon 1 part magnesium sulphate 1 part mkp 2 parts calnit ,week 6 down to just the 3 parts kristalon 1 part calnit drop the magnesium sulphate and mkp, about 10 gram of calcium sulphate until finish maybe even dropping calnit totally by week 7 depending on how things look

my tap water is good about 60 ppm of mostly calcium carbonate

fulvic until about week 6

Just useing ph test strips and always seems pretty close



60 day strain

 

[Ca++]

It's almost an RO grow. Many would start with calmag, to get it more like tap. Water hardness is usually cal and mag, but not so available. Canna offer a calmag for hardening water, that seems to be something different. Most likely, the stuff that's actually (typically) found in hard water. Them calcium carbonates (chalk) that buffer the pH well. The more, the more buffered. AU are producing the best chalk dust on the doorstep.

If the RO guys don't make it like tap to begin with, they tend to do badly. Unless the feed was actually formulated for RO, and I have not actually seen that in person. Low EC takes us even closer to RO. We need stuff in the tank that's hard to effect. If we use soft water and low EC, then large proportions of what we have, can be taken out by the plants. Usually it's low K leading to low pH, but in this case, it's not. It's low hardness to begin with. That calcium hardness is high pH.

We have had no good talks on this topic, but lost forum member AndyO formulated his pH perfect method using AU chalk. He was very happy, but didn't get to do many runs and share the knowledge

 

[967]

I had a look at their calmag agent SDS and it just seems to be cal nitrate and mag nitrate which is the basis of most calmag is it not? Think I've seen some with calcium chloride too..

So to save the canna tax I could get mag nitrate and make my own to harden my water first?

I've never had this issue with any other nutrient before even without calmag additive. pH usually comes in about right and drifts up as it's used. Maybe it's the mag nitrate I'm missing? Kristalon is 4% mag sulfate..

Either that or there's other shit (carbonates) in their calmag not listed

 

[Orange's Greenhouse]

I don't like using RO and then adding calmag. That stuff lowers pH as it is mostly acetates. The cation is absorbed by the plant in exchange for H+. That leaves acetic acid in the soil solution.
It's main use is to fix high pH root zone issues. But you could also flush with a proper nutrient solution for the same effect and less money (unless you buy cannabis branded nutes).
But RO water tends to be acid already. Carbonate is removed, leading to lower alkalinity. I have to add base as the nutrient mix (not Yara but Compo) comes out too low.

I also don't understand why you would need any type of "conditioner" to use with RO before adding nutrients. Any decent hydro nute has literally everything needed. Why add more bottles?
If the base nutrient is low on Ca/Mg increase the amount of Calcinit or Epson. You're probably adding it already. Switching to a soft water formulation works aswell.

 

[Orange's Greenhouse]

I had a look at their calmag agent SDS and it just seems to be cal nitrate and mag nitrate which is the basis of most calmag is it not? Think I've seen some with calcium chloride too..

It can't be all nitrate as anion. Then the nitrogen would be much higher, leading to burn. It isn't carbonate because that is insoluble. It is normally acetate but chloride is also used (and should be avoided for obvious reasons).

 

[967]

I guess they only disclose what they have to and Google search tells me acetates are considered non hazardous. Google searching ingredients says nitrogen, magnesium and bicarbonate. So I guess it's nitrates, acetates and bicarbonate then?

Either way would very much like to avoid the canna tax as previously mentioned . Is it really just the bicarbonate doing all the work?

 

[Orange's Greenhouse]

I guess they only disclose what they have to and Google search tells me acetates are considered non hazardous. Google searching ingredients says nitrogen, magnesium and bicarbonate. So I guess it's nitrates, acetates and bicarbonate then?

Either way would very much like to avoid the canna tax as previously mentioned . Is it really just the bicarbonate doing all the work?

Ca and Mg carbonate is not soluble and would just fall out of solution.

What do you mean with "the work"? I don't see a use case for it so I can't offer alternatives while keeping a straight face.
CalMag is a cannabis specific phenomenon. No horticulture/agriculture professional uses it.

 

[967]

I mean the so called hardening/conditioning of soft water. Cannas own website states calcium, magnesium and bicarbonate, not carbonate

I have cal nitrate and epsom like you said, so I don't need a calmag solution. Just trying to figure out what about their "calmag agent" supposedly fixes soft water problems...

 

[Ca++]

I also don't understand why you would need any type of "conditioner" to use with RO before adding nutrients. Any decent hydro nute has literally everything needed. Why add more bottles?
If the base nutrient is low on Ca/Mg increase the amount of Calcinit or Epson. You're probably adding it already. Switching to a soft water formulation works aswell.

Feeds can't have everything needed, without knowing what the water supplies. It's not unusual to see more Ca from the tap than the bottle, and the bottle expects this. Ca is both needed, and also the main antagonist. Feeds are formulated to work with ground water as nobody really wants to spend money scrubbing their water, only to pay to put it back again from a bag/bottle.

If the base is low in Ca/Mg due to soft water, then calmag isn't the answer. Though many will take that route, not realising over half what they added was Nitrogen.

We can't buy Calcium Bicarbonate in dry form. Calcium Carbonate is what's in the ground. Once it gets wet, it can bond with the hydrogen and carbon dioxide can join it, and it's then truly dissolved. Suspended will do though. Even Calcium Oxide can be suspended at a decent ppm, without falling from solution. However as Oxide it can be eaten. As a carbonate, it's not immediately available.
This is all talk really, as I'm no chemist. These carbonates are pretty neutral, around pH 6.0 and if the solution gets acidic, the acid and carbonates work on each other. Actually producing the carbon dioxide part of the bicarb, in that hydrogen bath. Things are not moving in the wrong direction. The acid environment is used to release the co2 and thus working to reduce acidity. It's why it should buffer well.
I could be missing something. I didn't chose chemistry as a subject. I just look for answers. What I do know, is andyO made it work, and said nothing about precipitation. IIRC there are grades of dust though.

Hardening the water with K or Mg seems way off beat. There is a lot of K already and Mg can soon get problematic, and can't supply the harness needed before then. Most tap hardness is calcium products. That's likely the right water. Calnit isn't ideal, as it's a lot of N, and the Ca is very available. Both are not goals.

Again.. I'm no chemist, but N isn't a cation or anion, but as plants use it, doesn't the pH lower? I would search, but then I would search a lot of what I said really. I don't have time.

 

[Orange's Greenhouse]

I mean the so called hardening/conditioning of soft water. Cannas own website states calcium, magnesium and bicarbonate, not carbonate

I have cal nitrate and epsom like you said, so I don't need a calmag solution. Just trying to figure out what about their "calmag agent" supposedly fixes soft water problems...

There are different water hardness scales, relating to different chemicals in the water. The carbonate hardness refers to the amount of carbonate/bicarbonate in the water. The total hardness measures how much Ca and Mg is in the water. The report states it "as CaO". Ca and Mg are lumped together because they are measured as a sum, not individually. They cause the same problems in relation to drinking water and water boilers (scaling) so it is not relevant. For us it makes a difference.

Carbonate and bicarbonate react with water. Depending on which pH the solution has the equilibrium is on either side. Above pH 8.4 it is carbonate, between pH 4.3 and 8.4 it is bicarbonate. Below pH 4.3 CO2 is liberated and no bicarbonate is present.
For solids the carbonates are more soluble and/or easier to buy and thus preferred. But it has no effect on the solution that gets created.

I don't know what canna is meaning when they say "soft water problem". The problem they are solving is transferring your money to their pockets.

 

[Orange's Greenhouse]

Feeds can't have everything needed, without knowing what the water supplies. It's not unusual to see more Ca from the tap than the bottle, and the bottle expects this. Ca is both needed, and also the main antagonist. Feeds are formulated to work with ground water as nobody really wants to spend money scrubbing their water, only to pay to put it back again from a bag/bottle.

If the base is low in Ca/Mg due to soft water, then calmag isn't the answer. Though many will take that route, not realising over half what they added was Nitrogen.

We can't buy Calcium Bicarbonate in dry form. Calcium Carbonate is what's in the ground. Once it gets wet, it can bond with the hydrogen and carbon dioxide can join it, and it's then truly dissolved. Suspended will do though. Even Calcium Oxide can be suspended at a decent ppm, without falling from solution. However as Oxide it can be eaten. As a carbonate, it's not immediately available.
This is all talk really, as I'm no chemist. These carbonates are pretty neutral, around pH 6.0 and if the solution gets acidic, the acid and carbonates work on each other. Actually producing the carbon dioxide part of the bicarb, in that hydrogen bath. Things are not moving in the wrong direction. The acid environment is used to release the co2 and thus working to reduce acidity. It's why it should buffer well.
I could be missing something. I didn't chose chemistry as a subject. I just look for answers. What I do know, is andyO made it work, and said nothing about precipitation. IIRC there are grades of dust though.

Hardening the water with K or Mg seems way off beat. There is a lot of K already and Mg can soon get problematic, and can't supply the harness needed before then. Most tap hardness is calcium products. That's likely the right water. Calnit isn't ideal, as it's a lot of N, and the Ca is very available. Both are not goals.

Again.. I'm no chemist, but N isn't a cation or anion, but as plants use it, doesn't the pH lower? I would search, but then I would search a lot of what I said really. I don't have time.

Then use either a soft water formula or a multi part feed. If the Ca in the water is low, increase the amount of Calcinit or add gypsum or what else is on hand. No reason to pay the green tax.

Bicarbonate does not buffer against pH swings at the desired values (5.8-6.2).

The optimal pH for us is 5.8. But that is in the shallow slope region of the carbonic acid/Bicarbonate buffer system. You have to add 5-10 molecules of bicarbonate to absorb one proton released from the plant. The more molecules the higher the osmotic pressure (similiar to EC) and thus more salt stress.
Carbonate is optimal if you shoot for a pH of 6.35.

But that is all theoretical. You can make it work. A good formulated nutrient has small pH swings (and thus only little buffering is required) or you do run to waste to simplifiy the operation.

 

[FTL]

@967 Dolomite lime. Make up a stock solution. May have to filter and bits out as used. Cal mag cheap as chips kings plant barn

 

[967]

Will look into that. Think I tried putting it in my res but seemed pretty insoluble so kinda stopped as it just piled up on the bottom. Are you from NZ?

 

[FTL]

Will look into that. Think I tried putting it in my res but seemed pretty insoluble so kinda stopped as it just piled up on the bottom. Are you from NZ?

Yeah mate. Just an idea hey, cheap and cheerful. Cheap always means more Fkn around usually fme but in saying that fuck canna and grow store nutes(waste of money)