i have a water softner with a bypass valve. The only water that is soft is hot water to match tank temp. FYI when I looked at my micro bottle it had white solid settle out of it. My tank ph is 6.4 with ph controller. Drop check is light green. My TDS is 268. Should I do a water change? I am still double dosing excel to control bba. I just connected the ph controller this past Friday.
This is getting complicated.
You use larger portion raw tap mixed with smaller portion filtered via whole house “softener”. The ratio is dependent on temperature, so the water parameters are never the same. Not good. Can’t you fill something with raw tap water and heat it up electrically?
To make this working we need to know more details.
What do you use to regenerate the whole house “softener”, NaCl or KCl?
What is raw tap GH, KH, TDS ppm as NaCl?
Knowing raw tap Ca or Mg would help a lot.
What is “softened” water GH, KH, TDS?
Your plant problems are caused by mineral imbalance of Ca, Mg, K and Na.
If raw tap water, “softened” water and aquarium water don’t have the same KH then the CO2 controller will make it worse. The controller is regulating CO2 delivery referenced to pH. When KH fluctuate then pH and CO2 does as well. This is bad for plants.
The white precipitation in micro solution is not good, you may need to use RO or distilled water to mix it up and put little Excel in to control fungus.