diff --git a/infrastructure/vps-standby/n8n/values.yaml b/infrastructure/vps-standby/n8n/values.yaml
index 20b2b08..daf349d 100644
--- a/infrastructure/vps-standby/n8n/values.yaml
+++ b/infrastructure/vps-standby/n8n/values.yaml
@@ -78,6 +78,37 @@ resources:
     cpu: "500m"
     memory: 512Mi
 
+# Chart defaults are more aggressive than n8n needs to actually finish
+# starting - without this the liveness probe kills the container before
+# it ever binds :5678 (confirmed live: exitCode 143/SIGTERM, crashloop).
+# Matches home's apps/n8n/values.yaml timings.
+startupProbe:
+  httpGet:
+    path: /healthz
+    port: http
+  initialDelaySeconds: 10
+  periodSeconds: 5
+  timeoutSeconds: 3
+  failureThreshold: 12
+
+readinessProbe:
+  httpGet:
+    path: /healthz
+    port: http
+  initialDelaySeconds: 5
+  periodSeconds: 5
+  timeoutSeconds: 3
+  failureThreshold: 2
+
+livenessProbe:
+  httpGet:
+    path: /healthz
+    port: http
+  initialDelaySeconds: 10
+  periodSeconds: 10
+  timeoutSeconds: 5
+  failureThreshold: 3
+
 extraEnvSecrets:
   DB_POSTGRESDB_PASSWORD:
     name: pg-n8n-app
diff --git a/infrastructure/vps-standby/nextcloud/values.yaml b/infrastructure/vps-standby/nextcloud/values.yaml
index d91b7c3..b5ed541 100644
--- a/infrastructure/vps-standby/nextcloud/values.yaml
+++ b/infrastructure/vps-standby/nextcloud/values.yaml
@@ -30,6 +30,14 @@ nextcloud:
        value: "2G"
      - name: PHP_UPLOAD_LIMIT
        value: "10G"
+     # libpq (via PHP's pgsql/pdo_pgsql) defaults HOME=/root in this image
+     # but tries to look up a client cert at $HOME/.postgresql/postgresql.crt
+     # for higher sslmodes - "Permission denied" there aborts the whole
+     # connection outright (confirmed live: psql itself connects fine with
+     # the same creds, only PHP's driver hits this). CNPG's in-cluster
+     # Postgres connection doesn't need client-cert verification here.
+     - name: PGSSLMODE
+       value: "disable"
 
    configs:
       proxy.config.php: |-