Big 3 Shootout Alk, Ca, Mg: RedSea, Nyos, Elos, Salifert, API, Hanna, Triton, AWT

[jason2459]

@Randy Holmes-Farley Would adding muriatic acid to my IO new salt mix used for water changes have a side effect of increasing Bromide? Only thing I've really changed recently just before these samples were set.

I went out of town for about a week and Murphy's Law visited my house and took over maintaining my tank. Caused a very large swing of many parameters including getting my Alk up to around 14 which I've slowly over the past several weeks brought down via just lowering my water change water's Alk.

 

[jason2459]

@Randy Holmes-Farley what is AWT testing for when they list Ionic Calcium vs Calcium?


Edit:
I also sent the question to AWT
"What is the difference between Ionic Calcium vs Calcium? And why are they listed separately?

I still haven't received any email back on that question. I've also sent in another asking how they test for the salinity levels.

Thanks very much for doing this for the community! Lots of people will benefit from your work here!

Thanks, I hope so. I certainly have.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

@Randy Holmes-Farley Would adding muriatic acid to my IO new salt mix used for water changes have a side effect of increasing Bromide? Only thing I've really changed recently just before these samples were set.

I went out of town for about a week and Murphy's Law visited my house and took over maintaining my tank. Caused a very large swing of many parameters including getting my Alk up to around 14 which I've slowly over the past several weeks brought down via just lowering my water change water's Alk.

I'm not sure if there is significant bromide in muriatic acid, but there might be.

 

[jason2459]

I'm not sure if there is significant bromide in muriatic acid, but there might be.

Thanks. I'm just using hardware store bought muriatic acid so I'm sure it's not pure.

I did get a response back from Aqua Medic.


"Customer Service <[email protected]>

Hi Jason,
Thank you for your inquiry.
We measure both ionic and total calcium because many of our customers use both these values when considering their tank's parameters.
Seachem does a good job of describing the significance here:

http://aquavitro.com/products/calcification.html
Please let us know if you have any further questions and take care!
Best Regards,
Aqua Medic Water Testing"




I find it interesting that they reference another company's product to explain the difference...

According to SeaChem:

"Description
calcification™ is a concentrated (140,000 mg/L) optimized blend of ionic and bioavailable gluconate-complexed calcium designed to restore and maintain calcium to levels found in natural seawater, without affecting pH. These two forms of calcium are combined in calcification™ to provide the hobbyist with a convenient way to ensure peak coral growth and health.

Ionic calcium is readily available, while the gluconate-complexed calcium confers several benefits. The uncharged calcium in calcification™ is readily absorbed with less physiological work than is required for the absorption of ionic calcium. Using calcification™, it is not necessary to maintain the excessively high concentrations of calcium (about 450 mg/L or more) often recommended by others. In fact, excellent growth of corals and coraline algae is achieved with total calcium concentrations as low as 380 mg/L. Used up to four times recommended maintenance dose, the gluconate polymer will not accumulate or encourage the growth of undesirable algae. The polymer itself is beneficial as a food source not only to the corals and other invertebrates, but also to denitrifying bacteria, actually promoting the natural anaerobic denitrification process in live rock and other substrate. Furthermore, the use of this gluconate polymer allows calcium, strontium, and magnesium to be utilized more readily than they would otherwise and also helps to stabilize them in solution without depleting alkalinity.

Some prefer not to use complexed calcium because of concern about adding organics to the aquarium. This is not a valid concern. The amount of organics added with complexed calcium is insignificantly small when compared to the organics released by most reef creatures, even in a no feed, no nutrients approach. Since complexed calcium products employ lactate or gluconate, the naive misconception that these products contain sugars has arisen. While these components are related to sugars, they are oxidized aldehydes and do not react or behave as sugars. Polygluconate contains no nitrogen or phosphorous, thus it is biologically impossible for it to lead to algae growth in a properly maintained reef system.

Unlike competing products that require multi-day interval dosing when combined with carbonate supplements, calcification™ can be dosed daily and within minutes of our eight.four™ as well as the entire aquavitro reef line."

 

[jason2459]

Can't say Aqua Medic doesn't answer questions.

They responded to the question on how they measure salinity.

"
Hi Jason,

To measure salinity, we have a custom digital refractometer. We calibrate it multiple times each day to ensure accuracy. Please let us know if you have any further questions and have a great weekend!

Best Regards,
Aqua Medic Water Testing

 

[jason2459]

I have responded and hope to keep an open dialog with them but I would understand if they shut it down after this reply. I am not at this point reviewing or expressing opinions on past tests but hoping to get improved future results from them.

My email reply to AWT:

Thank you very much for answering my questions. Reason I ask is I've gotten rather differing results between testing with AWT, my own test kits, and Triton. I will be honest and say I've been rather disappointed. I saw that Aquamedic took over AWT a couple years ago and invested in a new lab. I had heard of past poor results with AWT and was hoping to see better results under new ownership and quality .

I really hope this doesn't shut down our dialog but here are a couple forum threads that I've started that covers multiple tests with many different hobby test kits, AWT, and Triton.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...ts-api-salifert-elos-redsea-hanna-etc.222909/

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/b...os-elos-salifert-api-hanna-triton-awt.234660/


I'd like to understand the difference and variance in AWT vs the others. Truthfully, I would love to have a US based lab test facility that can compete with Triton in accuracy and precision.

Truely with Best Regards,
Jason

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Thanks. I'm just using hardware store bought muriatic acid so I'm sure it's not pure.

I did get a response back from Aqua Medic.


"Customer Service <[email protected]>

Hi Jason,
Thank you for your inquiry.
We measure both ionic and total calcium because many of our customers use both these values when considering their tank's parameters.
Seachem does a good job of describing the significance here:

http://aquavitro.com/products/calcification.html
Please let us know if you have any further questions and take care!
Best Regards,
Aqua Medic Water Testing"




I find it interesting that they reference another company's product to explain the difference...

According to SeaChem:

"Description
calcification™ is a concentrated (140,000 mg/L) optimized blend of ionic and bioavailable gluconate-complexed calcium designed to restore and maintain calcium to levels found in natural seawater, without affecting pH. These two forms of calcium are combined in calcification™ to provide the hobbyist with a convenient way to ensure peak coral growth and health.

Ionic calcium is readily available, while the gluconate-complexed calcium confers several benefits. The uncharged calcium in calcification™ is readily absorbed with less physiological work than is required for the absorption of ionic calcium. Using calcification™, it is not necessary to maintain the excessively high concentrations of calcium (about 450 mg/L or more) often recommended by others. In fact, excellent growth of corals and coraline algae is achieved with total calcium concentrations as low as 380 mg/L. Used up to four times recommended maintenance dose, the gluconate polymer will not accumulate or encourage the growth of undesirable algae. The polymer itself is beneficial as a food source not only to the corals and other invertebrates, but also to denitrifying bacteria, actually promoting the natural anaerobic denitrification process in live rock and other substrate. Furthermore, the use of this gluconate polymer allows calcium, strontium, and magnesium to be utilized more readily than they would otherwise and also helps to stabilize them in solution without depleting alkalinity.

Some prefer not to use complexed calcium because of concern about adding organics to the aquarium. This is not a valid concern. The amount of organics added with complexed calcium is insignificantly small when compared to the organics released by most reef creatures, even in a no feed, no nutrients approach. Since complexed calcium products employ lactate or gluconate, the naive misconception that these products contain sugars has arisen. While these components are related to sugars, they are oxidized aldehydes and do not react or behave as sugars. Polygluconate contains no nitrogen or phosphorous, thus it is biologically impossible for it to lead to algae growth in a properly maintained reef system.

Unlike competing products that require multi-day interval dosing when combined with carbonate supplements, calcification™ can be dosed daily and within minutes of our eight.four™ as well as the entire aquavitro reef line."

FWIW, Aquamedic does not appear to understand what value they are giving. It DEFINITELY is not free available calcium vs organically bound calcium. There is not enough organic matter in aquaria to have the effect they report.

Total organic carbon in reef tanks is on the order of 1-2 ppm:

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/8/aafeature3/

So to think that 1 ppm of organic carbon will bind a few hundred ppm of calcium is just beyond ridiculous.

I still suspect that what they are measuring is the calcium activity, probably by electrode, which in a certain sense is "free" calcium, as opposed to calcium that is interacting with the inorganic ions in seawater.

I've also never heard of a single person who uses the ionic calcium for any purpose.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Unlike competing products that require multi-day interval dosing when combined with carbonate supplements, calcification™ can be dosed daily and within minutes of our eight.four™ as well as the entire aquavitro reef line."

As to the Seachem comment, that's another very strange one.

Anyone EVER hear of a calcium product where one had to wait multiple DAYS before supplementing alkalinity with carbonate? How could that ever be true?

The reef world still is, unfortunately, filled with loads of nonsensical statements.

 

[GMay]

Myth again trumps chemistry and physics!

 

[joekool]

Always like salifert nice to see how it compares to the other brands. I'll be sticking with them for sure now.

 

[jason2459]

None of it really makes any sense. Their customized and constantly calibrated digital refractometer has not come back with results that are comparable with my measurements or even the estimated measurements from Triton's results.

I would expect Triton's calculated, with a couple minor assumptions, salinity to be off from my measurements more so then AWT's as they are directly trying to measure salinity. Triton does not claim a salinity meausrement at all but still comes very close to what I've measured.

Even my readings are most likely not exact but there's no way they are off by more then 1ppt. I have fairly high confidence in that considering the steps I've taken the calibrate the Apex probe and cross checking with my veegee refractometer which I check for calibration monthly and cross check that with my pin point salinity probe.


Then there's the rest of the readings like calcium. How do they (AWT) report Ca so far off. I just hope they take actions to correct things even if they don't respond.

 

[jason2459]

I will assume AWT is not going to respond to my emails anymore. I do not blame them.

So, my next adventure in testing multiple saltmix brands has begun
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/saltmix-parameters-bring-on-the-test-results.233233/

 

[NanaReefer]

So, looks like Salifert has a price drop across all their kits. At least through Bulk Reef Supply email I just got.

Magnesium is $15.99 at Premium Aquatics [emoji1360]

 

[john turner]

thanks very helpful. best to trash old regents save all tubes
well done, lot of work thanks again john

 

[jason2459]

Thanks I'm glad it helps. I'm on to testing saltmixes now.

Link in my sig.

 

[fishboys]

Thanks I'm glad it helps. I'm on to testing saltmixes now.

Link in my sig.

Thank you for taking the time to do this.

 

[jason2459]

Thank you for taking the time to do this.

You're welcome and thanks. There's more to come.

 

[gettaReef]

What ya got in the works?

 

[jason2459]

What ya got in the works?

Been working over several months to tie several things together and one final piece is hopefully here very soon.

 

[BoomCorals]

Thanks for doing these. It prompted me to try other tests.