Let's talk about the hanna meters....

[Troylee]

Sweet!!!! Let me know that would be great.... My regents are not expired but I have a good feeling there bad... Not sure if there is a certain way to store them or not mine just sit in a cabinet lol....

 

[kev2me]

So it looks like the current explanation from Hanna for the Alk checker is that you have to shake the vial for 2 minutes (instead of 30 seconds as per their original instructions) to make sure the reagent is completely mixed with the saltwater... Now if only the cuvettes didn't leak after sharking it for 2 seconds...

 

[Troylee]

I hate to say it but even with a rep here were not gonna get any advice or answers we want... I just did some research and everyone has the same problems on every forum..... There is even chemist questioning on how they can measure alk with there new checkers when it is impossible to test it the way they do... The rep answers I will have to check with the chemistry depeartment and never replies.... So I can safely say they have lost me as a customer...
Everyone is putting the alk meter up against sailfert etc and there way off like meters showing 4 or 5 dkh and there normal test kits showing 8 to 10.... Uhhhhhhhhhbh I'm done.....

 

[sowellj]

I am a chemist so I can offer a bit of insight maybe ... I have no idea about their alk meter. I did post my 2 cents on the phosphate meter a few posts back. Troylee you can pm your mailing address to me and I'll get some stuff in the mail to you on Monday. I suppose while I am at it, I could send duplicates standards to one or two other folks to see what the meter to meter reproducibility is.

 

[Troylee]

Sounds good... But I think this is just for fun anymore... I truly believe either my product or the regent is faulty and with No support they don't have a customer as far as I'm concerned.... They supposedly have changed the timer to 10 min so you don't have to beat the toaster anymore when using a singl vial... And I quote straight from Hannah " you can use both cuvetts and get accurate results but not as precise as using a single one" arrrrrr...

 

[fsu1dolfan]

Wow guess im gonna take both the Alk and Phos off my christmas list until things are addressed properly!

 

[Troylee]

from the sounds of it, i think there gonna re-call the alk meters.... they need to!!!!!! there actually now testing it them selves against sailfert etc. and seeing why the numbers vary so greatly... from i have just read every alk meter is reading 4 to 5 dkh which is impossible in our marine environment..... if they stay consistently off then maybe they can say, hay there off by 3 points so make sure you add that to get the correct number but then again it's just wrong imo!!!!! you should get a decent result from a product... maybe not exact 100 percent because there making them affordable but they could have raised the price and made a little better product imo.....

 

[CJO]

I hate to say it but even with a rep here were not gonna get any advice or answers we want... I just did some research and everyone has the same problems on every forum..... There is even chemist questioning on how they can measure alk with there new checkers when it is impossible to test it the way they do... The rep answers I will have to check with the chemistry depeartment and never replies.... So I can safely say they have lost me as a customer...
Everyone is putting the alk meter up against sailfert etc and there way off like meters showing 4 or 5 dkh and there normal test kits showing 8 to 10.... Uhhhhhhhhhbh I'm done.....

I have a few comments regarding this. If you are speaking of Boomer, he's very familiar with chemicals, but I'm pretty sure he's not a chemist. Even if he were, just because he doesn't know a way doesn't mean it's not possible (this would actually be more in a chemical engineer's field than chemist's). Habib, the CEO of Salifert, responded that it would be possible to test in that manner with a specific amount of buffer and a pH indicator.

Whose to say that Salifert or any other test is necessarily correct? The rep did reply back a couple of times on the RC thread (not sure why she hasn't responded here yet). She said that they had done extensive testing in-house, comparing the results with an autotitrator and a pH meter, which is the only true way of finding the alkalinity, and the results were very close.

I'm not saying that there isn't an issue with them, I just think that it's too soon to jump to conclusions.

CJ

 

[Troylee]

True but sailfert, API etc always got us through... If we were to buffer our tanks to get a reading of 8 to 12 on a hanna we wouldn't have any live stock left... Yes I have read boomers comments and he seems very intelligent in the area... I hate the way the rep is far and few between posts and only adresses one or two questions from the hundreds posted... Then most of the time the answer is call technical support with a phone number... Why would you want to answer the same questions a million times over and over when you could put some solid answers right there in the public to read..... I don't know man it's been a long day I don't like what I have read.... prove me wrong or everyone for that matter... I don't see any good threads about how great they are just bad reports.....
I'm only out 50$ and some change not a huge deal I have lost corals that were money but I'm just thinking of this as a whole and the millions they raked in for a bogus product IMO. And it's not the only product that has done this in the hobby.... I just expected more out of Hanna I guess....

 

[subielover]

My alk checker is dead on, tested against salifert and sera. Just thought I would throw that out there, has worked great for me. The po4 checker as well

 

[Oiseau Reefer]

I am a chemist so I can offer a bit of insight maybe ... I have no idea about their alk meter. I did post my 2 cents on the phosphate meter a few posts back. Troylee you can pm your mailing address to me and I'll get some stuff in the mail to you on Monday. I suppose while I am at it, I could send duplicates standards to one or two other folks to see what the meter to meter reproducibility is.

Pm sent

 

[drainbamage]

Here's an unrelated related question- I use the salifert test kits for mag, calc, alk, phos, trate, iodide. Now none are super easy, but between them all, I'd say phos is one of the easier tests to use. Put a few drops in, and wait 4 minutes, then color check. I do dislike that it's slighty tricky to color match at super low levels, but when it's clear, I'm happy. If it's got blue tint, I know I need to do something (water change, media, thin chaeto, etc) until I get a clear test.
I figured the Hannah meter would be easier to use, but it seems otherwise from even stock instructions- and if people are still testing against salifert, why not just use the salifert??

 

[sowellj]

I think the selling point on these was the accuracy on the low end.

 

[sowellj]

OK, so I have three takers on the phosphate standards. I'll make these up on Monday and hopefully get them in the mail. I'll have to limit it to these three folks for the moment; otherwise shipping is going to start to add up a bit. It will be interesting to see what sort of readings three different people get with the exact same solutions.

 

[ronnie]

Let me know if you want a fourth.

 

[HannaUSA]

Hi Guys,
Thanks for your patience. I had a family emergency that took me away from work for a while last week (my coworkers were responding on RC for me). I’ll do my best to answer all your questions as fully as I can.

Regarding your Certified Standard Kit – You are entirely correct, a 0.2 ppm deviation is unacceptable. If you’ll PM me with your address, I will send you a replacement as soon as I have one. (I’m travelling again at the moment, so I’m not sure what our stock status is right now, please bear with me.)

Regarding the 0.00 readings: It’s puzzling, but possible, to me as well that you would continue to get 0 readings. As I’m sure you’re well aware, there are many organisms, including HA, that absorb PO4 out of the water column, and an active culture can eat it up nearly as fast as it’s added. The amino acids you mentioned adding – I assume it contain PO4? Have you tried taking a sample of water out of your tank, adding this additive, and testing to see if you still get 0?

The most common and abundant form of phosphates is orthophosphate/inorganic phosphate (PO4, P2O5). This is the form detected by photometric methods. While there are other forms of phosphate that can contribute to the total phosphate levels, they are not nearly as abundant, and it is impossible to measure these forms without performing a digestion of the sample. This requires a reactor and an incubator, which are unfortunately pretty cost prohibitive outside of a lab setting. However, failing all else, it may be that the amino acids you are dosing do not contain orthophosphates, but instead contain organic phosphate.

Regarding the “time out†function and the cuvets: The auto time off function was added because it’s an industry standard practice to preserve battery life. I also found the 3 minutes span irritating, and they are working to change it on units now being produced.
Now, while it’s irritating, it doesn’t make the unit dysfunctional. We strive for customer satisfaction, which is we immediately moved to change it once we knew people didn’t like the function. However, we would not be able to stay solvent as a business if we were to take back the thousands of functional units with this feature, which do work as stated in their specifications.

The Certified Standard kit uses two vials because there’s simply no other way to do it. The zero standard is reusable, however, were it to be opened, it would become contaminated. While it would still probably read zero, it would no longer be able to be called certified. I agree that we should have done a better job making it obvious that the 1 ppm standard was NOT reusable – I was shocked when I discovered this as well. I believe that this only applies to the phosphate and iron standards. As it was explained to me by the chemistry department, there was simply no way to make a true phosphate or iron standard that was stable and thus reusable. Once reacted, they degrade very quickly. I will speak to the marketing department on ways to make this information more transparent in our literature and on our website.

i just hope that once the hanna rep comes over that she can provide real answers and not just some text book answers, kinda like when you call dell or some of these other companies , no matter who you talk to they all say the same thing as if we cant tell that they are reading out of there customer service manual. Really what we need is an actual tech or designer not a rep , a rep is only gonna know what they are taught to say or read

Just to defend myself in advance – I have been with Hanna for 5 ½ years, and I really do have a very good technical knowledge of most of our products. I have a double bachelors from Florida Tech in marine biology and aquaculture, a masters in aquaculture from URI, and I worked as the manager of live feed production for Great Bay Aquaculture in NH before coming to work for Hanna. I also had my own reef tank for several years, which was mostly softies, before buying a house and having babies prompted me to dismantle it due to the fact that it was a money pit.

Just checked the vegas water quality report and it doesn't show or they didn't test for po4 levels...
There is no way it's .09 maybe I just got a bad meter or some bad regents....

Most municipalities add orthophosphate to the drinking water. It wouldn’t be included in that report because it would be done by the local station, after testing. They add it to the water because it prevents lead pipes (still present in the plumbing of many houses) from corroding and leaching lead into your drinking water.


Regarding questions on the alkalinity tester - like I said, I'm on the road, so I don't know what the latest developments are, but the chemists really did do hundreds and hundreds of tests before releasing the product. We take all these concerns extremely seriously, and the entire chemistry department is working on resolving all issues raised.

Thanks
Jessica

 

[Troylee]

Nice you made it!!!!!
I will try adding the amino acids to the test solution and see what happens...

 

[sowellj]

I ended up coming down with a bad cold and in conjunction with that and a 1 week old baby ... I didn't make it to the lab/office today. Hopefully I'll feel better and will be able to get those standards made and mailed out tomorrow/wednesday. I promise .. I will get them out.

 

[jcom]

Jessica,

Thank you for taking the time to address our concerns. I have sent you a PM and look forward to receiving and having a go with a replacement standard kit.

p.s. - you've got good cred with our crew now! :wink:

 

[Troylee]

^^^ lol... I was just thinking about this thread today telling myself what do you do ya know...
I had another local check the tap water and he got .18 I got .9 still can't compare it anything for accuracy but the meters did show something...