CT_ Posted July 19, 2021 Share Posted July 19, 2021 (edited) Today on the live stream @Cory said he couldn't replicate the pH reading problem and that kinda bummed me out because I've spent a lot of time and energy and test strips trying to figure it out and I posted in another thread how to replicate it and what I think may be going on. Since Cory didn't respond maybe some of you could help me see if its just my strips or if its a repeatable issue. Could someone with a pH probe or the API liquid test take distilled water and add a tiny bit of baking soda lye aka sodium hydroxide (it doesn't take a lot to over shoot, but you can always dilute it if you do) until you get ~pH 8 water. Then test with the strips and compare the results. For me, my strips still read below 7 when I do this. Which is enough inaccuracy that I care about it, even for fish keeping. Edited July 19, 2021 by CT_ lye not baking soda Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Cory Posted July 19, 2021 Administrators Share Posted July 19, 2021 Can you link your other thread so I can read it again, I'm not finding it easily. We are investigating a few anomaly with test strips. We have labs working on recreating testing problems, we are selves are testing problems. One such example is the dr tims ammonia and our test strip problem. We acquired the original testing solution ,and it is different packaging from ours. however it tests the same for us. We have are working the labs to recreate an erroneous result as the original user got. Artificially creating an erroneous result from a different means doesn't get us to the solution. Right is our brand new one, left is a the customer having a problem. We made a 2ppm solution and both test the same. However we are still pushing forward to see what would be causing the problem. We have other inquiries and anomalies with with test strips, many waters around the country have different chemicals in the water which could cause different results than intended. We are looking into things and have inquiries open with the manufacturing lab and some analysis labs for things like the dr tims. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT_ Posted July 19, 2021 Author Share Posted July 19, 2021 On 7/18/2021 at 10:42 PM, Cory said: Can you link your other thread so I can read it again, I'm not finding it easily. Sure it's here. Also I just realized I had remembered my experiment wrong. a tiny bit of sodium hydroxide, not baking soda. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Cory Posted July 19, 2021 Administrators Share Posted July 19, 2021 Thank you for that again @CT_. We have closed another inquiry we had with test strips. Question: "Do your ammonia test strips work accurately when used to test water conditioned with conditioners that require a salicylate based ammonia test kit (conditioners like Prime and Complete)?" Our testing showed that they don't suffer from the problem of prime or complete interfering with the testing of ammonia. We are still actively working on other inquiries. Just wanted to show this as, it may be useful to some, and also to show that we are slowly but surely going through different inquiries. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT_ Posted July 19, 2021 Author Share Posted July 19, 2021 Awesome! All of your striving for improvement and understanding the corner cases really puts you and your whole team way above the rest of the industry. Once I get locked onto a question/problem I can't let it go so I'm always willing to help with samples or whatever helps find answers. The chemists I work with are all tired of my fish questions 😅 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Biotope Biologist Posted July 19, 2021 Share Posted July 19, 2021 From what I understand with the Dr Tims ammonia other company test strips were deliviering inaccurate results too after a certain dosage was exceeded. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Cory Posted July 22, 2021 Administrators Share Posted July 22, 2021 On 7/19/2021 at 2:51 PM, CT_ said: Awesome! All of your striving for improvement and understanding the corner cases really puts you and your whole team way above the rest of the industry. Once I get locked onto a question/problem I can't let it go so I'm always willing to help with samples or whatever helps find answers. The chemists I work with are all tired of my fish questions 😅 The saga continues. So far the lab can't replicate your problem. This is a test of sodium hydroxide. Ph Monitor at 10.98, strip reads higher than 8, which is contrary to your below 7 reading. Still investigating how you could be getting this result with distilled water. These issues are hard to figure out, and thus why we don't have fixes right away, and not always easily replicated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT_ Posted July 22, 2021 Author Share Posted July 22, 2021 On 7/21/2021 at 6:53 PM, Cory said: The saga continues. So far the lab can't replicate your problem. This is a test of sodium hydroxide. Ph Monitor at 10.98, strip reads higher than 8, which is contrary to your below 7 reading. Still investigating how you could be getting this result with distilled water. These issues are hard to figure out, and thus why we don't have fixes right away, and not always easily replicated. wow. thanks for testing that! I wonder If I just have a bad batch then? Could it be that something happened to the start or end of a the first batch? Like some chemical dispenser wasn't primed in the machine so the first 1000 strips didn't get it? I'm kinda dying to find out why now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hobbit Posted July 22, 2021 Share Posted July 22, 2021 Everything always works in the presence of the teacher. 🙃 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CT_ Posted July 22, 2021 Author Share Posted July 22, 2021 On 7/21/2021 at 7:26 PM, Hobbit said: Everything always works in the presence of the teacher. 🙃 It's funny you say that. In (post-graduate) academia we have the opposite saying. 😛 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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