View Single Post
  #3   Report Post  
Old 12-03-2005, 10:29 PM
dfreas
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Well I did another slightly (and I emphasize slightly) more scientific
test. I took two test tubes of my tap water, to one test tube I added
one drop of FloraPride and the other I left alone. Then I did the GH
test on both tubes. The tube treated with FloraPride was 3dGH while the
other came out as 5dGH. And yes I realize that I just said my tap water
was 4dGH a second ago...I suspect it is somewhere very close to exactly
between 4 and 5, sometimes the test takes four drops sometimes five.
Either this is a result of difference in drop size or my water really
is fluctuating (is that possible?).

Despite the fluctuation of my tap water the fact remains that in a side
by side test there was a difference of 2dGH in plain tap and tap +
FloraPride. One possibility is that in a sample this size (5mL in each
tube) a single drop of mostly DI water was enough to lower the dGH. The
other possibility is that this stuff really is lowering GH somehow.

I'm probably going to test a larger sample of my tap water to rule out
the first possibility but I think I'll wait until I hear a few more
responses to see if anyone has any other ideas as to what's going on
before I start wasting large amounts of FloraPride on my curiosity.

I think this test ruled out the possibility of a CO2 sensitive GH test
kit and though I'd really like to believe my plants are absorbing the
available ions that fast I think this test rules that out as the
responsible factor as well. When I do a larger sample I'll also test pH
in both samples to see if that is the problem.

To recap, current possibilities a
1) Consistent human error (increasingly unlikely as repeated tests come
up with the same result)
2)ph sensitive GH test kit.
3)One drop of DI water is enough to lower dGH by two degrees in a 5 mL
sample of tap water, in which case none of the possiblities Elaine
suggested have been ruled out and this second test was pointless.
4)FloraPride lowers GH

-Daniel