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#1
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Florapride and water softening cont. (long)
Despite my lack of posts recently I haven't given up on the tests to
see if FloraPride really is softening my water. I could use some help though. So if you have a bottle of FloraPride and would like to contribute to my impromptu study then do some tests and post your results here. Here's what I've done so far: First I need to know whether or not my GH test kit is pH sensitive, Elaine suggested this possibility when I first mentioned FloraPride softening the water and it seemed like a likely one. In order to test this I took two samples of tap water: 350mL tap water: pH = 6.8 , GH = 4dGH 350mL tap water + 1/4 tsp. sodium bicarb: pH = 7.6++ , GH = 2 Here the pH is far behond the limits of my test kit (as expected) and the GH has indeed been effected. I was suprised that it lowered, I would have expected the opposite so I decided to use a much smaller amount of sodium bicarb and try again. Here the measurements of sodium bicarb are approximate, the smallest dry measure I had was a 1/4 tsp so I took that and divided it in half with a knife repeatedly to get smaller measures. 350mL tap water: pH = 6.8 , GH = 4dGH 350mL tap + 1/512 tsp sodium bicarb: pH = 7.2 , GH = 4dGH So here a 0.4 change in pH has not affected GH by a measureable amount. I decided to double the amount of sodium bicarb and try again. From here on I'll leave out the tap water parameters since they remain the same throughout. 350mL tap + 1/256 tsp sodium bicarb: pH = 7.6 , GH = 3dGH Here i have reached the limit of my test kit for pH but the color has not darkened past the limit as it did in the initial test so I feel that the pH is probably accurate despite being at the limit of the test. The GH has begun to lower so I think this certainly shows that my GH test kit is in fact pH sensitive. To further test this I tried to make a lower pH solution - however I don't usually try to lower the pH of my water so I didn't have anything on hand to do so. I improvised and used lemon juice - I'm not sure if this is a useful measurement or not - for all I know there could be something in lemon juice that contributes to GH significantly but here are the results anyway: 300mL tap + 50mL lemon juice: pH = 6.0-- , GH = 6++ Here we have passed the lower limit of my pH test kit by far and the GH has obviously gone up. I didn't bother going beyond 6dGH with the test kit because I wasn't confident that this was even a valid measurement and if it is then 6dGH is enough to show that yes, GH does go up with this test kit as pH goes down (the expected result in light of the sodium bicarb tests). So I have shown that my GH test kit is pH sensitive. **However** what I have shown is that increasing pH causes decreasing GH and vice versa. Now let's test the FloraPride. 350mL tap + 10mL FloraPride: pH = 6.0-- , GH = 2dGH So here the FloraPride is pushing the pH down and the GH down at the same time. Something is going on. I would like to test weaker concentrations of FloraPride to see what happens to the GH for pH values in the range of my test kit but haven't done so yet. I would appreciate some independant measurements. If you have time and FloraPride available to you do some of these test (or design your own) and report the results. I'd really like to know if this stuff softens the water or not. Comments? Additional data? Any input is welcome! -Daniel |
#2
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Well since no one seems to want to join my test I decided to write an
email to Tetra and see what they say about it. I'll post the response here, though I'm not sure how informative it will be. -Daniel |
#3
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well, I posted this last night via another newsserver. Apparently it is not
working. So here it is again: ok, I just finished some extensive testing. Results are nothing like yours. I tested 4 different ways with 3 different kits, ph determined with pinpoint monitor. The kits are Hagen, Tetra and Aquarium Pharmaceuticals. The test conditions are listed below. 1: water ph 5.8 2: water ph 7.9 3: water ph 7.9 + flora pride @ 5ml / 16oz water 4: water ph 7.9 + seachem excel @ 45ml / 35 gallons water, flourish iron @ 10ml / 35 gallons, flourish potassium 15ml / 35gallons, flourish phosphorus @ 4ml / 35 gallons, flourish @ 7ml / 35 gallons, flourish nitrogen @ 5ml / 35gallons. (this is the prepared water for my 50% weekly change on my 75gallon tank) results for Hagen were 120ppm in all 4 tests results for tetra was 6° in all 4 tests results for ap was 7° in all 4 tests I don't know what is causing your problems, but my results don't vary at all, which they shouldn't. What brand test kit are you using? Or are you using some sort of strip? -- Margolis http://web.archive.org/web/200302152...qs/AGQ2FAQ.htm http://www.unrealtower.org/faq |
#4
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ok, this is the 4th time I've posted this. I am having trouble with my main
newsserver apparently. I tried this server yesterday, don't know if it is propagating or not. Anyway, here is my original response dfreas. ok, I just finished some extensive testing. Results are nothing like yours. I tested 4 different ways with 3 different kits, ph determined with pinpoint monitor. The kits are Hagen, Tetra and Aquarium Pharmaceuticals. The test conditions are listed below. 1: water ph 5.8 2: water ph 7.9 3: water ph 7.9 + flora pride @ 5ml / 16oz water 4: water ph 7.9 + seachem excel @ 45ml / 35 gallons water, flourish iron @ 10ml / 35 gallons, flourish potassium 15ml / 35gallons, flourish phosphorus @ 4ml / 35 gallons, flourish @ 7ml / 35 gallons, flourish nitrogen @ 5ml / 35gallons. (this is the prepared water for my 50% weekly change on my 75gallon tank) results for Hagen were 120ppm in all 4 tests results for tetra was 6° in all 4 tests results for ap was 7° in all 4 tests I don't know what is causing your problems, but my results don't vary at all, which they shouldn't. What brand test kit are you using? Or are you using some sort of strip? -- Margolis http://www.agqx.org/faqs/AGQ2FAQ.htm http://www.agqx.org/faqs/AGQ3FAQ.htm http://www.agutng.org.uk/ |
#5
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On Sun, 20 Mar 2005 12:44:12 +0000, Margolis wrote:
[putulin] -- Margolis http://www.agqx.org/faqs/AGQ2FAQ.htm http://www.agqx.org/faqs/AGQ3FAQ.htm http://www.agutng.org.uk/ Not Found The requested URL /faqs/AGQ2FAQ.htm was not found on this server. Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request. Not Found The requested URL /faqs/AGQ3FAQ.htm was not found on this server. Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request. |
#6
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how many of my posts did you see in this thread? One should have working
links to the faqs, while this one had old links that haven't been updated in a long long time If you see this one, these are the good links ;o) -- Margolis http://web.archive.org/web/200302152...qs/AGQ2FAQ.htm http://www.unrealtower.org/faq |
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