Hello all. I know I have seen electronic devices for measuring PH, salinity and hardness. Has anone ever seen an electronic device for measuring ammonia, nitrites and nitrates? Is it even possible to monitor these using non-chemical devices? I am tired of doing the 3 drops, 5 drops, 8 drops, 10 drops tube check!
Electronic Water Quality Devices????
- Thread starter Malachite
- Start date
Unless you have bookoos of $$$ I would say you will be stuck with checking them using the droppers.
I've seen the probe type devices you are thinking of, but I am not too familiar with them.
What I have seen of them though, it seems as though they are item specific, meaning that one unit checks one specific element (ie. Ph or Gh). I have not seen a unit that checks everything that a FW or SW aquariast needs to monitor. If this holds true, that would mean buying 6 or more separate units which would be very expensive plus very time consuming to plug in and place each probe and wait for a read out.
Test strips are an alternative to the vials and dropper method, but from what I gather and the opinions on this forum, are not as accurate or reliable as the dropper method.
I agree, it is a pain in the butt to check and recheck water on a daily basis when you are setting up a new aquarium, but I do not think there is a viable or as reliable alternative to the dropper method you speak of.
Hang in there though, once the cycle is over and the tank is operating as it should, you can limit your water checks to bi-weekly or monthly as needed to maintain water health.
There really is no more surefire way to know your tank is running as it should than to do water tests.
I recently moved my tank to a new house and, even though my fish never showed no signs of distress or problems, I incurred a nitrate spike. Without testing my water after I moved the tank, I would have never known that I had the potentially deadly spike.
I've seen the probe type devices you are thinking of, but I am not too familiar with them.
What I have seen of them though, it seems as though they are item specific, meaning that one unit checks one specific element (ie. Ph or Gh). I have not seen a unit that checks everything that a FW or SW aquariast needs to monitor. If this holds true, that would mean buying 6 or more separate units which would be very expensive plus very time consuming to plug in and place each probe and wait for a read out.
Test strips are an alternative to the vials and dropper method, but from what I gather and the opinions on this forum, are not as accurate or reliable as the dropper method.
I agree, it is a pain in the butt to check and recheck water on a daily basis when you are setting up a new aquarium, but I do not think there is a viable or as reliable alternative to the dropper method you speak of.
Hang in there though, once the cycle is over and the tank is operating as it should, you can limit your water checks to bi-weekly or monthly as needed to maintain water health.
There really is no more surefire way to know your tank is running as it should than to do water tests.
I recently moved my tank to a new house and, even though my fish never showed no signs of distress or problems, I incurred a nitrate spike. Without testing my water after I moved the tank, I would have never known that I had the potentially deadly spike.
I've been thinking about automating some of the testing too, Here is one company I found online. It looks like all you do is insert a vial of sample water, and add a reagent( not sure how this simplifies it), and press a button and it gives ammonia, chromium VI, cyanide, nitrate, nitrite and phosphorous + some other stuff.
http://www.hannainst.com/products/ion/c218.htm
Hope this helps you search. I'm really looking for something totally automated, plug it into a computer and it records the results every hour or something like that. I've seen it for Ph, Conductivity, Oxygen, but never Nitrate, Nitrite or Ammonia.
Be sure to post if you find out anything.
Matt
http://www.hannainst.com/products/ion/c218.htm
Hope this helps you search. I'm really looking for something totally automated, plug it into a computer and it records the results every hour or something like that. I've seen it for Ph, Conductivity, Oxygen, but never Nitrate, Nitrite or Ammonia.
Be sure to post if you find out anything.
Matt
How much is that bad boy though?? I noticed an entry form popped up when I clicked on ordering information....a tell tale sign its goona hurt!!
Like I said earlier, if you have enough $$ Im sure there are products that can even do water changes for you. If you have THAT much $$ though, why not just hire someone to come out and put the drops in the vial FOR you?
Am I the only one who actually enjoys doing tank maintenance??
Like I said earlier, if you have enough $$ Im sure there are products that can even do water changes for you. If you have THAT much $$ though, why not just hire someone to come out and put the drops in the vial FOR you?
Am I the only one who actually enjoys doing tank maintenance??
Actually, I love tank maitenance. I probably like it too much. I have to restrain my self from totally redecorated the tanks all the time. I just love computers too, and would love the thought of having it automated and being run by a computer with me monitering it, and enjoying the fish and stuff.
Matt
Matt
Here is a nice ammonia monitor, easy to set up, read and cheap also..............I don't have one but my local BA and PS say they work as well as a person doing the test.
http://www.bigalsonline.ca/catalog/product.xml?product_id=19577;category_id=3095
http://www.bigalsonline.ca/catalog/product.xml?product_id=19577;category_id=3095
Say, acefred, have you asked your local Big Al's if that ammonia monitor can be faked out by products like Prime and Amquel? In other words, does it give a false positive, like some of the single reagent test kits do?
Macromatt said:
I'm the same way. I have almost as many computers as fish. One of the main reason I have for wanting this is accuracy. To me one blue on te PH bar looks a lot like the others! It wouldalso be nice to graph how the water is affected as you change feeding and other things within the tank.