REEF KINETICS is a potential GAME CHANGER! Auto Water Tester

[Mark75]

Wow,....really surprised at the negative responses,.... I obviously hate testing water more than the average reefer!

I love this idea and, with any new tech, expect debut pricing to be very expensive. I am old enough to remember paying $1000 for a basic VCR.

I would guess the first generation will be terrible in every aspect, over priced, unreliable, inaccurate, and probably not even user friendly. But, with time this technology could advance our hobby for years to come. When cell phones first hit the scene the conversations were similar,.."they cost to much", "they don't work many places", "what's wrong with using the phone in my house", "If I am not home I'll just use a pay phone",..aren't you glad that technology was not abandoned.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Wow,....really surprised at the negative responses,.... I obviously hate testing water more than the average reefer!

I love this idea and, with any new tech, expect debut pricing to be very expensive. I am old enough to remember paying $1000 for a basic VCR.

I would guess the first generation will be terrible in every aspect, over priced, unreliable, inaccurate, and probably not even user friendly. But, with time this technology could advance our hobby for years to come. When cell phones first hit the scene the conversations were similar,.."they cost to much", "they don't work many places", "what's wrong with using the phone in my house", "If I am not home I'll just use a pay phone",..aren't you glad that technology was not abandoned.

Yeah. It's the nature of innovation that it will be met with criticism...the skepticism is heavier for this technology because others have promised and not delivered. However, I'm hopeful that Reef Kinetics will be different. As an innovation, it makes sense, and it is on display at MACNA with a working model. It's already financially backed, so a lot of the obstacles that the previous hopefuls had are already overcome. IMO that sets this apart.

 

[Kyuss414]

I dunno, I guess I just look at hobbies a different way. I have them for something to do in my free time. If I don't have the free time, or if the "hobby" starts seeming like a chore or work, it's time to give up the hobby. It's happened to me before with some hobbies.

The bigger thing I think of with the idea of automated testing (which controls your dosing) is redundancy. Most will agree that's a huge part of maintaining a tank long term and will have redundancies on heaters/chillers, ATOs, etc. Now you'd trust an automated system to always add the correct amount of reageant, always properly clean the vials, not have any equipment failures that skew the numbers? I suppose you could buy two units at $1000+ a pop?

IMO at that point you're better off just hiring an aquarium maintenance service so you wouldn't have to worry about any of it, not even the even more time consuming water changes. $2000+ would cover all of the chores for quite some time for most peoples tanks. Plus you wouldn't have to deal with customer service over the phone and/or forking out more money to send stuff back, especially if the company is overseas.

If it works and it accurate it's worth it. Readings sent to my phone. If alk or cal low. Pull up apex on phone and adjust dosers. All while sitting on the couch with my feet up, watching the news. Priceless. You can dream. But I don't see this coming to market anytime soon. But I wish them the best.

Different strokes for different folks I guess. I'd rather go smell my skimmer cup than watch the "news" these days.

 

[jerseypete]

I dunno, I guess I just look at hobbies a different way. I have them for something to do in my free time. If I don't have the free time, or if the "hobby" starts seeming like a chore or work, it's time to give up the hobby. It's happened to me before with some hobbies.

The bigger thing I think of with the idea of automated testing (which controls your dosing) is redundancy. Most will agree that's a huge part of maintaining a tank long term and will have redundancies on heaters/chillers, ATOs, etc. Now you'd trust an automated system to always add the correct amount of reageant, always properly clean the vials, not have any equipment failures that skew the numbers? I suppose you could buy two units at $1000+ a pop?

IMO at that point you're better off just hiring an aquarium maintenance service so you wouldn't have to worry about any of it, not even the even more time consuming water changes. $2000+ would cover all of the chores for quite some time for most peoples tanks. Plus you wouldn't have to deal with customer service over the phone and/or forking out more money to send stuff back, especially if the company is overseas.



Different strokes for different folks I guess. I'd rather go smell my skimmer cup than watch the "news" these days.

Watching the news, on the couch. The tank is next to the couch. But a big part of the hobby for me is the "build". And doing as little maintenance as possible. Waterchange only every 3 months. And as soon as someone invents an automated frozen food feeder I'm going to jump on that also.

 

[tomtom2245]

Do they need Beta testers because I volunteer

 

[locito277]

Had a great frozen food feeder here at Macna as well. 125$

 

[TaylorPilot]

A grand doesn't sound bad to me. A nice apex is close to that.

 

[revhtree]

FYI Mindstream is still progressing from what I understand. I will be having a meeting with them in the next couple weeks. Stay tuned!

This product or any product that will help us monitor water chemistry like ALK and CAL will also allow us to automate to maintain these levels as well. Exciting for me personally!

 

[Kyuss414]

Watching the news, on the couch. The tank is next to the couch. But a big part of the hobby for me is the "build". And doing as little maintenance as possible. Waterchange only every 3 months. And as soon as someone invents an automated frozen food feeder I'm going to jump on that also.

Like I said, different strokes for different folks. I just couldn't trust something as important as testing to be automated without some kind of redundancy, and even then it would only be saving me a trivial amount of time each month. Lucky for you though, the aquarium industry these days has no problem coming up with more stuff to sell ya.

No different then the car hobby where you have guys that pay someone else to do everything, and their involvement in the "hobby" is taking the car out for ice cream a couple Sundays a year. Eh, not for me.

 

[VegasUSP]

I went to their booth yesterday and talked to to them. They said the unit will be about $800. I'm definitely interested.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Watching the news, on the couch. The tank is next to the couch. But a big part of the hobby for me is the "build". And doing as little maintenance as possible. Waterchange only every 3 months. And as soon as someone invents an automated frozen food feeder I'm going to jump on that also.

Because your asked so nicely. Check this out:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/automated-frozen-food-feeder-at-macna.265006/

 

[jerseypete]

Because your asked so nicely. Check this out:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/automated-frozen-food-feeder-at-macna.265006/

Not really the type I had in mind. But it's a start.

 

[reefeqmover]

Another interesting piece of equipment

 

[drernesto]

It is a great looking product, they estimated price would be around $850 for the hub and one pod that will do two different tests each reagent capsule will hold enough reagent for 50 tests, additional pods (each pod does two tests would be around $200) pricing is a swag at this point. the estimated release next year. One very cool feature is that you can calibrate to use your own reagents.

Dear Jonty, thanks for passing by our booth! The estimated price would be between $600-800, and each additional Reef Bit (the dome) will cost around $200-250. We are trying our best to lower the price.
Best Regards,
Rabih Krayem

 

[locito277]

Where would you keep the machine? It looked a little big in person.

 

[tomtom2245]

So question, if this unit draws water from the tank, then how much does it use per test? I guess my concern would be the length of tubing used to get the water to the hub vs the amount used for testing. If the unit is placed such that an extended piece of hose is used, how long would it be then before tank water makes it to be tested. Could it be possible that the water being tested is 2, 3, 4, or more days old? Would the stale water affect the test results?

 

[TaylorPilot]

So question, if this unit draws water from the tank, then how much does it use per test? I guess my concern would be the length of tubing used to get the water to the hub vs the amount used for testing. If the unit is placed such that an extended piece of hose is used, how long would it be then before tank water makes it to be tested. Could it be possible that the water being tested is 2, 3, 4, or more days old? Would the stale water affect the test results?

Maybe it has a return line like a car, so that it flushed back into the tank so that it only uses new water. I had actually thought about that to. The biggest thing being PH, which I wouldn't be to worried about collecting because it can be done so easily with a probe.

 

[drernesto]

Where would you keep the machine? It looked a little big in person.

It would fit in the cabinet or beside any tank.
Happy Reefing

 

[drernesto]

So question, if this unit draws water from the tank, then how much does it use per test? I guess my concern would be the length of tubing used to get the water to the hub vs the amount used for testing. If the unit is placed such that an extended piece of hose is used, how long would it be then before tank water makes it to be tested. Could it be possible that the water being tested is 2, 3, 4, or more days old? Would the stale water affect the test results?

Dear,
The tube from your tank to the brain will come in a standard of one meter. If you want to put a longer tube, you'll have an option on the dashboard were you can adjust the length so the pumps will take more water. The test cycle takes around 20ml for the flushing to actual testing and cleaning back.
Best Regards,
Rabih

 

[tomtom2245]

Dear,
The tube from your tank to the brain will come in a standard of one meter. If you want to put a longer tube, you'll have an option on the dashboard were you can adjust the length so the pumps will take more water. The test cycle takes around 20ml for the flushing to actual testing and cleaning back.
Best Regards,
Rabih

Thanks! That also then kind of leads to my next question. Would I be correct in assuming that the unit would require some kind of waste collection that the old tests would be flushed to and the water that was cycled through to flush the system as you say? Or does it have its own internal collection cup that would need to be emptied? And finally, you laid out the costs for the units, but how much would reagent refills run?