Calibrating a Trident... with tank water

[trmiv]

Digging this up because I’m having a similar issue. I’ve been having issues with my calcium climbing and mag going down as the month goes on.

I’ve been working with Neptune on it and after it happened again they wanted me to swap in a new set of reagents, reset the trident, do two tests and if within range calibrate. So I followed those steps and then tested my tank water with the trident.
Alk: 9.2
Calcium: 546
Magnesium: 1360

calcium was off over 100 points from where I thought it should be.

They told me to test the Trident calibration bottle with my salifert kits so I did.
Bottle label:
Alk: 8.25
Calcium: 455
Mag: 1170

Salifert tests of Trident bottle:
Alk: 8.3
Calcium: 350
Mag: 1180

Thinking I messed up I tested the Calcium again and got 360. Thinking my Salifert kit was bad I tested some Fauna Marin Reference solution I had on hand which was marked 422 calcium with my salifert kit and got 415.

so knowing my salifert kits looked ok I tested my tank water with them and got
Alk: 9.3
Calcium: 430
Magnesium: 1430

I then decided to calibrate the trident again but instead of doing the 455 from the label of the bottle as calcium I entered 350 since that’s what my salifert tested it at. After that I ran a trident test on my tank and got
Alk: 9.1
Calcium: 434
Magnesium: 1354

Magnesium is still off but calcium is reading what the Salifert kits and my experience with my tank tell me my calcium is.

anyway I sent all this info to Neptune and we’ll see what they say.

 

[fdevans]

Did they ever get back to you? I have similar situation including the mold in the bottle.

I only tested against the Alkalinity, but here's what my various numbers were:
Bottle reads: 8.25
Hanna Checker: 8.9
Salifert: 8.8

I might also go with the tank/3rd party kit calibration method and skip the bottles from Neptune.

 

[trmiv]

Neptune actually told me to calibrate with my tank water using my salifert tests. I did that and it’s been great during this reagent set. Switching reagents in a few days and I’ll calibrate again to my tank water.

 

[cappa43]

I as well have had the Trident for less than a week and not having the numbers match when manually testing (very close), short circuits my ocd. Dosing is one thing…brs calculator whatever, then adjust the manual test…-+5 , -+62, -+ 87….. I’m good…show me the tank water Jerry!!! Pick your poison my OCD picked mine. ‍

 

[WhatCouldGoWrong71]

So calibrating to tank water is Ok? Prior to my Trident I used Hanna for DKH and Salifert for the other 2. To stay consistent to that and follow trends vs numbers, I can test my water with my normal manual testers, then use those values to enter into the Trident? If I use the included reagent fluid and then spot check with my manual testers of choice, I am not close to what the Trident says. This has me second guess how I manage my dosing.

 

[Gtinnel]

So calibrating to tank water is Ok? Prior to my Trident I used Hanna for DKH and Salifert for the other 2. To stay consistent to that and follow trends vs numbers, I can test my water with my normal manual testers, then use those values to enter into the Trident?

Yes, that is exactly how I do it. I have only used the calibration solution a few times with my trident and overall I’ve been much happier once I started calibrating it to match my other tests. The only little caveat that I’ve found is if your manual tests and trident tests are off by a large amount it won’t always accept the calibration value if it is a large change.

 

[cappa43]

So calibrating to tank water is Ok? Prior to my Trident I used Hanna for DKH and Salifert for the other 2. To stay consistent to that and follow trends vs numbers, I can test my water with my normal manual testers, then use those values to enter into the Trident? If I use the included reagent fluid and then spot check with my manual testers of choice, I am not close to what the Trident says. This has me second guess how I manage my dosing.

I’m not experienced to say what is right or wrong. I regurgitate information from well know sources, i.e (LFS, Community & Research). IDK, This decision like others in the hobby is personal preference. I’ve tested Hanna and it showed 7 dK was like yeah right then tested again same sample 7.9 then again same sample 7.8. Now you have Trident reagent totally different makeup testing different values. So what makes sense to me is the tank water method, because if you calibrate the machine to your water after doing consistent testing with your manual methods even though the reagents are different you can narrow down the margin of those higher confusingly different values. You’re still going to have +- nothing is perfect. Then after that follow those trends and manual test periodically. Those are your fluctuations you can trust. That’s my take.