ELOS NEW way of dosing "using weight" to "self-verify" exact dosing amounts of trace elements for your reef tank?

[revhtree]

Looks like this will be at MACNA this weekend and wanted to know what you all thought about it!

What do you think of the idea of "using weight" to "self-verify" exact dosing amounts of trace elements for your reef tank?


Here's the email I just got about it.

ELOS Pesatron Automatic Weighing Station

The ELOS Pesatron works symbiotically with the ELOS Dosatron to provide reliable and consistent dosing to your aquarium. The ELOS Pesatron self-verifies exact dosing amounts using weight and adjusts the behavior of the dosing pumps, without the need for manual calibration. With the ELOS Pesatron built in weight scales, you no longer need to manually calibrate dosing pumps, preventing dosing errors that may occur by drifts over time. In addition, the ELOS Pesatron is accurate to the tenth of a gram.

ELOS Dosatron Intelligent Dosing Station

It’s not just a simple dosing pump - it’s the "brain" of your aquarium. The Elos Dosatron will calculate dosing level needs of your aquarium based on the data you enter (KH-Ca-Mg Test) and will administer the main supplements accordingly. The ELOS Dosatron learns your aquarium’s daily needs and behavior to fully automate dosing procedures.

 

[SPS2020]

Among other things, I weigh the four parts of ESV salt and prefer weight to volume every time with measurements in reefing and cooking.

 

[Wasabiroot]

I think making measurements by weight rather than volume is almost always more accurate, and it has the bonus side effect of also being easy to convert with metric. I do my salt mixing by g/mL and it comes out to the correct salinity every time. So this can't be a bad thing

 

[The Deaf Reefer]

I'm a former pastry chef ... I follow the European style of baking which is weigh ingredients by weights... grams, oz or lbs

It more accurate than using ml or cups... for example flour ... some people scoop out of the bag by a measurement cup or take a spoon and scoop it into a measurement cup

Scoop out of the bag method usually compact the flour more which mean more flour. A cup of flour weigh 120g, if they scoop out of the bag usually it like 140-150g

Doing weights is better, accurate and easier to scale up or.down depending of various size of the tanks or severity of the condition of the tank

 

[Wasabiroot]

I'm a former pastry chef ... I follow the European style of baking which is weigh ingredients by weights... grams, oz or lbs

It more accurate than using ml or cups... for example flour ... some people scoop out of the bag by a measurement cup or take a spoon and scoop it into a measurement cup

Scoop out of the bag method usually compact the flour more which mean more flour. A cup of flour weigh 120g, if they scoop out of the bag usually it like 140-150g

Doing weights is better, accurate and easier to scale up or.down depending of various size of the tanks or severity of the condition of the tank

I was thinking of baking also! Just like some of our reagents (nitrate test kit powder comes to mind) - the packing density of a level scoop may differ from user to user but 0.25g is 0.25g no matter how it gets scooped

 

[The Deaf Reefer]

I was thinking of baking also! Just like some of our reagents (nitrate test kit powder comes to mind) - the packing density of a scoop may differ from user to user but 0.25g is 0.25g

Exactly

 

[wmb0003]

It is a great error proofing tool. The concept has been used for quite a while, just not in the aquarium industry yet. I have experience with a similar system in a manufacturing setting. I am confident in my current GHL dosers so not sure if I will be making the switch. I would like to see how it performs over time.

 

[Quietman]

I can see weighing powders to make a solution, but once you have the solution and it's kept stirred (or analyzed after settling for concentration) I would think volume additions are easier, cheaper and just as accurate. Adding accurate volume of a known concentration is accurate. Am I missing something?

edited: I was...it's not solely based on weight, it's confirming dose weight vs volume as back up as I see it and adjusting dose volume. Ok...nice to have confirmation and automatic adjustment. Not sure it's worth the money but that's a common theme of mine but I can see people investing in it.

 

[JeffB418]

Ouch $950 for the set tho

 

[ZombieEngineer]

This idea is pointless. The dosing container measurement is going to drift in calibration just as easily as the dosing pump anyway. Let's spend $400 to tell you you don't need to calibrate a dosing pump that has little to no drift after 1 year, by adding an additional point of failure that requires calibration every year.

This extra "accuracy" isn't even beneficial. If my dosing pump drifts even an unprecedented 10% in 60 months, my testing would just misconstrue that as increased dosing demand and make absolutely zero difference in the end.

Hurray for $400 paperweights

 

[The Deaf Reefer]

Ouch $950 for the set tho

Oooo dang didn't realize the price lol

Maybe a test to say how much I need and I will just weigh the product myself and dose it

 

[Karen00]

As others have mentioned I find it a far more accurate and orecise method to mix ingredients whether it's for reefing, baking, etc. This assumes your scale is calibrated.

Edit: Having said that I wouldn't pay $950 to have something that does this. If someone were to give one to me I wouldn't say "no".

 

[wmb0003]

This idea is pointless. The dosing container measurement is going to drift in calibration just as easily as the dosing pump anyway. Let's spend $400 to tell you you don't need to calibrate a dosing pump that has little to no drift after 1 year, by adding an additional point of failure that requires calibration every year.

This extra "accuracy" isn't even beneficial. If my dosing pump drifts even an unprecedented 10% in 60 months, my testing would just misconstrue that as increased dosing demand and make absolutely zero difference in the end.

Hurray for $400 paperweights

I think the benefit of this device is more of a check, or error proofing. If for some reason the dosing head gets stuck on, you have a scale that will check the weight and notice that there is an error and shut off the dosing head. I see this device as redundancy to prevent an over dosing.

 

[ZombieEngineer]

I'm a former pastry chef ... I follow the European style of baking which is weigh ingredients by weights... grams, oz or lbs

It more accurate than using ml or cups... for example flour ... some people scoop out of the bag by a measurement cup or take a spoon and scoop it into a measurement cup

Scoop out of the bag method usually compact the flour more which mean more flour. A cup of flour weigh 120g, if they scoop out of the bag usually it like 140-150g

Doing weights is better, accurate and easier to scale up or.down depending of various size of the tanks or severity of the condition of the tank

This is measuring the weight of water not solids...the reason baking is more accurate with weight is because you are adding solids that may compress (like flour) differently between batches. 1ml of water weighs 1g every time and does not vary with volume because water is incompressible.

If you want to use a scale for mixing batches of sodium bicarbonate, there is a case to be made for that, but the variation is minimal (still within 2%) if you just use leveled cups and mark a 1 gallon line on your mixing container.

 

[ZombieEngineer]

I think the benefit of this device is more of a check, or error proofing. If for some reason the dosing head gets stuck on, you have a scale that will check the weight and notice that there is an error and shut off the dosing head. I see this device as redundancy to prevent an over dosing.

If the head gets stuck on, how is this going to turn it off...

 

[The Deaf Reefer]

This is measuring the weight of water not solids...the reason baking is more accurate with weight is because you are adding solids that may compress (like flour) differently between batches. 1ml of water weighs 1g every time and does not vary with volume because water is incompressible.

If you want to use a scale for mixing batches of sodium bicarbonate, there is a case to be made for that, but the variation is minimal (still within 2%) if you just use leveled cups and mark a 1 gallon line on your mixing container.

Yeah you are right in one way but the big thing is human error ... not everybody Measure liquid the same way though

People could stop pouring at under the line, on line or above the line.. people have their own version of whatever the measurement is... weigh the product eliminate the guess-work

 

[wmb0003]

If the head gets stuck on, how is this going to turn it off...

I would assume there are different levels of controls within this piece of equipment. If for some reason the dosing calibration does not match the scale calibration within a certain % error. I would think the manufacturer would have an emergency stop feature that would kill the power supply or some other means of stopping the dosing pump.

Edit: I speaking regarding my experience with this concept in different applications. If the manufacturer of this product did not add in those fail safes, I agree with you that it is not needed.

 

[Reef-junky]

I see this as just another over priced accessory that’s cool but not necessary. I’m sure it’s very accurate but is that level of accuracy necessary? No

just my 2 cents

 

[Reef-junky]

Yeah you are right in one way but the big thing is human error ... not everybody Measure liquid the same way though

People could stop pouring at under the line, on line or above the line.. people have their own version of whatever the measurement is... weigh the product eliminate the guess-work

i don’t know how this is set up to work but if I was going to do this by weight I would want the weight of what ever I add to the water to be part of it. You should be filling the container part way then adding powder to it. The powder should be part of the total not the total plus the powder. This is the way it’s done in a lab.

The way liquid is measured is like this
(Any other way is incorrect):

 

[wmb0003]

Thinking more about this, other aquarium controller companies should take note. It would not be hard to program similar logic into existing controllers if they had a scale add on that interfaced with their systems. I am not a big fan of learned dosing, that one might be a little more difficult but comparing dosing amounts vs weight and calculating fill levels could easily be done.

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