Exact iDip Digital Water Testing
- Thread starter Rockinreefs
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lnevo
Active Member
Ok, I did a lot of tests tonight as things have changed a bit more. I dosed another 20 oz of magnesium for another +100ppm mag last night.
Alk: 134, 145, 146
Cacium: 404, 420, 408, 416
*** I did start a new bottle of calcium strips today.
Magnesium calculated at: 1015, 1143, 1118
Alk: 134, 145, 146
Cacium: 404, 420, 408, 416
*** I did start a new bottle of calcium strips today.
Magnesium calculated at: 1015, 1143, 1118
Broadfield
Red Sea Reefer Consultant... Non Affiliated
How do you calculate the Magnesium within the app?
lnevo
Active Member
You do the calcium test and then the hardness test and click on results, it will calculate magnesium. It will also give residual alkalinity if you did an alk test, whatever that is 
Last edited:
lnevo
Active Member
How To Calculate Magnesium Hardness
- Complete tests for Calcium UH Marine and Total Hardness UH Marine in any order.
- Press results. The value for Magnesium Hardness (as CaCO3) will be calculated automatically and displayed on the Results page of the app.
- If your desired result is the Magnesium Ion (Mg+2) multiply Magnesium Hardness (as CaCO3) by 0.2428
lnevo
Active Member
Skipped a day...
Today's results:
Alk: 141ppm
Calcium: 420ppm
Magnesium: 1029
One thing to add, I did change my methodology the day I did a ton of tests. I now shake the reagent bottle before the hardness and calcium tests.
So, overall my method to test:
First, I take out all the things I need and setup my testing space. I take out the three test strips I will use as well as the dropper bottles for CA and Hardness.
1) Rinse Rinse Scrub Rinse Rinse
3) Fill cell (Full for alk, 3.8ml for CA and THH)
2) Select test in app
3) Shake bottle and add drops (2 for CA and 9 for THH)
4) Cap and zero meter
5) Click read, insert strip, and start swishing
6) Remove strip, cap and wait for reading
Back to Step 1 for each test.
Total time is like 5 minutes tops.
Today's results:
Alk: 141ppm
Calcium: 420ppm
Magnesium: 1029
One thing to add, I did change my methodology the day I did a ton of tests. I now shake the reagent bottle before the hardness and calcium tests.
So, overall my method to test:
First, I take out all the things I need and setup my testing space. I take out the three test strips I will use as well as the dropper bottles for CA and Hardness.
1) Rinse Rinse Scrub Rinse Rinse
3) Fill cell (Full for alk, 3.8ml for CA and THH)
2) Select test in app
3) Shake bottle and add drops (2 for CA and 9 for THH)
4) Cap and zero meter
5) Click read, insert strip, and start swishing
6) Remove strip, cap and wait for reading
Back to Step 1 for each test.
Total time is like 5 minutes tops.
I purchased an iDip at MACNA and have only done a little testing with it but thus far, I am a bit concerned. I've only tested alkalinity so far and each time I run a test, I compare to Salifert and find the iDips results to be substantially lower. I watched their video showing two swipes of the strip per second for 20 seconds. Pretty straight forward. My first tests a little over a week ago resulted in 8.6DKH with the Salifert and 112ppm on the iDip which was way low in comparison to the Salifert results which I trust based on my SPS growth and consistency of the Salifert tests. It's possible that I didn't get enough swipes in with the strip on that test. Either way, I reached out to Sensafe via voicemail and email but didn't hear back from them until I called again days later to follow up. When I spoke with them, they told me their results aren't consistent with Salifert and I should get a Red Sea kit. They indicated that their results typically come in 1 whole DKH lower than Salifert. They said they were working on determining why and that they have found their results to be closer to Red Sea test kits and on par with other testers such as the Hach or Hanna. So I went to the store and bought the Red Sea Pro alk test kit at their advice and retested using all 3 kits. After running the tests, I feel as though I wasted some money as the results between the RSP and Salifert were in line with my expectations and proved to be very close. Red Sea resulted in 8.4DKH. Salifter 8.6 and iDip was 139ppm which is still what I consider to be much lower but at least closer to the other tests. I sent the results over to the iDip support guys on Tuesday and they never responded which was a bit disappointing. At least this time the results were more inline with what they said they have found but still not that close to the RSP test as they would have suggested.
Alk is a pretty important test for a reef tank and this reduces the usefulness of the iDip for me. It is reasonably fast and reasonably easy to use but accurate test results are critical to a reef tank. Especially for those of us that make decisions on calcium reactor settings or dosing based on these numbers. I'm not completely turned off by this product yet and will likely give it a bit more time but I will continue to use my Salifert tests because I know those can be trusted and are consistent. I will have to do some other tests such as calcium and compare to Salifert and Po4 and compare to my Hanna ULR to see how the iDip compares there as well. I will likely do that this weekend and will report back with the results.
I'm curious what others have found when comparing the iDip test results to tests like Red Sea or Salifert..
Alk is a pretty important test for a reef tank and this reduces the usefulness of the iDip for me. It is reasonably fast and reasonably easy to use but accurate test results are critical to a reef tank. Especially for those of us that make decisions on calcium reactor settings or dosing based on these numbers. I'm not completely turned off by this product yet and will likely give it a bit more time but I will continue to use my Salifert tests because I know those can be trusted and are consistent. I will have to do some other tests such as calcium and compare to Salifert and Po4 and compare to my Hanna ULR to see how the iDip compares there as well. I will likely do that this weekend and will report back with the results.
I'm curious what others have found when comparing the iDip test results to tests like Red Sea or Salifert..
lnevo
Active Member
Are you using the new "570" strips and the Alkalinity 570 test? or the older one?
My feeling is that the specific measure is irrelevant but the trend and consistency. If you do 5 tests you will have 5 very similar results. So you can measure the consumption of alk easily. It's really just a matter of calibration to be able to compare with others doing tests if your dkh is 7 or 8.
My feeling is that the specific measure is irrelevant but the trend and consistency. If you do 5 tests you will have 5 very similar results. So you can measure the consumption of alk easily. It's really just a matter of calibration to be able to compare with others doing tests if your dkh is 7 or 8.
I am using the new 570 strips that just came with my iDip that I received a week ago. I understand the consistency part but if we are targeting specific alk levels in a reef tank, having accurate results is fairly important IMO. Especially if one is dosing and targeting specific levels. Not everybody is going to have multiple tests to determine the accuracy of a particular tester and for the cost of this device, I would expect accuracy and consistency. Not just consistency. Further, if the Salifert and Red Sea tests are accurate which I expect they are, that leaves the iDip with a margin of error that is greater than 10% which isn't acceptable for a device of this nature. At least not for the money. That said, I understand this is likely a work in progress but I would have expected more and certainly wouldn't depend on it's results and would defer to my other test methods for accuracy and cost.
lnevo
Active Member
Understood. Its a fair point, but even between Hanna, Red Sea and Salifert there is discrepancy. So really how accurate are these kits we are using as is.
My suggestion would be to do more tests with the idip. It does take some getting used to for consistency. Also use the cover, it does help..
My suggestion would be to do more tests with the idip. It does take some getting used to for consistency. Also use the cover, it does help..
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I've found most test kits to be fairly reliable and accurate enough. Even API with some parameters like Ca and Alk.
http://reef2reef.com/threads/big-3-...os-elos-salifert-api-hanna-triton-awt.234660/
I will be very curious what your results are..
Well I totally forgot that I don't dose my QT as I just have had a clown in there for a couple of months and just top off. Nedless to say my Hanna showed 23ppm alk and the idip was just spitting out LO
I am filling up my 55g drum with ocean water next week though so should have better numbers then.
Agreed.. Something has to be wrong with those results.
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