Has anyone tried the HI784 Marine Ammonia checker? Is it better than their latest Magnesium Checker?

MikeTheNewbie

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I wonder if anyone has tired Hanna's Marine Ammonia checker and if they have confirmed it works properly.
I have had good experience with most of their egg shaped "checkers", yes even the Calcium Checker, but the last one (HI783 - Marine Magnesium Checker) was a disaster.
They were supposed to send new reagents if you registered to their website but so far the only response I saw was a notification of price increases :S
Anyway, I'm considering getting their Marine Ammonia checker to do some experiments with copepod culturing but I wonder if it provides reasonably precise measurements.
Any feedback will be greatly appreciated.
 

czoolander

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I wonder if anyone has tired Hanna's Marine Ammonia checker and if they have confirmed it works properly.
I have had good experience with most of their egg shaped "checkers", yes even the Calcium Checker, but the last one (HI783 - Marine Magnesium Checker) was a disaster.
They were supposed to send new reagents if you registered to their website but so far the only response I saw was a notification of price increases :S
Anyway, I'm considering getting their Marine Ammonia checker to do some experiments with copepod culturing but I wonder if it provides reasonably precise measurements.
Any feedback will be greatly appreciated.
I have all their checkers and with the magnesium recall. I filled out the form 4 weeks ago. Nothing has shipped to my house. I reached out to the company 2 weeks ago . Nobody has responded. They are just ghosting me now. Not good customer service at all

So not a happy customer and wont be buying hanna products in the future and I will have eventually 7 checkers useless because i wont buy more reagants . I will probably end up buying a trident or something else .
 
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MikeTheNewbie

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I'm also disappointed with the limited communication about the Magnesium checker but, objectively some of their testers are good if you use a pipette instead of the mark on the vial. Nitrate, Phosphate, Calcium have served me well. They regularly track with my ATI ICP results.
I wonder if anyone has tried the ammonia and compared it to another test.
 

JXNATC

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I have the Ammonia checker. I like it. It shows a trace amount in my system that I'm more likely to believe than trusting my old eyes and matching colors.
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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Very curious to know what your cycled tank reads with the meter

It only reads hundredths, while reefs tanks actually control their nh3 down to thousands and not hundredths, so it's still just a ballpark. Technically it should read zero on a running reef, since it can't read in thousandths, so the fact it shows hundredths is an accuracy concern.

We need to see how it patterns out across cycles tanks to know the test kits accuracy in my opinion

*they're calibrated for 77 degrees water samples, nearly everyone is above that range. They have an error rate of .05 ppm +/-

The truth is these meters don't have any utility in display tanks. They don't text you if spikes happen while away (which is a warning of a fish crash already happened and now they're rotting in tank, ammonia will never rise causing a fish loss) they're only helpful for managing nh3 levels in quarantine tanks and cycling displays
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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I've never seen one used in a cycle but would like to

Reason why: we already know the start date for any cycle attempted, they don't have ranging dates of completion

So I'd like to see what this meter shows on a new cycle by day ten wait... that's one way we know if it's accurate or as bad as api
 

JXNATC

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Very curious to know what your cycled tank reads with the meter

It only reads hundredths, while reefs tanks actually control their nh3 down to thousands and not hundredths, so it's still just a ballpark. Technically it should read zero on a running reef, since it can't read in thousandths, so the fact it shows hundredths is an accuracy concern.

We need to see how it patterns out across cycles tanks to know the test kits accuracy in my opinion

*they're calibrated for 77 degrees water samples, nearly everyone is above that range. They have an error rate of .05 ppm +/-

The truth is these meters don't have any utility in display tanks. They don't text you if spikes happen while away (which is a warning of a fish crash already happened and now they're rotting in tank, ammonia will never rise causing a fish loss) they're only helpful for managing nh3 levels in quarantine tanks and cycling displays
The most recent reading was .07 from the Hanna. I was using Salifert before and it was reading zero. I figured that the Hanna is probably over reading as the tank is cycled, but I like having a baseline that doesn't rely on me differentiating colors. I'm not treating it as anything to worry about at the moment. My temp has been going between 76 and 77 for what the Apex probe and the redundant Inkbird probes say. It would've been nice if I had it at the beginning of the cycle to see how it reacted. I think I just like throwing my money at the tank. :)
Make It Rain Money GIF
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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Agreed

Once we get several readings on cycled tanks we'll have a great baseline for the devices to know what a cycling tank should wind up at (not zero that's old cycling rules)

I like this meter is $59 and not $200 like seneye
 

JXNATC

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Agreed

Once we get several readings on cycled tanks we'll have a great baseline for the devices to know what a cycling tank should wind up at (not zero that's old cycling rules)

I like this meter is $59 and not $200 like seneye
I will say that the case is an upgrade from their older checkers. That's a bonus.
 

Biglew11

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I'm not saying free amonia is his problem, but it appears he has multiple test showing free amonia in his system. Someone else has said that copper can cause errors in amonia test.

My question to @brandon429 is if a fully cycled tank can process amonia so fast why can it show up in such a high concentration and show such a decrease with a water change.

This is a legit question, Not doubt. I get that a fully cycled tank will have some amonia as the cycle is a continuous thing. And most aquarists don't measure it once the tank is cycled.
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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Lew on this particular tank he posts above .07 on the Hanna checker

I learned yesterday from Garfs post that this meter reports as nh4 then we must convert it to nh3

seneye shows that running reef tanks are .001-.006~ ppm nh3 on average

depending on his pH above this is converted to .007 — .004 pretty darn close to seneye after I learned we must convert the readings above. Those readings above are sensible for the context of the tank, we still have another Hanna checker post showing 2.5 nh4 in a cycled tank, which I don’t believe is accurate. We don’t have any details other than a test read to state the 2.5 levels, those are insane readings for a cycled reef tank, so this tester isn’t out of the water yet for accuracy but in this thread here the .07 lines up very well with the tank age and stocking details
 

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