Poll: Alkalinity Monitoring Options

[Terence]

I was talking accuracy Terrance not precision, I agree with you completely on the precision point. In these systems I view precision and consistency as kind of the same thing. If you have a different view on that I'd love to hear it.

Nope, that is exactly what I am talking about. Customers should expect all manufacturers to give their precision numbers. NOTE: Not all in the list at the top of this thread have done so. Also, customers should assume that those numbers (including ours) are given based on using the product exactly as designed and recommended (which for some is quite complex) and also are going to be when everything is going your way. So, that is why I say that any company that can give you +/- 0.05 is going to be something that matters as a precision of +/- 0.15 would likely end up as 0.3 in a consumers hands.

 

[Amoo]

Nope, that is exactly what I am talking about. Customers should expect all manufacturers to give their precision numbers. NOTE: Not all in the list at the top of this thread have done so. Also, customers should assume that those numbers (including ours) are given based on using the product exactly as designed and recommended (which for some is quite complex) and also are going to be when everything is going your way. So, that is why I say that any company that can give you +/- 0.05 is going to be something that matters as a precision of +/- 0.15 would likely end up as 0.3 in a consumers hands.

Can you shed some light on some of the things you guys may have encountered up to this point which would not exactly play in our favor in regards to precision? I'm assuming you're talking about things like proper maintenance, water clarity?

 

[Terence]

Can you shed some light on some of the things you guys may have encountered up to this point which would not exactly play in our favor in regards to precision? I'm assuming you're talking about things like proper maintenance, water clarity?

At this point there is not much a consumer could do to throw our system off except possibly not calibrating it correctly. By taking out the need to use a pH probe or other sensor in the water, a lot of that variability goes away. Also, our reagents will be pre-mixed. I know that was not the case with at least one of the devices above at some point - so there is variability there as well. One other advantage with the Trident that is not immediately obvious is that we have just one peristaltic pump. As it wears, its change is proportional on all actions - pulling water, adding reagent, etc. so the effect is not nearly the issue as if you had three pumps and they possibly wear at different rates.

 

[MnFish1]

If you read back through everything I was posting, that is exactly what I was saying. The discussion started talking about the inaccuracy of the Mindstream and I countered that with discussion about how "real world" accuracy is what we need and pushing "well we can measure down to .05" while nice, isn't exactly a real world problem as we can't even check that with our hobbiest level kits.

As to the rest of your points, maybe if you could learn to have a discussion without sounding like you know everything and everybody else is an idiot by passively aggressively saying things like "mentally masturbate" and because you find no value in a part of the discussion you clearly didn't even get the whole point of as "silly" people might respond better to you. Mistakes happen, equipment fails, you can have double failures, you can have cascading failures. This forum is about learning and helping each other and encouraging good and thoughtful discussion, if you want to constantly be negative and passive aggressive you might find more friends over at that central place. Either way I'm out. Good luck.

If I was passive aggressive I wouldn't tell you directly, as I am now, that all of the items you criticize in my posts are fully visible in yours above. Im sorry I did not intend to suggest that I know everything - I was asking a question (see below) and you took it as an attack against you which it was not meant to be. I was not saying or implying anyone was an idiot. There have been many people here saying the benefits of the measurements is 'getting data', 'crunching data', etc. Just having a list of numbers might be 'fun', besides that Im trying to figure out the 'real-world' application here as well. Perhaps you take offense at me asking for more of a scientific rationale as compared to an anecdotal rationale for what we do with our tanks. Part of that comes from the fact that much of what we do as 'dogma' in reefing is based on anecdote.

With measurements only happening 2-4x a day, a precision of +/-0.2 is not adequate as by the time you get enough data points to know that a 0.2 downtrend is not an anomaly, your tank could be 0.4 down a day later. The next day if it goes the other way, you are up 0.4. Many in this hobby want to maintain their alkalinity closer than that. You can argue the validity of that, but this tighter precision is something customers want - especially if, due to lax maintenance or other reasons the reality is that the real-world precision is double the manufacturers stated rating.

I agree with what you're saying, and I understand that some people want it. And I agree if one wants to maintain their alkalinity +- .2 all the time, the tests need to be accurate and precise and done 4x/day. I guess I was trying to ask (and still didn't get an answer) is whether there is any data to suggest that this is necessary/beneficial to the average reef tank and also whether this effort at tighter control may cause more problems than it solves. I will still buy a monitor - and probably the Trident since it can measure all 3 parameters, but Im not sure I would use the data to have that tight of a control. Perhaps having this kind of technology in the hands of the general reefing public will answer those questions.

 

[MnFish1]

If you read back through everything I was posting, that is exactly what I was saying. The discussion started talking about the inaccuracy of the Mindstream and I countered that with discussion about how "real world" accuracy is what we need and pushing "well we can measure down to .05" while nice, isn't exactly a real world problem as we can't even check that with our hobbiest level kits.

As to the rest of your points, maybe if you could learn to have a discussion without sounding like you know everything and everybody else is an idiot by passively aggressively saying things like "mentally masturbate" and because you find no value in a part of the discussion you clearly didn't even get the whole point of as "silly" people might respond better to you. Mistakes happen, equipment fails, you can have double failures, you can have cascading failures. This forum is about learning and helping each other and encouraging good and thoughtful discussion, if you want to constantly be negative and passive aggressive you might find more friends over at that central place. Either way I'm out. Good luck.

If I was passive aggressive I wouldn't tell you directly, as I am now, that all of the items you criticize in my posts are fully visible in yours above. Im sorry I did not intend to suggest that I know everything - I was asking a question (see below) and you took it as an attack against you which it was not meant to be. I was not saying or implying anyone was an idiot. There have been many people here saying the benefits of the measurements is 'getting data', 'crunching data', etc. Just having a list of numbers might be 'fun', besides that Im trying to figure out the 'real-world' application here as well. Perhaps you take offense at me asking for more of a scientific rationale as compared to an anecdotal rationale for what we do with our tanks. Part of that comes from the fact that much of what we do as 'dogma' in reefing is based on anecdote.

With measurements only happening 2-4x a day, a precision of +/-0.2 is not adequate as by the time you get enough data points to know that a 0.2 downtrend is not an anomaly, your tank could be 0.4 down a day later. The next day if it goes the other way, you are up 0.4. Many in this hobby want to maintain their alkalinity closer than that. You can argue the validity of that, but this tighter precision is something customers want - especially if, due to lax maintenance or other reasons the reality is that the real-world precision is double the manufacturers stated rating.

I agree with what you're saying, and I understand that some people want it. And I agree if one wants to maintain their alkalinity +- .2 all the time, the tests need to be accurate and precise and done 4x/day. I guess I was trying to ask (and still didn't get an answer) is whether there is any data to suggest that this is necessary/beneficial to the average reef tank and also whether this effort at tighter control may cause more problems than it solves. I will still buy a monitor - and probably the Trident since it can measure all 3 parameters, but Im not sure I would use the data to have that tight of a control. Perhaps having this kind of technology in the hands of the general reefing public will answer those questions.

 

[chefjpaul]

At this point there is not much a consumer could do to throw our system off except possibly not calibrating it correctly. By taking out the need to use a pH probe or other sensor in the water, a lot of that variability goes away. Also, our reagents will be pre-mixed. I know that was not the case with at least one of the devices above at some point - so there is variability there as well. One other advantage with the Trident that is not immediately obvious is that we have just one peristaltic pump. As it wears, its change is proportional on all actions - pulling water, adding reagent, etc. so the effect is not nearly the issue as if you had three pumps and they possibly wear at different rates.

Sure, another thread become a sales pitch for neptune.

Let say you send out a bad batch of reagents, similar to what happend to Hannah not long ago? (As an example)
Things can go wrong and will.
....or, Lets say the three pumps you speak of that one is using is a much better quality build vs. The one from neptune? How is this any different in reality if they can outlast the one?

See, there are many variables here, one isn't necessary better than another unless the user preference says so.

I truly appreciate Neptunes advancements, as I do your competition, but lets let the market dictate each users needs.aa

Speaking of accuracies, a great quote I like from Richard Ross for everyone listening;

"Let’s first consider what is meant by the terms ‘precision’ and ‘accuracy’. Precision is defined as how reproducible results of one test are relative to others. That is, if we test the same water using the same test kit, do we get about the same number every time, or do we get a wide range of variation each time we use the kit? Accuracy is defined as how close we come to the true value with our test kit. Using a realistic aquarium example, we could imagine some sea water which has a magnesium concentration of exactly 1300 ppm. Let’s say we use a test kit to determine the magnesium concentration of this sea water three times and we get values of 1150, 1160, 1145 ppm. The test kit is fairly precise, but it’s not very accurate since the average of these three values is 1152 ppm, which is not very close to the true value of 1300 ppm. Conversely, if we get values of 1100, 1250, 1500 ppm, the average of these three gives us 1283 ppm, which is close to the true value of 1300 ppm, so the kit is relatively accurate, but not very precise. Ideally, we want our test kits to be both as accurate and precise as possible".

 

[MnFish1]

Nope, that is exactly what I am talking about. Customers should expect all manufacturers to give their precision numbers. NOTE: Not all in the list at the top of this thread have done so. Also, customers should assume that those numbers (including ours) are given based on using the product exactly as designed and recommended (which for some is quite complex) and also are going to be when everything is going your way. So, that is why I say that any company that can give you +/- 0.05 is going to be something that matters as a precision of +/- 0.15 would likely end up as 0.3 in a consumers hands.

So do I have this right? When Neptune uses the term' Precision of +/- .05' this refers to taking several samples of the same 'water' and testing them and all of them came within +-.05?

Can you comment on the accuracy of the measurement (i.e. testing against a known solution(calibration) and how often calibration is expected for the Trident? Im assuming those details might not yet be worked out - but I thought I would ask. PS - I was writing this as chefjpaul must have posted his precision/accuracy post above.

 

[Amoo]

@chefjpaul One of the things I have appreciated out of @JonasRoman 's posts so far is instead of trying to tell us that his company is doing it this way and it's better then others because x, y or z, much of the information he has provided has simply been in the form of "we tried several methods and this is what we found to be the best solution." I definitely don't get the sales pitch feeling. It would be nice if we could hear from company reps specifically about their products and not play the comparison game. I'd rather hear from the specific people who knows those products best rather then reps from other companies speculating about this or that.

Jonas's info on FB about probe precision has been very informative and interesting.

 

[Amoo]

So do I have this right? When Neptune uses the term' Precision of +/- .05' this refers to taking several samples of the same 'water' and testing them and all of them came within +-.05?

Can you comment on the accuracy of the measurement (i.e. testing against a known solution(calibration) and how often calibration is expected for the Trident? Im assuming those details might not yet be worked out - but I thought I would ask. PS - I was writing this as chefjpaul must have posted his precision/accuracy post above.

This is essentially the same question I asked in the Vendor thread which he said they weren't ready to start giving out that information yet, which he echoed earlier in this thread. So in regards to Neptune's precision all we have is "their word" it will be good.

 

[chefjpaul]

@chefjpaul One of the things I have appreciated out of @JonasRoman 's posts so far is instead of trying to tell us that his company is doing it this way and it's better then others because x, y or z, much of the information he has provided has simply been in the form of "we tried several methods and this is what we found to be the best solution." I definitely don't get the sales pitch feeling. It would be nice if we could hear from company reps specifically about their products and not play the comparison game. I'd rather hear from the specific people who knows those products best rather then reps from other companies speculating about this or that.

Jonas's info on FB about probe precision has been very informative and interesting.

I definitely see your point here, sometimes it gets too much.

I agree with the probe myself, as I can easily just replace one much cheeper than constantly paying for reagents or calibrate quickly as one example.
(I mean 40-50 $ / year or even quarterly is still much more efficient for me and my time I feel).
Plus as I quoted Ross avove regarding reagent accuracy vs. Precision.....

I will defiantly look more into what JonasRoman has to say.
Thanks.

 

[Amoo]

I guess I was trying to ask (and still didn't get an answer) is whether there is any data to suggest that this is necessary/beneficial to the average reef tank and also whether this effort at tighter control may cause more problems than it solves. I will still buy a monitor - and probably the Trident since it can measure all 3 parameters, but Im not sure I would use the data to have that tight of a control. Perhaps having this kind of technology in the hands of the general reefing public will answer those questions.

I don't know if you've had a chance to see the video BRStv posted about Dana Riddle's Macna presentation on photo uptake periods, but the "presumed" and I believe working theory is that when photosynthetic activity is at it's maximum we SHOULD see our largest calls for Alk & Ca. So let's use round numbers so I can easily explain this. Say a tank calls for 10ml dose a day of 2 part. What we could learn from monitoring at an increased frequency is we may be able to stabilize dKH to an almost flat level by dosing say 4ml at 10am 1 ml at 1pm 4ml at 4pm and 1ml at 8pm. So while out overall dose for the day is 10ml, we could further learn how to achieve maximum growth success by optimizing our dosing.

Think that answers your question?

 

[JimWelsh]

I agree with the probe myself, as I can easily just replace one much cheeper than constantly paying for reagents or calibrate quickly as one example.

You do understand that all of the alkalinity monitor devices using a pH probe also require a reagent, yes?

 

[chefjpaul]

You do understand that all of the alkalinity monitor devices using a pH probe also require a reagent, yes?

Yeah, I was more relating to having 3 types / tests, Only because I personally only see the need to monitor KH that frequently on my small 120.

Also why some require an extra doser as Terrence was reffering.

 

[Terence]

@chefjpaul I'd rather hear from the specific people who knows those products best rather then reps from other companies speculating about this or that.

Speaking to methodology and its upsides or downsides is not speculating about anything if, for instance, in our road to a solution we looked at these other methods and found them to less desirable due to some of the reasons mentioned already.

This is essentially the same question I asked in the Vendor thread which he said they weren't ready to start giving out that information yet, which he echoed earlier in this thread. So in regards to Neptune's precision all we have is "their word" it will be good.

What we are not prepared to release is the methodology for validating our numbers. But at least we have put a stake in the ground. And, for all but one of these devices, all you really have anyways is the word of the developer. I do not know any of these other devices that have been sold or independently tested. Rest assured we know before the Trident goes out to the general market, there will be plenty of people giving their experiences from our NSI team.

 

[Amoo]

Speaking to methodology and its upsides or downsides is not speculating about anything if, for instance, in our road to a solution we looked at these other methods and found them to less desirable due to some of the reasons mentioned already.


What we are not prepared to release is the methodology for validating our numbers. But at least we have put a stake in the ground. And, for all but one of these devices, all you really have anyways is the word of the developer. I do not know any of these other devices that have been sold or independently tested. Rest assured we know before the Trident goes out to the general market, there will be plenty of people giving their experiences from our NSI team.

KH Guardian would like to have a word with you about this. Again I just see it as really distasteful to bash other products while trying to prop your own up consider how well the 2016 Apex launch went. You're already going to get a majority of the customers because your product has the name Neptune on it, but you guys also can't afford another product launch like the one you just had or that pristine reputation is going to take a serious hit. I get it, your job is to sell units, but honestly I think anyways, the best way for you to sell units is to just give us details and tell us how great it is without playing politics and beating down the smaller guys.

 

[justingraham]

KH Guardian would like to have a word with you about this. Again I just see it as really distasteful to bash other products while trying to prop your own up consider how well the 2016 Apex launch went. You're already going to get a majority of the customers because your product has the name Neptune on it, but you guys also can't afford another product launch like the one you just had or that pristine reputation is going to take a serious hit. I get it, your job is to sell units, but honestly I think anyways, the best way for you to sell units is to just give us details and tell us how great it is without playing politics and beating down the smaller guys.

Stop before all the Neptune lovers who only see the name apex start bashing you

It doesn't matter how many valid points u bring up like in order to get the trident u have to have the new apex that doesn't have a record like the original apex does the end result is apex is advancing the technology forward and just upgrade. It doesn't matter if you prove time and time again that there is faults with the new apex and how there monitor is 1500-1600 dollars not 500-600 their response to that is the day they announced the trident you should have sold your apex classic for the most money possible and go in debt to buy the new apex that was on sale for 715 dollars the week of macna.

It's not worth the fight trying to show those people that just because Neptune says something that it's Got to be true and that neptunes word is everything because as A customer on here told me who had a perfectly working apex that when the new apex came out he upgraded to it because he saw the writing on the wall the new apex crashed his tank twice and he was ok with it because of the customer service you won't be able to communicate with people like this as apex will never do anything wrong in their eyes

I have an apex and I love it but I am not brainwashed and find a bunch of this attempted bullying on this thread funny. The one pump thing was funny to me like ok only one pump controls everything so it's less likely to go out of calibration but if that one pump fails what do you have? Great customer support is the correct answer.

I would love to get the trident it prolly is the best bang for the buc but the more I read these threads the more I think why I bought an apex in the first place

Jonas's alktronic for me is slowly pulling away from the trident esp hearing about the future doseing pumps please have four usable heads Jonas for us triton guys.

And I still want to know where the numbers apex are giving are coming from besides dancing around the question but we prolly won't find that out until next year sometime.

 

[MnFish1]

I don't know if you've had a chance to see the video BRStv posted about Dana Riddle's Macna presentation on photo uptake periods, but the "presumed" and I believe working theory is that when photosynthetic activity is at it's maximum we SHOULD see our largest calls for Alk & Ca. So let's use round numbers so I can easily explain this. Say a tank calls for 10ml dose a day of 2 part. What we could learn from monitoring at an increased frequency is we may be able to stabilize dKH to an almost flat level by dosing say 4ml at 10am 1 ml at 1pm 4ml at 4pm and 1ml at 8pm. So while out overall dose for the day is 10ml, we could further learn how to achieve maximum growth success by optimizing our dosing.

Think that answers your question?

Thanks - yes that answers my question - there is no data that shows any benefit to maintaining alkalinity within a .2 range on a constant basis - but it is something that will be much easier to 'test' with an alkalinity monitor. And no I didn't see that presentation - thanks for bringing it to my attention. I hope you understand the reason for asking the question was to get at the utility of having 4 measurements/day vs doing measurements on another schedule.

If there were clear data available that this has significant advantages, it would be. a major selling point to any alk monitor.

 

[MnFish1]

This is essentially the same question I asked in the Vendor thread which he said they weren't ready to start giving out that information yet, which he echoed earlier in this thread. So in regards to Neptune's precision all we have is "their word" it will be good.

Right - I wasn't asking about 'precision' I was asking about 'accuracy'. And no offense to Terence - he has also Side-stepped the accuracy question as well. Look at it this way: Day 1. Calibrate Trident with lets say alk of 8 calibration solution. You Measure 3 times The measurement comes out 8.01, 8.03, 7.99 = The Precsion is exactly as they say and it is quite accurate as well. Lets say 2 weeks later - if you again checked with the alk 8 sample the measurements came out 8.15, 8.16 and 8.14. The Precision is still within their parameters, but the measurement is not as 'accurate'. I.e. will accuracy 'drift' over time.

Precision is merely a measurement of how close together a number of measurements on the same sample are to each other. It does not mean the actual measurement is 'correct' or 'accurate'

 

[Eric Tang]

@chefjpaul One of the things I have appreciated out of @JonasRoman 's posts so far is instead of trying to tell us that his company is doing it this way and it's better then others because x, y or z, much of the information he has provided has simply been in the form of "we tried several methods and this is what we found to be the best solution." I definitely don't get the sales pitch feeling. It would be nice if we could hear from company reps specifically about their products and not play the comparison game. I'd rather hear from the specific people who knows those products best rather then reps from other companies speculating about this or that.

Jonas's info on FB about probe precision has been very informative and interesting.

Since working with Jonas, I really admire and proud of his dedication to this hobby. As he says, he has been almost working 24/7 on this project for over a year which started as his DIY project. He goes into very fine details in terms of all the different parts and how hoses should run etc. I can't say ALL but probably we have looked into most of the details in a very fine manner and have done tests to decide on the final design of the product.

I think this is a very good thread of we can say and discuss our views in a polite manners. We should be making friends in this hobby and not enemies!

 

[Amoo]

Right - I wasn't asking about 'precision' I was asking about 'accuracy'. And no offense to Terence - he has also Side-stepped the accuracy question as well. Look at it this way: Day 1. Calibrate Trident with lets say alk of 8 calibration solution. You Measure 3 times The measurement comes out 8.01, 8.03, 7.99 = The Precsion is exactly as they say and it is quite accurate as well. Lets say 2 weeks later - if you again checked with the alk 8 sample the measurements came out 8.15, 8.16 and 8.14. The Precision is still within their parameters, but the measurement is not as 'accurate'. I.e. will accuracy 'drift' over time.

Precision is merely a measurement of how close together a number of measurements on the same sample are to each other. It does not mean the actual measurement is 'correct' or 'accurate'

I'm not sure your involvement in the hobby in the summer of 2015 (IIRC?) when mindstream announced their product initially and launched their kickstarter. I'm PRETTY SURE but not positive many of our chemists (I know Randy was one of them) begun to theorize and explain to a lot of the community some of the benefits of getting these measurements on such a frequent basis (mindstream is every 20 mins iirc? ).

The reality is we really don't know yet. Unfortunately for this hobby anything that doesn't get crossover from the aqua culture industry for food, we really lack many of the funds as a community to do much research. You have folks like Dana and others who are able to get their hands on some of the expensive equipment it takes, but at no time previously in this hobby have we had the opportunity to collect data on a wide scale level about how Element uptake could effect coral growth and coloration. Like them or hate them, I'm pretty sure Mindstream started all of this. Now that said, I believe many of these other companies have done their own research and development when mindstream revealed the consumer want for a product like this and they all went about their own way of doing it. Essentially Mindstream's failure to get off the ground when they hoped, really left the market wide open and we're very fortunate that many of the other companies that took the idea and made it in to these products we're seeing.

So while it may not matter in the long run, exactly what benefits can be seen from having this much measuring frequency AND consumer data, the possibilities are endless. Yes people will screw some things up at first, but that doesn't make these a bad product for the crowd. The brains on these boards will interpolate all this data and in 2 years instead of seeing threads asking for help calculating 2 part, Randy will spend half his day helping people extrapolate their data to figure out peek (max efficiency) dosing times.