Hi all,
To preface this -the salifert kits I've been using are the same since November 2021. They all expire in early 2024 so I figured they were good.
I recently bought another 3 pack of the alk, mag and ca tests since my I needed a new alk test and it was cheaper to buy all 3. Well I am noticing some disparities in results thats suggesting my old kits likely are going bad.
Last week I tested mag with my old kit and it was 1200 which is too low for my tank so I slowly have been adding a bit more mag to get the level up to 1350. It was up to 1350 according to the old test as of early this week. I test again today and its right back down to 1230 which makes 0 sense. I then used the new mag test and it shows a 1410ppm concentration which is a bit high but more likely after all of the mag I have been adding. I did test again with the old test kit and get a completely different result of 1370 which tells me the higher value is more likely than the lower one and that this old mag test is garbage.
Same issue with calcium. I tested with the old kit and got 410 which I thought was a bit low (I usually am at 450). Tested with the new one and got 480 ppm which is a tad high.
My alk tests (new and old) are matching okay.
I noticed the new salifert mag test doesn't have the old powder any more and is more like the alk kit. Is it something with these two powder based tests (ca and mg) that go bad? Is it good practice to just not trust a test kit thats been in use for about a year? Maybe I should just be buying new kits every 6-8 months or so.
I also noticed on the new tests that when the plunger is filled to 1.0mL, the actual liquid level in the chamber varies. With the old tests, all of the liquid lines would be at .85mL when the top of the plunger hit 1.0mL. With the new tests, I noticed the liquid level is all over the place between each 3 test kits when the plunger sits at 1.0mL. Is this a potential problem?
Thanks for any advice you can provide!
To preface this -the salifert kits I've been using are the same since November 2021. They all expire in early 2024 so I figured they were good.
I recently bought another 3 pack of the alk, mag and ca tests since my I needed a new alk test and it was cheaper to buy all 3. Well I am noticing some disparities in results thats suggesting my old kits likely are going bad.
Last week I tested mag with my old kit and it was 1200 which is too low for my tank so I slowly have been adding a bit more mag to get the level up to 1350. It was up to 1350 according to the old test as of early this week. I test again today and its right back down to 1230 which makes 0 sense. I then used the new mag test and it shows a 1410ppm concentration which is a bit high but more likely after all of the mag I have been adding. I did test again with the old test kit and get a completely different result of 1370 which tells me the higher value is more likely than the lower one and that this old mag test is garbage.
Same issue with calcium. I tested with the old kit and got 410 which I thought was a bit low (I usually am at 450). Tested with the new one and got 480 ppm which is a tad high.
My alk tests (new and old) are matching okay.
I noticed the new salifert mag test doesn't have the old powder any more and is more like the alk kit. Is it something with these two powder based tests (ca and mg) that go bad? Is it good practice to just not trust a test kit thats been in use for about a year? Maybe I should just be buying new kits every 6-8 months or so.
I also noticed on the new tests that when the plunger is filled to 1.0mL, the actual liquid level in the chamber varies. With the old tests, all of the liquid lines would be at .85mL when the top of the plunger hit 1.0mL. With the new tests, I noticed the liquid level is all over the place between each 3 test kits when the plunger sits at 1.0mL. Is this a potential problem?
Thanks for any advice you can provide!