Salt production and accuracy

[Faria]

Hopefully this thread belongs in here.

Randy, could you help me understand a bit more how the industry works? I understand that the answers to the following questions may vary according to the each manufacturer.

1) When making a salt batch or any other mixture such as AFR, would a manufacturer trust the grade/purity of a certain chemical and then add a specific amount (in mass) to the mixture?
2) Would this procedure be more trustworthy than doing an ICP test such as those currently available to hobbists?
3) is the ICP analysis performed (and shared) by salt manufactures more accurate than the ones available to us hobbists? If it's the same "grade", does it make sense for a company to add an ICP analysis of each batch in this case?
4) Wouldn't (3) be like trying to check a certain mass in a kitchen versus in a lab if we assume that USP/ACS grade chemicals have been used in the process?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I do not know what every manufacturer does, but certainly many will require a certificate of analysis for the material they purchase, and that certificate would often indicate some info about purity and impurities. They may also do QC themselves. Their reputation is riding on not sending out a disaster because some supplier sent something wrong.

I would not assume salt manufacturer QC is better than ICP by a user because the user is testing his actual material, while the salt maker is testing a small sampling of an entire large batch (assuming they do test every batch), and the homogeneity of that large batch may be a laborious thing to prove all the way to the bucket and bag level. The tools they use are also not likely better than those by the better ICP hobby companies such as Oceamo. They might be inferior.

I would not expect salt makers to necessarily provide anything but estimates of what they intend to put in the mix because if they did, it will cause all sorts of complaints when hobbyists, correctly or due to testing errors, do not show the exact same levels in their bucket.

 

[JTP424]

Agreed with Randy!
Worked in the metal finishing industry for aviation.
Basically we'd purchase large amounts of acids, chemicals, salts etc, and go through thousands of gallons a week.
With the strict requirements and standards in the industry, certificates of requirements were always required mainly for tracability. When a plane malfunctions, it gets traced all the way back to the batch of anodize salt it was processed to confirm ran to spec. We had a lab would perform titrations/run samples daily of not only the product when it arrived but also samples of finished product.
Although not a.... "personal safety" focused industy i can see these salt companies performing quality control samples in a batch every so often. Their in house labs are probably up to snuff and good ones would perform several audits.
My guess is some of the better salts (i.e. more consistent) probably perform internal and external(vendor) audits to confirm product quality.