Question about Hannah checkers

[jesse1884]

About Hannah checkers are they good?
I ordered a phosphate calcium and alk from go reef

[Aquattro]

Should ask BEFORE ordering:) The PO4 is great, the others, not so much. Lots of complaints about them.

[reefwars]

alk and phos are awesome calcium sucks, lr i like the ulr not so much:)

[Seriak]

alk and phos are awesome calcium sucks, lr i like the ulr not so much:)

I use a Hanna kit for alk and I also read that Calcium wasn't as good as the elos kit. I should have listened to Dave/Denny at Concepts as the Elos kit for phosphate is fine but comparing colors at low levels is not as good as a digital reading.

[jesse1884]

yes the digital readout is what cought my eye ive read that the calcium reads a bit high at times but ive read reviews and i get mixed comments........ im just simply sick of guessing colors


what is soo bad about them they just not accurate??

[reefwars]

yes the digital readout is what cought my eye ive read that the calcium reads a bit high at times but ive read reviews and i get mixed comments........ im just simply sick of guessing colors


what is soo bad about them they just not accurate??


well in order to get an accurate reading from the calcium you need to use di water, on top of that they have you adding different things at different times in very very small amounts so the margin for error is high.

i find its just as much work for the elos test for calcium as it is for the hanna calcium , but the elos doesnt add such small amounts of reagents.


the ultra low range test kits are good its just if your not ultra low then its not needed.

[jorjef]

I find the Alk very straight forward and easy to use. Back to back repeat tests are consistent. Calcium you need to be very,very accurate. It seems to be even if you miss a few grains of powder results can vary wildly.

[FragIt Dan]

PO4 is good, Ca can be good but the syringe they give you to add 0.1ml of tank water is, IMO, not accurate enough. I carefully did several tests in a row on the same water and had readings fluctuating by 40-60ppm. I eventually got a very accurate glass pipette and am getting much more accurate readings. As already mentioned, you need to use very clean RODI water as part of the test, but you can verify it is Ca free by running a test without adding any tank water and dividing the test result by 100; ie if you do this and get a result of 200, your RODI water has 2ppm Ca in it. You should/will need to get a reading of 0, indicating a result of 0.00ppm, if it is flashing 600 then you have more than 6ppm Ca in your RODI water. If you don't have access to good RODI water, go get a 4l jug of distilled water from a pharmacy (~$3) and run a test on it to make sure it's ok.
Dan

[monocus]

i have the phos,alk,cal,nit,and iodine and have never had any problems with them;and yes you really have to read the directions on the calcium

[jesse1884]

i just bought a good ro/di system from my LFS that has a tds meter built in it are those always accurate do you know?

[jesse1884]

and to think i got the hannah checker because i thought other calcium test kits were a pian

[martinmcnally]

Funny I was just testing my Calcium a few minutes ago with a Hanna checker. It read 551. Fail haha! Last reading was 490 and I haven't done any water changes or added calcium.

IMO the power packet is dumb and a mess. Also adding droplets is way easier and very accurate compared to syringes. They did get the reader right however they have a long way to go on everything else.

[kien]

I started with the PO4 and love it. Then got the Alk and love that one too. Then got the calc and despise it. It is in my opinion more of a pain than other standard (non digital) kits. I used the Hana calc checker once a year ago and it has been collecting dust ever since.

[subman]

I sold my ca and alk Hanna kits and went back to drops just found the readings more consistent. I'm using the red Sea pro kit now and love it

[Kevotron]

The Alk one is quite easy to do and recommended
but Ca is a nightmare... I can use the Elos 5 times before completing 1 Hanna test

[Skimmerking]

Why check dal any ways if your ALK is gtg then u are fine and your po4 well it's nice to check that thou

[Aquattro]

Why check dal any ways

huh?

[FragIt Dan]

Why check dal any ways if your ALK is gtg then u are fine and your po4 well it's nice to check that thou

I would respectfully disagree. Just because your Alk is fine does not mean your Ca is fine (I assume you meant Ca when you said 'dal').