Testing for the colorblind...

M

Matt

Detritus
#1
#1
Hey all,

I'm two months into my first tank in the hobby, and I'm looking for some advice on testing. I'm somewhere on the colorblind "spectrum" and generally do not trust that I know a particular color. I can certainly see shades of difference, but can't tell you if it is greed or brown. I'm thinking of investing the money for the Hanna checkers that just give me a readout for Alkalinity and Phosphate (I hear their Calcium is no good...)

Do any of you have similar experience and have the more standard color chart test kits worked for you?
 
TheRealChrisBrown

TheRealChrisBrown

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
ex-officio
#2
#2
I think Hanna checkers are the way to go in this instance. Their Alk is super easy to use. I believe there is a low range and a high range phosphate...make sure you get the right one. I use their calcium too, I run the test and if it seems way out of touch I'll do another test kit.

I've also done the professional testing services before. You send in a sample of water and they run it through a fancy machine and it gives you a detailed report. They are somewhere in that $30 to $50 range (last I checked), but the report you get back is pretty thorough. I'll attach some screenshots from my last test so you can see what they are like:

View attachment 13982
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View attachment 13980
 
neil82

neil82

Sting ray
M.A.S.C Club Member
#3
#3
I use the hanna checker alkalinity and phosphate tests. I really like both. Super easy to use. For calcium and magnesium, I use salifert. Previuosly I was using red sea, but i personally prefer salifert. Seems like the color change is a little more pronounced.
 
SynDen

SynDen

Administrator
Staff member
M.A.S.C Club Member
M.A.S.C. B.O.D.
M.A.S.C President
M.A.S.C Webmaster
#4
#4
Matt said:
Hey all,

I'm two months into my first tank in the hobby, and I'm looking for some advice on testing. I'm somewhere on the colorblind "spectrum" and generally do not trust that I know a particular color. I can certainly see shades of difference, but can't tell you if it is greed or brown. I'm thinking of investing the money for the Hanna checkers that just give me a readout for Alkalinity and Phosphate (I hear their Calcium is no good...)

Do any of you have similar experience and have the more standard color chart test kits worked for you?
Click to expand...
Hanna CA is pretty good, but its one caveat is that you have to use distilled water for the test or it will read higher then it actually is.
 
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