Dialing in the data: How often do you calibrate your water quality meters?

Peace River · Apr 4, 2024

Dialing in the data: How often do you calibrate your water quality meters?

Testing the water parameters is important to reef keeping and there are many, many tools to help us with those measurements. Whether we use standalone meters, meters that are built into controllers, and even laboratory meters where water can be sent for analysis, there are many ways to evaluate our water. However, it is important that the data is accurate and reliable. The saying “garbage in, garbage out” certainly applies when checking water parameters and a faulty or undependable meters is a problem, especially when we are trusting it to be accurate. One of the ways that will help us to be aware of potential problems with our meters is to pay attention to what our fish and coral are telling us. Another way that we can account for issues with our meters is to regularly calibrate our meters. How often do you calibrate your water quality meters? Please let us know about your testing habits in the related discussion thread and feel free to share any tips that you have for working with meters and water testing.

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Photo by @Ch3tt

If you want to look into water testing a little further, then there are a lot of resources on Reef2Reef. One specific resource is the article: Reef Aquarium Salinity: DIY Calibration Standards. There are also many more resources to be found in the R2R Reef Chemistry forum and in the R2R articles section – enjoy!

This QOTD is sponsored by: www.tckcorals.com

JayM · Apr 4, 2024

The only thing I have that can be calibrated is a refractometer. It gets checked every time I mix up a new batch of water (2-3 times a month) or anytime I get a reading different than I expect it to be.

BubblesandSqueak · Apr 4, 2024

Peace River said:
$CH3tt_Refractometer.png$

Photo by @Ch3tt

seems we went to the same place for our counters

lapin · Apr 4, 2024

New tank calibrate often. Old tank not so much. Fancy stuff like Alkatronic calibrate every day

Reefer Matt · Apr 4, 2024

I try to calibrate my apex ph probes monthly, and they usually are off by around .1. My refractometer gets calibrated when I see a number that draws suspicion. My advice is to calibrate even if you like the numbers you are seeing. I promise you will be surprised at the difference at some point in time if you never calibrate.

shakacuz · Apr 4, 2024

quarterly/as needed.

with strict testing protocol, you can avoid testing error. and with refrigerating reagents prolonging shelf life, it reduces the amount of restocking on reagents or recalibration. probes would require more maintenance than water testing kits.

vlangel · Apr 4, 2024

My tank is coming into its 8th year, has easy to keep creatures. The only thing I calibrate and then only rarely is my swing arm hydrometer. I take it to my lfs and check to see if it is still reading accurately. It's probably 15-20 years old and so far so good.

Treefer32 · Apr 5, 2024

A couple years ago I realized my refrac was off when I couldn't get magnesium up to where I wanted. Someone suggested checking my salinity with multiple tests. My refrac is reading 1.026 which was actually around 1.0245.
I disocvered this by getting a glass hydrometer, Taking five gallons of my tank water letting it cool to 70 degrees and placing the hydrometer in the water. Waited a couple hours for everything to equalize and then took the reading of the hydrometer. It was reading low. I tried calibrating the refrac, but it was at it's max. So, I just know now that I need my refrac to show salinity at 1.027 and that will be 1.025 - 1.026 based on the glass hydrometer. I try to check this annually but will admit with minimal water changes (once every 6-8 months 50%). I don't check it as often as I should.

I could check my new water change water with the glass hydrometer I guess. I never thought of that. My understanding is the glass hydrometers are most accurate but are temperature sensitive.