Where to puchase standards solutions

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GaryT58

GaryT58

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Jul 26, 2016
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Can anyone tell me where I can purchase standards solutions so I can verify my water testing?

I use the Lamotte ColorQ 7, which from reading posts, many here have very strong feelings for and against. PLEASE - I do not want this to degrade to why I should or should not use that device. I am an scientist and want to purchase standards solutions and test myself to verify its accuracy and my testing method. I would want to do this regardless of which testing product I owned.

I would like third party solutions. That is, not a solution that is manufactured by one of the test manufacturers, as this would seem to not really be a blind test.

Thanks,

Gary
 
GaryT58 said:
I would like third party solutions. That is, not a solution that is manufactured by one of the test manufacturers, as this would seem to not really be a blind test.
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Why do you say that you don't get a blind test with solutions that come from one of the kit manufacturers, like Taylor? What's not blind about it, especially tests like FC where it is pretty unbiased as to whether the solution turns from pink to clear.

If you are a scientist then maybe you know someone in a lab that can do this testing or you have a relationship with a company that supplies chemicals to science labs. But I wouldn't be so sure that they wouldn't be using the same solutions anyhow.
 
GaryT58 said:
Yup, spent an hour looking so far. Hoping to find someone here that has already purchased. Also, want one not made by a test manufacturer.
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Sorry -I mis-typed-
Via staying away from test manufacturers, I think you will find the you may have to go to multiple sources to get any type of coverage to the various pool water tests. I also think you may have to buy in quantities that will be cost prohibitive.
 
wayner said:
Why do you say that you don't get a blind test with solutions that come from one of the kit manufacturers, like Taylor? What's not blind about it, especially tests like FC where it is pretty unbiased as to whether the solution turns from pink to clear.
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When I see a solution manufactured by those that sale the test kit, I wonder how the solution was made and verified. If tested with their own kit then it would be introducing the errors of that kit. I would prefer standards made to a higher level.

If you are a scientist then maybe you know someone in a lab that can do this testing or you have a relationship with a company that supplies chemicals to science labs. But I wouldn't be so sure that they wouldn't be using the same solutions anyhow.
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I have BS in Computer Science. I have taken a wide variety of science classes in my degree, but do not claim to be a chemist, nor work in a lab. I understand testing methodology very well.

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EVChargeGuy said:
I think you will find the you may have to go to multiple sources to get any type of coverage to the various pool water tests. I also think you may have to buy in quantities that will be cost prohibitive.
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Yes, that may be. Hoping to hear from those that have gone this route to see if this is really the case, and then I can make a decision based upon that. Thanks.
 
If you are just looking to determine the margin of error for a particular test kit or device I think you may be better served by finding a local lab that can test with a higher degree of accuracy than the home tests that are readily available. The age of the test sample and/or time difference between when each test was preformed would be a factor thus the need for a local lab.

An interesting experiment but as many on here have said you are testing pool water not making rocket fuel, if you try to control the chemistry too narrowly you will not have a "Trouble Free Pool"
 
You could check Accustandard, Ultra Scientific or o2si. Those are the ones off the top of my head that I remember from my real lab rat days. Those companies I know provide standards but are skewed more toward the organic standards, but they may have chlorine standards as well.
 

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atttech-2 said:
If you are just looking to determine the margin of error for a particular test kit or device I think you may be better served by finding a local lab that can test with a higher degree of accuracy than the home tests that are readily available. The age of the test sample and/or time difference between when each test was preformed would be a factor thus the need for a local lab.

An interesting experiment but as many on here have said you are testing pool water not making rocket fuel, if you try to control the chemistry too narrowly you will not have a "Trouble Free Pool"
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Yes, that is an option I can check. Until I read the horror stories here, I would have thought that a pool store with their computerized testing would have been a benchmark.

Not seeking super accuracy, just want to determine if my testing is +/- what. That way at least I know if I am in a valid range for my goals.
 
Why not do your own verification on your own for some of the tests. You should be able to verify several of them. For example calculate how much chlorine you have to put in 1L of distilled water to have FC of 10.0. Then run the test with your test kit. Same with CYA, etc. You could likely also do the same with pH although it appears that the pH of distilled water isn't always 7.
 
wayner said:
Why not do your own verification on your own for some of the tests. You should be able to verify several of them. For example calculate how much chlorine you have to put in 1L of distilled water to have FC of 10.0. Then run the test with your test kit. Same with CYA, etc. You could likely also do the same with pH although it appears that the pH of distilled water isn't always 7.
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Yes, I thought of that. But after reading some threads on the forum on how bottled chlorine degrades over time, and this varies based upon storage temperature, I would not have a known %age.

I have found many parties with ph standards, which as Joel above rightly stated, are focused more to organics. Joel - thanks for the sources, I will check those out.
 
Why not just perform an MSA on the ColorQ and on a Taylor k2006 and on the TF 100? The results of an MSA don't really care about the "exactness" of the tests, but more on techniques and repeatability and consistency.

If your sigma values are very different, you will have your answer.
 
In all honesty, it should not matter where the standard comes from (assuming you want to spend the cost of a full test kit on just one standard). If the standard is offered as a "NIST Traceable" standard, then it's manufacturing has to conform to a precise set of conditions and practices in order to obtain a NIST Certificate (and NIST will have confirmed it's exact value as an independent source). It's similar to how a manufacturing facility can only obtain an ISO certification if it conforms to set of perquisite conditions as well as on-going monitoring.

I would caution against getting too caught up in all of this. NIST-traceable standards are often very expensive and you could easily spend the cost of several test kits worth of money on these standards only to gain very minimal and statistically meaningless information...but have at it if you wish....
 
JoyfulNoise said:
In all honesty, it should not matter where the standard comes from (assuming you want to spend the cost of a full test kit on just one standard). If the standard is offered as a "NIST Traceable" standard, then it's manufacturing has to conform to a precise set of conditions and practices in order to obtain a NIST Certificate (and NIST will have confirmed it's exact value as an independent source). It's similar to how a manufacturing facility can only obtain an ISO certification if it conforms to set of perquisite conditions as well as on-going monitoring.

I would caution against getting too caught up in all of this. NIST-traceable standards are often very expensive and you could easily spend the cost of several test kits worth of money on these standards only to gain very minimal and statistically meaningless information...but have at it if you wish....
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I understand that after all of this that I may simply prove that my system is sufficiently accurate for my purposes, which is really what I want. I would like to understand if the NIST sample for example for cyn is 50, that if my readings are 53-47, then good. I also understand the costs can be a bit, but that can be countered over time by not over/under chemical feeding of pool.

I read/seen a wide variance of opinions on various testers from users claiming one better than the other. Ideally I would love to see a independent review of the various kits from an impartial reviewer (yes redundant)
using NIST standards.

When I look at a piece or audio, or video, or test gear, I can find reviews that measure performance with real test gear with well defined methods, which are repeatable. So I was hoping to find the same for these tests.

So, yes maybe I am being too picky and should just accept that its working, but from my background it hard.

Thanks

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Griswald said:
Why not just perform an MSA on the ColorQ and on a Taylor k2006 and on the TF 100? The results of an MSA don't really care about the "exactness" of the tests, but more on techniques and repeatability and consistency.

If your sigma values are very different, you will have your answer.
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Sorry, not familiar with the term MSA.

Without knowing the actual value, the range alone is not enough. For example, if test A shows ph as 7.55 - 7.45 and test B show PH as 7.71-7.69, which is better? If I know the real PH is 7.5, then I could live with either if I know they are consistent, but would probably prefer test A since if is closer to real value, even though the range is wider.
 
Measurement Systems Analysis, a six sigma tool to verify that an instrument is correct within your expected tolerances.

Basically you have a few people run the tests on the same samples and plug those values into a sigma calculator like Minitab. The results are statistically corrected so you can tell if your measurement system is good enough. For example, you buy the standard and your 50 ppm solution shows 42. How do you know that you didnt affect the results by misreading or poor technique? Or, you get 50 and say your tester is perfect, again how do you know you tested correctly? A MSA takes all of the factors into account and "normalizes" them.

Engineering geek stuff, but very useful.
 

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