Replacement reagents for HTH kit

[Terry]

First off let me say what a wonderful site this is full of incredible information! Thank you to everyone who gives their time and knowledge to help!

I found the poolforum site several weeks ago and have been reading and reading and reading. The more I read, the more I learned, the more it all came together. Imagine my disappointment when I discovered I couldn’t join in the discussion. But then I found a post sending me over here. And I started reading again.

I think I have a pretty good grasp on the concepts, and understand a lot of what has happened with my pool over the last 13 years and why. Not a surprise I’m sure, but I have fought that thing since we bought the house. And I do mean literally fight- the more I punched, the more it punched back!

Since finding y’all I've pulled the tri-chlor from the pool and switched over to bleach, completed a partial drain to lower my CYA from over 100, lowered my TA from 120 via muratic acid/ aeration, and added salt and borates.

I had one of the Walmart, 5 way, $15 test kits so I went to Leslie’s and bought their last FAS-DPD kit- the single one that only tests chlorine.

And since I know you like to know what’s going on, here are my current stats:

Clear water
TC 6.5
CC 0
pH 7.6
TA 90
CH 180 (pool store number)
CYA 70
Salt 1600 (no swg)
Borates 55 (pool store number)

I am having trouble reading the pH and I thought I read that you could add a few extra drops of phenol red to help the color intensity w/out changing the actual color/ affecting the test results. Is this correct?

I am about to replace some of the reagents from my HTH kit. I read somewhere that HTH uses repackaged Taylor reagents, but do not see any reference to the Taylor numbers. Having owned different kits over the years I know different ones use different methods (quantity of pool water, use of a chlorine neutralizer, alk from blue to clear, etc) and I’d like to keep everything the same as I’m using now. Can anyone tell me what the comparable Taylor numbers are?

Thanks in advance!

 

[JasonLion]

The chlorine and PH tests in the HTH kit are essentially the same ones as are in the Taylor K-1000, chlorine is R-0600 and PH is R-0014. The CYA test is the standard Taylor CYA test, R-0013. However the TA and CH tests don't have any exact correspondence. The HTH versions of the TA and CH tests are simplified (less expensive) versions for which I can't find any exact correspondence with any of the Taylor kits that are publicly available.

 

[MikeInTN]

FWIW, SPS has the best prices I've found on Taylor reagents. Plus, they sell bigger bottles of the reagents, so for the ones you use often (like the FAS-DPD), you can get a 2 oz bottle instead of the smaller 3/4 oz bottle.

Disclaimer-I'm not affiliated with SPS in any way, nor do I receive any compensation for any referrals, etc. Just trying to help a fellow pool owner save a little money.

 

[Terry]

Thanks for the info and tip on reordering! Looking through Taylor’s website and the K-2006 instructions it looks like I should be able to use 007, 008, & 009 for the TA and still use my tube and have a green to red color change (had the blue to clear once and didn’t care for it).

What is the difference btwn R-0014 and R-0004? More specifically can I use the 0004 with my comparator? I have the one that is in the K-1000 and noticed the K-2006 comparator is larger, but both instructions call for 5 drops and both 0014 and 0004 are listed as phenol red. I can get 0004, but not 0014 at the pool store, and as they had ‘never used an HTH kit’ they couldn’t tell me if it would work. Since the colors should be the same from comparator to comparator the only thing I can think of that would be different is the concentration of the reagent which would account for the same # of drops in the larger volume of water. However, the last thing I need is for my pH test results to be off so I will wait to hear from the experts!

 

[JasonLion]

I believe that the difference between the two PH reagents is just the concentration.

 

[MikeInTN]

My K-2005 (I added the FAS-DPD reagents so I call it a "K-2006) uses the -0004 phenol red reagent, and the comparator tube for it is 44ml. I actually use this same tube for my chlorine testing too, as it has 25ml and 10ml gradations as well.