SLAMing, CYA

[survivalcar]

I'm on Day 6 of SLAMing and it's getting clearer by the day. However today it seems like the CYA level is going up. Is this normal? It was 60 a few days ago but now it may be creeping up to 80. I keep second-guessing my measurements (because really, not seeing a black dot isn't really an exact thing, is it?) and so I also did a measurement with the strips just now and for the first time there's a little purple in the color, indicating a higher level.

If it's normal, should I just adjust the FC level according to the chart? If not, what should I do? I realize you can't really bring CYA down. The CYA reading at the beginning of this season was 0.

Thanks!

Chris

 

[mknauss]

Welcome to the forum! :handshake:

CYA can only increase if you added it.

When you do the CYA test, try this next time.

Once you have your solution ready, back to the sun, etc. Fill the vial to a line, say 80, lower the vial to your waist level and glance for the dot, you see it, add solution to the 70 line, glance, see it, repeat until you no longer see it with a glance.

The vial is in logarithmic scale. So it is not viable to interpolate between the lines. Just use the whole numbers, such as 50, 40, 30, ....

 

[survivalcar]

Thank you. I don't know why this didn't occur to me before but prior to today, I had been using the original CYA agent from the test kit (Taylor FAS-DPD, R-0013). When that ran out, I had a bottle I ordered from the internet last year. This bottle spent the whole New England winter out in the cabana, where it would have frozen for sure. Does that seem like the kind of thing that might alter the CYA reading? I also have a newer bottle and I just re-tested and that indicates it's closer to 60ppm, I think. Honestly I wish there was a less subjective way to measure CYA!

Welcome to the forum! :handshake:

CYA can only increase if you added it.

When you do the CYA test, try this next time.

Once you have your solution ready, back to the sun, etc. Fill the vial to a line, say 80, lower the vial to your waist level and glance for the dot, you see it, add solution to the 70 line, glance, see it, repeat until you no longer see it with a glance.

The vial is in logarithmic scale. So it is not viable to interpolate between the lines. Just use the whole numbers, such as 50, 40, 30, ....

 

[mknauss]

All of your reagents should be stored in climate controlled environment. The R-0013 is the most stable of them all, but freezing does not do it any good.

Take care.