Automated Alkalinity monitoring

[Marshall O]

Do you mean the reagent is deadly? I see a lot of warning label as to not to breathe the stuff and such.
When I said discarding, I mean you need to find a place to drain the constant solution. And draining into the sink will probably not be good.

I think he was referring to dosing based on the automated testing. All of us can envision a scenario where something happens and you end up dumping Alk into your tank, causing a crash. That would be my fear anyways.

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[Marshall O]

I would think the part about an accurate pump could be easily skirted by just over flowing a known volume and then internally transferring to the test sample no need for an accurate pump. This thing is no more than an automated Hanna type tester.

Jim

The way this is accomplished in the water/waste water industry is simply provide more than enough flow/pressure and simply use a pressure reducing valve just before the analyzer, with a needle valve for fine tuning.

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[Jim Tansey]

The way this is accomplished in the water/waste water industry is simply provide more than enough flow/pressure and simply use a pressure reducing valve just before the analyzer, with a needle valve for fine tuning.

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You don't really need anything but a known volume just spill a little excess and transfer it to the test container the output of a dosing pump is already at low pressure.

Jim

 

[dz6t]

For a chemistry point of view, color-metric testing of Alk is mean for ball park estimate.
It is known that Hanna Alk checker is not as accurate as titration.
In theory, using a ball park estimate to control dosing may have some issue down the road.
Also a real time monitoring of Alk may not be necessary. A daily testing is good enough.
With Alk test kit at about $20 for 200 tests via titration, also one of the easiest test to do, I doubt the money will be well spend on an automatic system.
As many incidents have demonstrated, automation of ALK dosing can be deadly. Mostly dumping excess amount of ALK in the system that crash SPS tanks (for LPS and softy tank, the need of dosing ALK is not on high priority).

Just my opinion. Thanks

 

[drsalomon]

Very creative use of ph port on any controller to relay the alk readings. Great for when you go on vacation. Have noticed co2 in hom drops from ~700 to 400 when people leave which impacts pH and potentially alk consumption. Also i doubt there is a diurnal swing in alk in the ocean like there is in our tanks