Calibration fluid

[Jarrett]

So i got the calibration fluid for my refractometer and it is saying my reef is at 1022. this whole time i was calibrating with RO water and it was telling me 1025 should i believe the 1022 reading it just seems odd because all my corals are fine and i even have sps. do you think i should start raising my salinity to 1025 and follow that reading.

 

[Will]

Good Question...Hope someone has an answer..

I've always used RO water to calibrate my Refractometer... . Haven't had any problems but would like to know if there's a huge difference using the calibration fluid.

 

[Jarrett]

seems like theirs a significant diferance. i dont know what reading to believe.

 

[44santababy]

buy the calibration fluid for 35ppt, its critical. After properly calibrating with the correct solution, it was off by 4ppm. I was running at 1.021 with no coral loss or stress. I slowly topped off with mixed saltwater to raise to correct levels at 1.025. If your ever in queens, stop over and you can use my solution or buy it, its cheap.

 

[44santababy]

how do you calibrate with RO water? Doesnt makes sense...

 

[Jarrett]

i got that exact solution santa so if your level was at 1021 and you didnt lose any coral like me then maybe the reading i got is correct and i should start raising the salinity.

 

[44santababy]

i was shocked when i saw the 1.021 reading, with no stress at all to corals. Now i calibrate monthly for reassurance...

 

[Jarrett]

yea i never knew about calibration fluid untill recently. i am glad i found out now compared to later on when something bad would of happened.

 

[44santababy]

i dont know the long term effects running a reef tank at 1.021, but for a short term it had zero effect on my fish or corals. Now i always make sure i'm at 1.024-1.025...

 

[Will]

I have read various articles on calibration of refractometers and quite a few say you can use distilled water which I would think would be the same as RO water as far as purity. The refractometer is reading the salinity of the water , therefore As a baseline should'nt the refractometer read 0 on pure water??If it read anything else it would be out of calibration...

Here's is one of the many I have read.
http://www.ehow.com/how_12003394_calibrate-refractometer-salinity.html

 

[greybolt03]

I just bought one last week and was told to use ro water to calbrate that there was no calibration fluid sold for this one maybe different makes have different specs???

 

[James404]

Long article but there's some good Information in it regarding calibration.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-12/rhf/index.php

 

[Exotic Reef]

How many drops are you driping of the fluid?

 

[Will]

A really ,really long ,long article...:banghead:

I was getting dizzy reading all that...Had to skip most of it and "cut to the chase"

Say's calibrate with pure water and then with calibration solution at least once to check and if the difference is greater than something or other then calibrate it to the solution.

Is that about right??

 

[Lostinthedark]

I always used Ro/Di to calibrate to zero. I ordered some calibration fluid to double check after reading about the differences in reading. It checked out perfect at .35. No difference on mine anyway.

 

[44santababy]

thanks guys, i just learned i can double check with ro/di...good to know

 

[fishman1069]

The manual that came with my refractor said to calibrate it with ro water, so thats what I always did. I just read a thread not to long ago, where Boomer was saying that most common refractometers weren't set up to read seawater. The one he recommended was like $250! I forgot the name of it and the reasons why but I'll try to find the link for it.

 

[Exotic Reef]

The manual that came with my refractor said to calibrate it with ro water, so thats what I always did. I just read a thread not to long ago, where Boomer was saying that most common refractometers weren't set up to read seawater. The one he recommended was like $250! I forgot the name of it and the reasons why but I'll try to find the link for it.

Yea saw the same the one I saw was like 150. And tells you the temperature and reads the salt in the water and has other features well

 

[Paolissimo]

You might want to read the boomer article in the chemistry forum, he talks about this issue. He goes into details on refractometers, and which ones to buy. He basically says DO NOT USE RO/DI but use calibration fluid because is very accurate. On a side note, I whenever i buy corals from lfs, i test their water salitnity and it's always a bit higher then mine. I use fluid to calibrate not ro/di