My Reefbot Arrived!

rushbattle · Apr 17, 2019

Elder1945 said:
My question is, Can you test multiple tanks with it? as in put the hose in a beaker full of X tank water and get a result?

I am excited about all of the "Testers" that are on the market or that are on the way but it still would be nice to test all 3 soon to be 4 of my systems with one product.

I would like to run a copper test on my QT ever day but then test my 2 displays and frag tank as well.

Sure, no problem. But I’m guessing with your budget you will end up with multiple units.

It’s way easier to just put the hose in a cup than test manually, but harder to remember to put it back in the other water if you do any automatic testing.

Zaffor · Apr 17, 2019

idol said:
IMO, I have more faith in the Apex Trident. They will release it when it's flawless and low in service requirements. I would rather have supplied testing products that I can buy from BRS - Marine Depot - Saltwater Aquarium. Replacing Pump heads every 6 months and Long custom needles every 60 uses is not for me. To much taking care of the unit that is suppose to make things simple. I am not onboard for that. I can do a lot of testing for $920.00.

I believe that time frame for the pump is grossly underestimated. The owner has used the same pump head for several thousand tests.

KenO · Apr 17, 2019

Elder1945 said:
My question is, Can you test multiple tanks with it? as in put the hose in a beaker full of X tank water and get a result?

I am excited about all of the "Testers" that are on the market or that are on the way but it still would be nice to test all 3 soon to be 4 of my systems with one product.

I would like to run a copper test on my QT ever day but then test my 2 displays and frag tank as well.

I would think if you you have an apex you can get a multi port solenoid or multiple solenoids and test multiple tanks.

Mike.P · Apr 17, 2019

Hemmdog said:
Dang you have quite the view from that window! Jealous!

And an actual parquet floor! ;Woot

Mike.P · Apr 17, 2019

slewrock1 said:
Running KH, CA,Mg, and PO4 takes me about 30ish mins each time, including equipment cleaning. If I did this once a day (which I don't), it would mean that I'd be spending over 1 week per year on testing my aquarium water.

As one who hates testing water, I chalk this up as a waste of time. The RB costs appx $1000 and I have it setup to make 3,000 tests/year since I'm testing all 4 parameters twice a day. Over the course of 1 year, the cost of this machine comes out to paying RB about $0.12 for every test it runs, which you can probably find in your couch cushions!

It's $1000? Yeah, that's expensive, but not nearly what I thought it would be... I remember catching a snippet of a video of this thing, and my reaction was along the lines of "Oh wow, that's amazing! Probably costs like $10k though, not even going to bother looking into it." lol. This may change things.

rushbattle · Apr 17, 2019

scott11106 said:
i have been waiting for the apex trident but if this does all of those tests and can use basic red sea regents that might be a better solution. the test of time will also be important ..

hmm very interesting

I’ve got one up a little north of you if you want to check it out. Uses Red Sea refills for all of my tests except Tropic Marin for NO3. The syringes are $0.23 on amazon. Trident doesn’t do N and P, which are two thirds of what I really care to test often, the other being alk.

Elder1945 · Apr 18, 2019

KenO said:
I would think if you you have an apex you can get a multi port solenoid or multiple solenoids and test multiple tanks.

The Trident just does Mag,Ca,Alk.

The overall assumption of this "Bot" is that more and more test kits can be used so Copper is one that might come out.

The hard 3 are amazing trust me but I must have po4,no3. The trident just does not have the capability to do that and I am under the impression it can not be changed.

I run mixed reefs though and never strait SPS so my needs do not match everyone's needs.

Copper on a QT tank tested every few hr's would be amazing..... for me..

Elder1945 · Apr 18, 2019

rushbattle said:
Sure, no problem. But I’m guessing with your budget you will end up with multiple units. It’s way easier to just put the hose in a cup than test manually, but harder to remember to put it back in the other water if you do any automatic testing.

rushbattle · Apr 18, 2019

Elder1945 said:
The Trident just does Mag,Ca,Alk.

The overall assumption of this "Bot" is that more and more test kits can be used so Copper is one that might come out.

The hard 3 are amazing trust me but I must have po4,no3. The trident just does not have the capability to do that and I am under the impression it can not be changed.

I run mixed reefs though and never strait SPS so my needs do not match everyone's needs.

Copper on a QT tank tested every few hr's would be amazing..... for me..

In agreement on all of your thought process.

stacksoner · Apr 18, 2019

Ok friends, I have been filming the RB with my NestCam for the past 2 days and will chop up the videos of each test and post them all with the substantive test results. I will also run manual redundant tests with various test kits (Hannah, elos, red Sea, API) to show how accurate the results are.

stacksoner · Apr 18, 2019

Elder1945 said:
The Trident just does Mag,Ca,Alk.

The overall assumption of this "Bot" is that more and more test kits can be used so Copper is one that might come out.

The hard 3 are amazing trust me but I must have po4,no3. The trident just does not have the capability to do that and I am under the impression it can not be changed.

I run mixed reefs though and never strait SPS so my needs do not match everyone's needs.

Copper on a QT tank tested every few hr's would be amazing..... for me..

Agreed. I pulled Magnesium out of the line up and now have Kh, Ca, N03, and P04 in the mix.

Fishguywc · Apr 18, 2019

I need to do that and pull Mag out now that it’s stable, I’m replacing the API PO4 w RedSeA now to get lower resolution. Slewrock1 what No3 are you using?

KevinB79 · Apr 18, 2019

wow I love the sound of this I'm still new so most of this is greek to me but I love the idea of this testing without me having to do it all the time.

scott11106 · Apr 19, 2019

so i still have a question on if there is a way to have the apex pull the data so i can have the system dos or change depending on the results?

rushbattle · Apr 19, 2019

scott11106 said:
so i still have a question on if there is a way to have the apex pull the data so i can have the system dos or change depending on the results?

No yet. Reef Kinetics has said they will hopefully release API so you can gather, but it will be a good while if they do get around to it. Dosing based on automatic testing is a risky endeavor right now, I would want something more like aviation grade data gathering before I did that.

Sunreefer · Apr 19, 2019

KevinB79 said:
wow I love the sound of this I'm still new so most of this is greek to me but I love the idea of this testing without me having to do it all the time.

For some testing is a way to connect to their tanks. For others testing takes away time to enjoy the viewing pleasure of the tank. Really depends how you like reefing.

scott11106 · Apr 19, 2019

i agree on the trusting the testing and not being automated but figured i would ask, i really like just automating the testing then manually adapting the dosing ect so this seems like the perfect fit !!

i do believe i may have to get one, just need to figure out where i am going to put it as i am adding a calcium reactor and moving away from dosing 2 part so that needs some real estate

stacksoner · Apr 20, 2019

Fishguywc said:
I need to do that and pull Mag out now that it’s stable, I’m replacing the API PO4 w RedSeA now to get lower resolution. Slewrock1 what No3 are you using?

API. It's impossible to find the tropic Marin n03

stacksoner · Apr 20, 2019

God, the RB keeps impressing me. I was watching it perform a Kh test last night and saw that the syringe holder was vibrating for a few seconds. I thought the RB may have been stuck or something was jammed in the track.....then I took a closer look and saw that it vibrated intentionally after drawing the titrate to free up any trapped air bubbles, like when a doc flicks the syringe.

Fishguywc · Apr 21, 2019

slewrock1 said:
API. It's impossible to find the tropic Marin n03

I did some hunting around for other NO3 test kits and found another post for the Fauna Marin which do work with the Bot and they even have refill kits like the RedSea which are much cheaper. I bought 3 of these below and will give them a try.

http://cm-distributors.com/product/aquahome-test-no2no3-refill/