Trident vs. Manual Dosing

[Mrsadat]

Hello fellow reefers, I currently don’t own a Trident but I’ve been getting a lot of mixed reviews about it. I notice a lot of people use it only to test the water, and say they will never trust it to dose, and in certain situations even after it test the water some people still do a manual test and the two test come out completely different . Can we trust the Trident? Why spend all that money on it if you don’t trust it, why not just stick to the traditional ways of testing.

 

[ca1ore]

I’ve not read many negative reviews ..... well, other than folks grousing about not being able to get one. Also keep in mind that there’s always going to be somebody who has a bad experience, either due to a malfunctioning device or user error. I have one, and it does pretty much exactly what it claims to do. Whether you use some kind of automated testing to trigger actions is up to the individual. I tend to use automated testing and sensors to trigger alerts. Not limited to trident; more prudent IME.

As to variations between testing devices or kits, this seems inevitable if you really think about it. Absolute accuracy is hard to get to, which is why most only claim precision. For example, my trident reads alkalinity consistently between 9.3 and 9.5; my hanna tester reads consistently between 10.2 and 10.5. When I use the trident calibration solution in the hanna, it’s always about 1 dkh higher. Which is more accurate? Within acceptable ranges, does it matter?

 

[krbshappy71]

Great question and answer, I’ve been kicking this around myself wondering how much I should strive for automated and how much to do manually.

 

[Billldg]

I have had my Trident for about a month now and have been using the controlled dosing for about 2 weeks now and it is great. I haven't calibrated my Trident yet because the numbers were in line with my Hanna and the Triton test I sent off a few weeks earlier. The only drawback to a Trident is that it makes you lazy, I don't test nearly as much now and its great.

 

[robbyg]

From what I am reading it works.
As with any piece of equipment it will work until it does not work! The difference with auto dosing is that when it does fail it can possibly dump a whole bunch of chemicals in your tank and wipe it out within hours.
I would never trust any of these units for direct control of dosing. Maybe in a few years when the technology has matured and has proven itself to be very reliable and has built in safeguards I may change my mind.
For now IMHO they are just great devices for simplifying water testing.