Red Sea Mg Test Kit Gone bad?

[dalee26]

I have had the test kit that is listed in the Title of this thread for about a year now. It has worked well up until tonight when I tested my tank. It should read around 1600 because I boosted it to that a month and a half ago to battle the Cyan algae. It has tested fine, but tonight it says my Mg is over 5000. It used 2.5 mL of the solution and the second time it used 2.2. It didn't look like the rich purple it used to turn to when it would get close to turning blue. It was really faint with a white tint. Has anyone else had issues with this and if so what did you switch to afterwards? I don't test it very often, but after my Instant Ocean hydrometer was off by .05 (that was just stupid of them to mess it up by that much <<cost me lots of $$ before I realized how off it was>>) I prefer to use one that is closest to the true values. Happy holiday, happy reefing, and thanks for taking the time to read this and help me out.

Darren

Charleston, SC

[bertoni]

I haven't used Red Sea kits in a long time, but they do seem to expire more rapidly than other tanks, possibly due to their liquid reagents. I'd get another test kit. 5000 ppm magnesium sounds like a testing error of some sort.

[dalee26]

That is what I figured when the second test came back with the same results. If it was that high then nothing would be alive in there, IMHO. Thanks for the quick reply!

Darren

Charleston, SC

[bertoni]

You're welcome! Good luck!

[Billybeau1]

FWIW, there are only two hobby grade magnesium test kits that I've tested that are worth a darn.

Salifert and Elos.

Forget the rest. I've tested them all.

:)