Need help balancing my water

[bsdell]

I bought the BrewLab test kit and everything has gone well. My test results over several days are really consistent. Part of my day job involves testing boiler water so I feel my testing skills are adequate. My problem is with my cation and anion imbalance in Brun Water. The only way to get them to balance is to make my Sodium (which is calculated) negative. Here's the formula with my test kit. SodiumA-B *23

A=(Chloride/35) + (Sulfate/48) + (Total Alkalinity/50)
B=(Total Hardness/50)

Chloride: 20/35= .571
Sulfate: 0/48= 0
Tot Alk: 80/50=1.6
Tot Hard: 180/50=3.6

(.571+0+1.6) - 3.6= -1.429 * 23= -32.867

I understand that the water needs to be balanced and this number makes it balance. But how can it be negative? If I put the number in at a positive my imbalance is ~3.1. If I put it in as negative I'm balanced at ~.4.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ajdelange]

The most likely explanation is that you are measuring one or more of the parameters incorrectly. The other explanation is that there is a lot of other cations in your water such as nitrate, nitrite, phosphate, bromide, fluoride... in your water. Of these only nitrate could possibly be there in sufficient quantity to put a dent in the missing 3.6 mEq/L. Were I you I would send a sample off to Ward Labs and use their result as a guide against which to compare you own testing until you get the hang of it.

 

[bsdell]

Thank you for your reply.

I will take a sample and send it off and test the same sample myself to see how far off I am. It's a good possibility that there are a lot of nitrates in it. The water source is from a very large aquifer that is covered by farm land.

 

[ajdelange]

I hope the answer doesn't come back with 3.6 mEq/L nitrate as that's 225 mg/L (as Nitrate - note that Ward Labs will report as N). I think the MCL for nitrate is 40 mg/L. 225 would be closer to liquified moo poo than drinking water!

 

[bsdell]

Yeah, the water isn't quite that bad.

Right after I posted that I put the numbers in with a higher nitrate and realized that was a pretty stupid thing to post. I'm not a smart man!:smack:

Thanks again for taking the time to respond.

 

[ajdelange]

Right after I posted that I put the numbers in with a higher nitrate and realized that was a pretty stupid thing to post. I'm not a smart man!:smack:

Please don't think that! Given the previous discussion it was a very reasonable thing to suggest because, at least in principle you are right. Moo poo and lots of high nitrogen fertilizer may indeed be responsible for elevated nitrate in your water. Even to the point where you exceed the MCL.

When I suggest that bad measurements on your part is the most likely explanation, based on my and other peoples' early experiences with testing protocols they haven't used before, the possibility exists that you did do things right and that there are 3.6 mEq of something else out there which, given where you live, could well be nitrate. Calling for additional testing is certainly justified by this even if the Ward labs test comes out at the safe level. I think you owe it to yourself to get this testing done. To do so would be smart IMO. In any case I think correlating with the local farm activity is pretty smart on your part.