hth and aqua chem test kits

[fullhouse]

is one more accurate than the other. i would like to buy ben's test kit, but this month that is not possible. i've had the aqua chem, but our walmart just got in the hth and i was not sure if it was better.

[prh129]

I have the HTH kit so I can give you some perspective on that one. The chlorine test is OTO which tests for total chlorine. The color chart on the tester only goes up to 5 ppm although Ben has indicated roughly what range some darker colors would correspond to. The downside of this is that you should monitor the CC levels to know when and if the pool needs to be shocked and in that case you will want to get FC up in the 10 ppm range so the OTO test isn't going to be a lot of help there.
The other tests in the kit are pH, alkalinity, hardness and CYA. The hardness test in this kit did not work on my water sample (see separate thread on this topic) but I have a vinyl liner so it's not a big concern anyway. The hardness test in Ben's kit works just fine. The CYA test has a minimum measurable value of 30 as opposed to 20 in Ben's kit. There is a significant amount of CYA reagent used in each test so I would guess there is enough in the HTH kit for 5 measurements.
All in all I would say this is a good kit to start with and if you could get an FAS-DPD chlorine test as a supplement that would be very helpful. However, I would also add that considering all of the helpful advise on this forum and the cost savings that can result, the cost of Ben's test kit is a pretty good bargain.

Peter

[fullhouse]

Peter,
Thanks for you reply.it sounds like i should just look for the FAS-DPD chlorine test as a supplement and order Ben's test next month. i have been reading on here and it seems like several people use a couple of different test kits. will the FAS-DPD test test for combined chlorine?

[prh129]

The one in Ben's kit does so I assume that they all would - you add some powder to start then use one reagent to determine free chlorine and a second reagent to determine combined chlorine.