Angel said, >They realized all they were doing was wearing down their silver rods.<
If you are *wearing down* your silver rods, it is working. The rods don't *wear down*, they dissolve. If they are dissolving quickly, your water is getting plenty of silver. I think the issue may be in what you think you are getting. You said it was 3-4 ppm. How did you arrive at this number? The only way I know of accurately measuring ppm is with a spectrophotometer, which I assume you don't possess. The readings you get with a TDS or PWT meter are not ppm, and must be translated into ppm using various formulas which are not dependably or consistently accurate. I had a sample of my CS tested by a local Industrial testing laboratory some time back and was told it was 5 ppm. I KNEW that was wrong, so I had them test it again. They said, Oh Yeah, sorry, it is actually 7 ppm. I sent some of that same batch to Old Bob, and he pronounced it to be 18.7 ppm, very small particle size. I asked him why the difference in testing results, and he said the lab near me didn't know how to test for the nanosilver portion (what he called 'ionic'). The basic problem with units that autoshutoff is if they shut off too soon (whether because the autoshutoff function is faulty, or it is set too low or because of water quality). My units don't shut off automatically because various water qualities would affect that. I just brew it as long as possible while still getting clear CS. As soon as you get yellow CS, you know you have brewed it too long and need to shorten the brewing time a bit (not that there is anything wrong with yellow CS). Units that autshutoff don't allow this. As I understand it, the autoshutoff function operates by shutting off at a maximum amperage. You will reach that maximum amperage sooner with water that has 'stuff' in it (minerals or chemicals, etc.) than you will with very pure distilled water. This means that if your water has minerals in it, the minerals will conduct electricty before much silver has been dissolved into the water and the unit will shut off before there is much silver in the water. In other words, the minerals in the water take the place of silver to increase conductance and raise amperage. In Angel's case, the fact that his silver rods are dissolving quickly indicates that he is getting plenty of silver into the water, whatever his ppm measurements may seem to indicate. Angel, if you are waiting to get a 10-20 ppm reading with a TDS meter (although it isn't actually ppm) using a unit with autoshutoff, it isn't likely to happen. This doesn't mean you aren't getting 10-20 ppm, but the autoshutoff mechanism will shut off the brewing process sooner with, say, Reverse Osmosis water than with good distilled water. (Most RO units don't remove as much 'stuff' from the water as distillation units.) There are also varying qualities of DW, and DW that comes in soft opaque plastic bottles may have more substances in it than DW that comes in the blue, hard plastic, 5-gallon bottles. Also, because of the presence of chemicals in today's water that evaporate along with the water, a good DW unit needs to have a carbon filter at the end of the distillation cycle, and the filter needs to be kept clean. DW devices that are not adequately serviced (such as happens in a pharmacy or grocery store) can produce less-than-pure water, which can afect CS-brewing. Your Silver Puppy is almost certainly producing adequate CS if your rods are dissolving. Terry Chamberlin __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com -- The Silver List is a moderated forum for discussing Colloidal Silver. Instructions for unsubscribing are posted at: http://silverlist.org To post, address your message to: [email protected] Address Off-Topic messages to: [email protected] The Silver List and Off Topic List archives are currently down... List maintainer: Mike Devour <[email protected]>
