Alkatronic is constantly” retesting” and has many black dots in the graph. Why?
To avoid potential error measurements, the machine will always compare a new measurement with the previous measurement (If wash out mode is enabled). If the difference is more than 0.20 dKH, the machine will redo the measurement for safety reasons. It could of course be a true deviation from the previous measurement, for example if your measurement interval is very long and you could have actually had that big of a deviation. In that case, Alkatronic will re-measure and accept that the second value as true. The main principal of the wash out mode is that the machine will redo a measurement if the difference in alkalinity is more than 0.20 dkH from the previous measurement, and when the difference is <=0.20, accept that value and set it for true.
The washed-out value/s will not be shown in either the graph or the history as we interpret them as false. But, as an indication that a value was proceeded by a wash out sequence, that value will be marked with a black dot. There are 2 reasons that the wash out sequence will kick in. One is, and that is the main goal of this algorithm, when the machine performs an error measurement. The other reason could be that the value is actually correct, but the time between 2 measurements is that big that the alkalinity has actually changed that much. Focustronic Owners Club FAQ 2019 6 So, some black dots, maybe 2-5 a week, is normal. But if you have very many black dots, like several every day, you can go through this check list:
1. If the time-tag after a washed-out measure ends with something close to XX:24, that means that the value was correctly measured by Alkatronic but that the difference compared to previous measured value was >0.2dKH, and therefore Alkatronic only redo the measure once and then settle the value. In this case, everything is correct in all aspects, but consider increasing measure frequency.
2. If the time-tag after a washed-out measure ends with something close to XX:36 or more, that means that the first value was incorrectly measured by Alkatronic and therefore, Alkatronic redo the measure twice or more, and then settle the correct value. If this” XX:36- measurements”, happens only 1-2 times a week, you do not have to do anything, but if it happens more often: Check user manual under” A lot of black dots in graph” and” Bad Precision”.