New Grower Why EC is a million times better than PPM. Plus a question for all the growers who currently use EC

[epenguin]

I love it when an old thread has the paddles put on it and gets shocked back into life.

Nammy, a peep is a person. Peeps are people. Or am I the only one who thinks that?

Anywho - back to the debate. Having not long done my qualifications in engineering (All in metric by the by), I have been working at a precision engineering place, where all the machinery is many decades old and is in Imperial. All the technical drawings are now metric. Bar none.

So, to use the millers or lathes etc, I have to constantly convert between the two. At first it is a nightmare, but you get used to it after a while and it becomes second nature. Like anything, if you do it often enough it isn't a problem.
I have more problems with old drawings that are in Imperial. I was turning a six foot hydraulic ram on a lathe last month that had a tolerance of two thou'.
Took me a week to do four of them!!

All that aside, we must settle on a standard that we can all use. And metric is the way. Like it or not, Imperial must got the way of all previous standards. Just look at spanners. Gawd knows how many different types there are.

Below is a real good read on the timeline of British standards. Do have a look. It is a hoot.

http://www.metric.org.uk/uk-metric-time-line

eP.

 

[MikeyB420]

Nammy, a peep is a person. Peeps are people. Or am I the only one who thinks that?


Below is a real good read on the timeline of British standards. Do have a look. It is a hoot.

http://www.metric.org.uk/uk-metric-time-line

eP.

Was it Harry Enfield who coined the phrase 'peeps'?

[video=youtube;0mYssEXILjc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mYssEXILjc[/video]

Back on thread, I blame the French for sodding up measurement! (of all kinds!)

PAL

MB.

 

[Waira]

...eP! Peep's are people!?!? :twist: :Medibles: ...I thought they were those foul, atomic colored Easter marshmallow candies!! :MmmMedibles..: ...*(an American confection of dubious merit)....

>>> Nammy! -don't be a hater dewd ..what happened to mellowing in your old age?! :Sharing One:

>>> HH :Cool bud:"kudos" .... something very much overlooked, indeed, and of significant importance! And I'm guilty of the asking for ppm's myself,....:No: LOL! ...though sometimes, it's about just checking on how an RO unit is doing,...or working with what meters people have on hand! :dunno: Aaaay, whaddya gonna do, eh? :smoke::Cheers:

 

[MikeyB420]

(an American confection of dubious merit)....

:Smokin:

PAL

MB.

 

[Duckster]

Ohh, don't get me wrong, I wish the U.S. could get with the metric system. My sarcasm is for "Americans" because we are just too damned stubborn to convert to metric. the Inches/ feet/yards system has long since outlived its usefullness and needs to be retired. Sure, EC is fine, I just don't care for it personally.

I know someone who dropped out of a Biology class because they couldn't grasp the metric system,,,, What's so hard about multiplying and dividing by ten??

I prefer the metric system from an engineering and math point of view. However being born and raised in the land of inches and feet, I tend think and visualize in those terms. Which adds the mental task of converting back and forth constantly. Much like most bilingual people tend to think in their native tongue.

 

[Duckster]

Ah yes the inconsistencies of water chemistry measurements and methods. A prime example of why you can not use someone else's numbers as a gospel for your grow. Granted, if you have the same grow medium, same lighting setup, same strain from the same breeder, it can be a great place start. But you will still have to tweak your processes to meet your own circumstances.

Until all or most of the variables are removed, canna growing will remain less of a science and more of an art form. IMO

 

[Duckster]

I love it when an old thread has the paddles put on it and gets shocked back into life.

eP.

Probably my fault. Was reading through this in the morning. Liked a few comments. Planned to make a comment but had to take an extended "work break". Come back this eve and several new posts. Amazing what happens when an interest is shown.

Happy - many thanks for the relationship curves between EC and the various TDS meters. I have pasted this into my own personal "bible"

 

[GodAmJT]

I'll play devil's advocate here: If not ppms and use EC, then why the several different EC calculations? Why not use just one, so the ppms could be used as a standard as well?


Personally, I have equipment that reads in ppm with the 0.5 EC scale. Sure, I can easily convert the ppm to EC knowing that, but if EC was allegedly the standard, then why don't they make equipment to read in EC more prevalent? When I purchased my TDS/PPM/EC meters, none of them have the option to read out in EC.. They both came with a conversion chart though..

 

[Happy Horticulturist]

I'll play devil's advocate here: If not ppms and use EC, then why the several different EC calculations? Why not use just one, so the ppms could be used as a standard as well?


Personally, I have equipment that reads in ppm with the 0.5 EC scale. Sure, I can easily convert the ppm to EC knowing that, but if EC was allegedly the standard, then why don't they make equipment to read in EC more prevalent? When I purchased my TDS/PPM/EC meters, none of them have the option to read out in EC.. They both came with a conversion chart though..

EC is standard. PPM requires conversion. That's the point!

 

[Happy Horticulturist]

Yep the good old half assed American way! I too bought metric wrenches back during the Great Experiment...lol! So we made cars (and STILL do.. ) that half the bolts and screws were metric, and half were the usual mix of U.S. Thread and SAE. Because its easier to figure out how many 64ths there are in 27 inches.......VS how many centimeters in 5 meters...
And the problem is it is broke, its an antiquated and difficult system of measurement.

Yes, I understand being comfortable with what your use to, doesn't mean its worth saving!

Funny though, I bet you know the formula to convert grams and ounces lol! :Sharing One:

I asked for a metric tape measure at Lowes......they looked at me like I had three heads.........LOL!

Over here our tape measures have meters and centimetres on the left side and feet and inches on the right side. Over here we understand feet, inches, miles, pounds, ounces, but working in metric is so much easier because everything is divisable by 10. No complex conversion schemes and having to say something is one thirty two'th of an inch


EDIT: Wow ePenguin... I just looked at this link... http://www.metric.org.uk/uk-metric-time-line

No wonder the imperial system is so messed up. It all makes sense now.

See with the metric system 'they' realised the existing system was terrible and they needed something that was clean, accurate, consistent and based on measurable real world objects and comparisons (like water and the circumference of the earth) rather than inconsistent comparisons like a hand span or a the size of a barley corn or a chain... If you think that's the best way of measuring you either just don't know what I know, or you do and you're stubbornly grasping on. Let it go man

Even Fahrenheit and Celcius. In celcius zero degrees is the freezing point of water and a hundred degrees is the boiling point. What is Fahrenheit based on?

"Researchers have gone to their graves trying to figure out what old man Fahrenheit was up to, Leslie. Here's the story as well as I can piece it together:

Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit (1686-1736) was a German instrument maker who invented the first practical mercury thermometer. Casting about for a suitable scale for his device, he visited the Danish astronomer Ole Romer, who had devised a system of his own. As it turned out, it was a case of the blind leading the blind.

Romer had decided that the boiling point of water should be 60 degrees, which at least had the strength of numerological tradition behind it (60 minutes in an hour, right?). But zero was arbitrary, the main consideration apparently being that it should be colder than it ever got in Denmark. (Romer didn't like using negative numbers in his weather logbook.) In addition to the boiling point of water, the other landmarks on Romer's scale were the freezing point of water, 7.5 degrees, and body temperature, 22.5 degrees.

D.G., simple soul that he was, thought this cockeyed system was the soul of elegance. He made one useful change--to get rid of the fractions, he multiplied Romer's degrees by 4, giving him 30 for the freezing point and 90 for body temperature. Then, for reasons nobody has ever been able to fathom, he multiplied all the numbers by 16/15, making 32 freezing and 96 body temperature. Boiling point for the time being he ignored altogether.

By and by Fahrenheit got ready to present his scale to London's Royal Society, the scientific big leagues of the day. It dawned on him that it was going to look a little strange having the zero on his scale just hanging off the end, so to speak. So he cooked up the explanation that zero was the temperature of a mix of ice, water, and ammonium chloride.

Later Fahrenheit established that the boiling point of water came in at 212 degrees. Over time this replaced body temperature as the upper landmark on his scale. Meanwhile, as more precise measurements were made, body temperature had to be adjusted to 98.6 degrees.

In short, 100 means nothing on the Fahrenheit scale, 96 used to mean something but doesn't anymore, and 0 is colder than it ever gets in Denmark. Brilliant. Lest we get too down on Fahrenheit, though, consider Anders Celsius, who devised the centigrade scale (0 to 100). Everybody agrees Celsius's scale makes more sense than Fahrenheit's. Trouble is, the original Celsius scale had 100 for freezing, 0 for boiling. In other words, it was upside down. (The numbers were reversed after Celsius's death.) You have to wonder whether these guys breathed one lungful of mercury fumes too many.

Now for a little bonus info. At what temperature do the Fahrenheit and Celsius scales read the same? Why, minus 40, of course. Cecil was stumped by that one once during a radio interview, and you can bet it won't happen twice."