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Seaklear Vs Ahh-Some Test Results


dlleno

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Here I present results from testing the "Ahh-some" flush product against SeaKlear's "Spa system flush". bottom line: Ahh-some is the clear winner for me, and I won't go near the System Flush stuff anymore -- but read on for specific details.

My tub is a good candidate for a flush: Brand new late last summer, its 2nd fill is ready to dump. My ozone generator cannot oxidize enough bromide (from the bank) to keep up with the sanitizer demand when the spa is not in use (proper dosing for bather loads has been followed). My water is always clear; there are no other problems other than this curious sanitizer demand. At this point I do not suspect the ozone generator itself to be at fault, although that is a stone I may have to turn over.

In my experiment, I set out to prove (or disprove) the hypothesis that Ahh-some is a better biofilm flush product. While unable to test the ability of either product to remove and kill bacteria, my test indicator would be the amount and nature of the gunk deposited along the water line. Starting with the stated hypothesis, my plan was to clean my spa with System Flush first, and then follow with Ahh-some. in order for the test to be meaningful, I would flush with SeaKlear system flush twice, following the label directions. here are the results.

Background detail -- spa water is ready to dump, but balanced and still crystal clear. I soaked first for about 30 min at a relatively high concentration of bromine ~8ppm; then got out and started the flush process. Here are the steps I followed and the results:

1. I Removed the filters (put them in filter cleaner to soak) and Dumped the entire bottle of SeaKlear Spa System Flush into my 500 gal spa (This is the dosing recommended for an 800 gallon spa). per label directions, I ran all jets and water features for about 45 min. air intakes were turned down to minimize foam. The result was a nasty dark brown deposit along the water line, which appeared almost immediately. I let her sit all night. The next day I shut her down, drained, cleaned, and refilled.

2. I then repeated the same process with a second $15 bottle of System Flush. This time I got all white foam and no residue along the waterline. per label directions (filters still out) I let her sit all night. the next day I shut her down, drained, cleaned and refilled.

3. Now it was time for the ahh-some treatment. This time, to avoid confusion with metal deposits I treated with a metal sequestrant. I then took a level tablespoon of Ahh-some gel (dosing recommended for a 300 gal spa) and introduced it to the water. I found the gel was rather resistant to dissolving in the water but suspected that was because my water was 55 degrees... but it started working right away. per label directions I put my filters inside the spa to decon them as well**. Also per label directions I dosed with enough chlorine to be effective (10ppm). I ran the jets 30 min. Immediately, a nasty brown gunk appeared, this time a little lighter in color but easily twice as much material ended up along the water line, compared to the first System Flush treatment.

4. After an hour, I shut her down drained, cleaned, and refilled. I hosed the filters down and re-installed. , shock to 10ppm chlorine (I did not superclorinate) and I'm now in the process of reducing TA to 50ppm.

Some things to note (and to like) about the ahh-some product

* two significantly over-dosed System Flush appliations did not even come close to the amount of material removed by a single under-dosed application of ahh-some.

* This material is more than a "dislodge the gunk" product. while it does that very well, it also claims to kill bacteria. otherwise they wouldn't recommend putting your filters into the tub as well

* sanitizer is required to work with the ahh-some product. I'm going to look into this further, but its not clear to me what FC levels would be best.

Next steps for me:

* After converting to bromine, see if the spa will maintain a low residual bromine level when not in use.

* I may start using this stuff at every drain, or perhaps every other drain. it could be overkill, as a great many of us survived the 80s and 90s without this stuff, but consider this: whatever gunk you see on the water line after treatment is no longer serving as a culture medium down inside your pipes.

** Edit for additional clarity: I haven't changed any of the above text, but what I didn't state clearly is that the brown gunk formed immediately on the vessel walls, and THEN I put my filters in to be cleaned. The ahh-some did release material from the filters, but before adding the filters I proved sufficiently that ahh-some removed more material that the SeaKlear did not touch.

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Thanks for the feedback. The test results linked to on their website seemed to indicate that Ahh-Some was a better product, but we didn't have enough reports here to be definitive. In the past we did have members compare Swirl Away against Spa System Flush and the latter was better for most people so we switched to recommending it. After I heard about Ahh-Some, I've been recommending that in parallel but didn't want to switch to an exclusive recommendation until we got some more feedback. So thank you for doing this test.

I will note that having the product work on water after adding back in the filter isn't a direct comparison because the gunk could be just cleaning the filter, but then again that is a benefit (i.e. getting the filter cleaned).

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Indeed, that would have been a good confirmation, to be sure. however, the fact that the second application of system flush produced no new material confirms that the first application had done its work and reached the limit of its effectiveness. It was only after confirming this point, that the ahh-some product was added and found to dislodge more material. Now then, in order to conclude from this test alone that ahh-some is a better product, one would need to assume the following:

1. the measure of success is the amount of material accumulated in the vessel after treatment. This is an easy assumption to accept.

2. there is only one "type" of gunk that these products are removing. This one hasn't been confirmed, so its best not to jump to this conclusion. . For example, the "gunk" in my spa had accumulated over a period of only 6 months, over two fills starting with a brand new spa. Therefore, although I would have expected the first fill to purge such material, it is conceivable that this gunk would have contained more mfg adhesives from labels, for example, assembly debris, etc, compared to an older spa. Was the ahh-some product simply more effective against the "type" of gunk in my spa that SeaKlear couldn't touch, and would the converse then be true as well? that cannot be determined from my test.

One test that is yet to come is the sanitizer demand test -- to see if my ozone generator can oxidize enough sodium bromide to keep the water sanitized when not in use. FYI I purposely did not perform a superchlorinization step because I wanted to see if I could assign the root cause of my problem statement to the gunk itself.

my other conclusion is that I'm going to repeat the ahh-some treatment at the next fill. maybe even every fill.

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  • 5 months later...

update on this experiment: Since flushing the spa with Ahh-some last Winter, my water maintenance has been a breeze. My ozone generator maintains 1-2 PPM bromine with no bather load (bromide salts present in the water) and my sanitizer demand is unbelievably low. $6 worth of Ahh-Some has released additional material that $30 worth of SeaKlear did not touch.

(Edit: I corrected the cost of Ahh-some and added the cost of SeaKlear)

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Thanks for the feedback. I've been recommending Ahh-Some over SeaKlear Spa System Flush and Swirl Away for some time now so glad the results are still consistent.

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Your welcome. I'm about to share some additional results of a month-long experiment I have just concluded, where I compared three additional products with ahh-some. I'll share my test details later, but the bottom line is that ahh-some blows the others out of the water. In addition to the System Flush experiment, above, I now have data on Silk Balance "Clean Start", Aquafinesse "Spa Clean" and Natural Chemistry "Spa Purge"

The evidence is just overwhelming.

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