Aquamira: mixing & temp effectiveness?

Ben vs. Mike in…

3…2…1…

Oooh! Can't wait! :-)

Huh, what?

Another option (heck of a lot cheaper too):

1. Fill water, squeeze in 5 drops of chlorine bleach (per quart). Ready to hit the trail again.
2. Hike (or relax) 30 minutes while chlorine kills viruses and bacteria.
3. Drink water through a compact, 2-oz weight AquaMira Frontier Pro filter — blocks protozoa, clarifies water, and improves taste (including removal of residual chlorine).

Why waste money on Aqua Mira with its long wait time (30 minutes @ room temp all the way to 4 hours with really cold water)?

But if you must, then get the more powerful AM tablets. 3X the strength of liquids and obviously no pre-mix hassle or wait time required.

CAUTION: The more diluted A.M. liquids are meant for bacteria only, not protozoa (crypto). Read your instructions! The 3x stronger A.M. tablets are good for protozoa, but potentially long wait time.

Now, 3 – 2 – 1, waiting for Mike to tell you the weaker AM liquid is all you need! Except that's not following A. M. instructions at all. But Mike will tell you he's never gotten sick. Well, lots of people don't filter and don't get sick either, but …

Interesting alternative, Ben.

Reading the instructions that come with the AM (2% ClO2) it says: "Let stand 15 minutes. If water is very cold, cloudy or tinted let stand 30 minutes." Nowhere does it say wait 4 hours. Or is there some fine print not included on the packaging?

Why wouldn't the tabs have a wait time? Isn't the process just the same? They are both chlorine dioxide and react to water to release "nascent oxygen." Or are you suggesting no 5 min premix wait time? All the tabs I've ever seen suggest 4 hours.

I'm intrigued by the AM Frontier Pro as an inline filter. That might eliminate 3.7oz for the Steripen + the 1.5 oz of the gatorade purification bottle, for a net savings of 2.2 oz less the weight of the AM tabs.

Ah, finally found the early (original?) posts from 2009 and 2010 where you laid out the details. Interestingly, Google did a better job of searching than the BPL search function!

" "Let stand 15 minutes. If water is very cold, cloudy or tinted let stand 30 minutes." Nowhere does it say wait 4 hours. Or is there some fine print not included on the packaging?"

Curtis — do you see anywhere on the package / instructions where protozoa (e.g. crypto) is even mentioned at all? The 15 minutes is all that's needed — for bacteria. The weak solution mentions nothing about the harder-to-kill protozoa. Because it is forbidden by the EPA.

In contrast, the tablet contains the same exact ingredient but in 3X more potent concentration — and it is allowed by the EPA to mention effectiveness against protozoa. However, in cold water, that can take up to 4 friggin' hours. A false sense of security really, since NONE OF US will ever wait that long on the trail, in the middle of the day!! So, even though the tablet is more potent and can do more — the treatment time for colder water is just too long for my liking — so a dubious advantage as far as I am concerned.

The tablet does not require pre-mixing (or the 5 minute pre-mix wait). You drop the tablet into your water and it immdiately bubbles away like alka seltzer.

And yes, I like my chlorine/Frontier Pro combo very much. You can position the filter at the end of your hydration tube and use the included bite valve — or you can splice the filer in line — or you can use it as a gravity filter when at camp. But know that its pore size is humunguous — 3.0 micron!! I wouldn't use it without pairing with chlorine.

Hope this helps!

You wrote:
—
Curtis — do you see anywhere on the package / instructions where protozoa (e.g. crypto) is even mentioned at all? The 15 minutes is all that's needed — for bacteria. The weak solution mentions nothing about the harder-to-kill protozoa. Because it is forbidden by the EPA.
—

The front of the label says, "Kills odor causing bacteria and enhances the taste of stored potable water." That is the only mention of bacteria/bugs on the label.

Exactly. The A.M. liquid solutions are not allowed to mention the hard-to-kill protozoa. Bacteria, on the other hand, are a lot smaller and easier to kill — hence just 15 minutes. But can you be sure that your water sources have only tiny bacteria and not the tougher protozoa??

If you want protection against protozoa (crypto, giardia) — then you need the more potent tablets. Or, per my conversation with an A.M. rep — you can achieve the efficacy of the tablet by tripling the dosage of your liquid A.M. But that gets beaucoup expensive — and you still have to deal with the long wait time. Protozoa like crypto are relatively big and they come with protective shells — so it just takes chemicals a long time to kill them, esp. in cold water when chemicals become sluggish. That's why I rely on a simple filter to block them instead.

"the tablet contains the same exact ingredient but in 3X more potent concentration"

Can someone clarify this please? The Aquamira drops label indicates 2% stabilized chlorine dioxide while the Aquamira tablets label indicates 6.4% sodium chlorite.

Product literature for the tablets indicates a resulting 4ppm chlorine dioxide solution when desolved in water. Aquamira drops (1 ounce of 2% solution treats 30 gallons of water) calculates out to 5+ppm.

Is chlorine dioxide the same as sodium chlorite? Does something happen chemically that reduces the 5+ppm concentration?

Thanks in advance.

Lance:

I no longer use AquaMira chlorine dioxide — liquids or tablets. But when I compared them a few years back, the percentages were 3X the difference. I also verified this directly with an A.M. rep — it was she who suggested I could match the efficacy of the tablets by tripling the dosage of the liquids.

May be a good idea if you (or someone else) do another follow-up conversation. Things change sometimes — although in this case, maybe not — given the instructions and packaging of the liquids still mention ONLY bacterial treatment.

"Can someone clarify this please? The Aquamira drops label indicates 2% stabilized chlorine dioxide while the Aquamira tablets label indicates 6.4% sodium chlorite.

Product literature for the tablets indicates a resulting 4ppm chlorine dioxide solution when desolved in water. Aquamira drops (1 ounce of 2% solution treats 30 gallons of water) calculates out to 5+ppm.

Is chlorine dioxide the same as sodium chlorite? Does something happen chemically that reduces the 5+ppm concentration?"

Household bleach is a solution of sodium chlorite in water. Free chlorine is liberated in the raw water, which slowly causes some bugs to die. The smell is from chlorine.

Chlorine dioxide is not the same. For one thing, chlorine dioxide is not long-term stable. That's why you have to mix two components, wait for the chlorine dioxide to form, and then use it. I _think_ that it works on bugs by a different mechanism, because I _think_ it suddenly lowers the pH of the raw water which kills bugs. The smell is slightly different from chlorine.

I would expect various bugs (whether virus, bacteria, or protozoan) to be killed at different rates (free chlorine versus chlorine dioxide) and to different degrees. So, the two treatments are two different things. If they were the same, then the Aqua Mira company might just package bleach into little capsules.

–B.G.–

Bob,
Are you confusing the chemical in Aquamira tablets,sodium chlorite (NaCl02) with the chemical in bleach, sodium hypochlorite (NaClO)?

In any case, I feel confident that chlorine dioxide is not the same thing as sodium chlorite or sodium hypochlorite.

Thanks

"Are you confusing the chemical in Aquamira tablets,sodium chlorite (NaCl02) with the chemical in bleach, sodium hypochlorite (NaClO)?"

Bleach is sodium hypochlorite. The name changes depending on how it is in solution.

Aqua Mira tablets are chlorine dioxide, or they produce chlorine dioxide.

Aqua Mira is not sodium chlorite.

Two different things.

–B.G.–

Aqua Mira tablets are chlorine dioxide, or they produce chlorine dioxide. Ditto for Aqua Mira liquids.

Not a chemical expert at all, but the active ingredient used to treat the baddies in both cases is chlorine dioxide. Just different concentration/potency as stated.