Lou, titration beats hell out of degrees Brix, or other convoluted
methodology, however titration is far from the best, and frankly, may not be
a good idea, as it gives a false sense of comfort and security.

The problem with titration is that it measures quantity of TOTAL alkalinity,
and measures impurities, and garbage picked up in the cleaning process, as
ACTIVE cleaner--WRONG!

The perfect example of this is that an old bath that titrates as being fully
up to strength, cleans NOT NEARLY as well as a new cleaner bath.

Much much better, much more indicative, yet not perfect, is to measure pH.
pH tells what sort of alkali is present.  This will not tell you how much
soil you have dissolved/dispersed in the cleaner/saponifier, but is a much
truer indicator of cleaning strength.

The problem with pH is that it does not tell you how much saponifier to add
to bring the system up to the desired pH.  You have to fool around, and check
it out in the lab, then do the job in production.

Hope this helps, this is not a straight forward subject, and frankly, many of
the vendors do not understand their own chemistry well enough to be of much
help.

Regards,

Rudy Sedlak
RD Chemical Company

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