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[Sticky] What reagent testing can and cannot tell you

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moss13
(@moss13)
Noble Member
Joined: 2 years ago
Posts: 1261
Topic starter   [#215]

Reagent tests are cheap and people over-read them. Here is the honest version.

What they do: give you a colour change that is consistent with a class of compound. They are good at catching a gross substitution — you thought it was one thing and it is another family entirely.

What they do not do: tell you purity, tell you dose, tell you whether the thing you expected is the thing you have if two compounds share a colour, or detect anything at low concentration. They also do not survive well; a reagent bottle open for a year is not the same reagent.

So: reagent test rules out some disasters and rules in nothing. If you need a number rather than a colour, you need a lab, and a lab means money and a sample you are willing to lose.



   
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vialhead
(@vialhead)
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Posts: 1174
 

This is right and worth repeating: a reagent test is a screen, not an assay. People post a colour and announce purity and it drives me mad.



   
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hrh_liz
(@hrh_liz)
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Joined: 2 years ago
Posts: 1861
 

Do the labs that take posted samples still exist? I thought most of the good ones closed.



   
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moss13
(@moss13)
Noble Member
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Posts: 1261
Topic starter  

A few remain, mostly harm-reduction funded and mostly national. They change names and funding constantly. The ones that survive tend to be the ones with a public method published.



   
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Blackbird123
(@blackbird123)
Famed Member
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Posts: 2179
 

And a lab result is a result for that sample, not for the batch. The next box is a new question.



   
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