If you're doing manual titration
it's time to switch gears

Performing manual titrations can be extremely tedious, requiring the operator to stand in one place, watching minuscule droplets drip into a sample container and diligently waiting for the color change or other endpoint indictor to occur before starting the process all over again, for possibly hours and hours of repeated sample titrations.

An automatic titrator allows you to start the titration and then walk away from the titrator to perform other tasks or tests while the titrator takes care of the titrant addition, endpoint detection and results calculations automatically without any involvement from the operator.

Once the titrator is done, the titrator will beep, notifying the operator that the results are available and another titration can be started.

Manual titrations typically use a non-certified, Class B or Class A burette with stopcock to add doses of titrant to the sample. The operator uses the stopcock to start and stop the additions of titrant into the sample, often one drop at a time, until the endpoint is reached.

The precision of these additions, especially near the endpoint, is primarily determined by the operator’s skill level, experience and focus on the task at hand. All too commonly, an operator can allow too much titrant to flow out of the burette into the sample and overshoot the endpoint, requiring them to perform the entire titration all over again. Even highly skilled and experienced operators can be limited in the precision of their manual titration results by the last few drops of titrant, since each drop can vary in volume.

When using an automatic titrator, the titration is performed using a high-accuracy titrant delivery system that controls all titrant additions into the sample and will adjust the dose rate as it detects the endpoint approaching.

Once the endpoint is reached, the titrator uses the precisely measured volume of titrant added to the sample to automatically calculate the concentration results for the sample. The operator’s skill level, experience and focus on the task at hand is no longer a factor in the overall accuracy of the titration results and the possibility of missing the endpoint is greatly reduced.

Typically calculating titrations in the lab is done by calculating the sample concentration after the endpoint has been reached. There are many points in this calculation where human error can get in the way of consistent, reproducible results.

When using an auto titrator, it will automatically calculate the sample concentration from the entered parameters. Plus, on the automatic titrator, electrode, titrant and titration setup parameters can be saved as a method, so the exact same settings are used for each titration. These methods can be transferred between titrators for consistent procedures to be used on multiple titrators or multiple labs. This way you can save time with repeat titrations by running the exact same parameters each time without having to reenter any information.

Instead of manually logging the titration results in a notebook or scrap of paper, an auto titrator will automatically save the titration results in the data log with time and date stamp.