Chromatography Forum

Hello everyone,

I have an Agilent 1100 HPLC with the normal setup. In my maintenance documents there are warning about using solutions above 9.5 pH because it is bad for the quartz on the flow cell.

I might be tasked with running a method in the future that has a mobile phase of ~12 pH. How can I minimize the damage that this will do, and is there an alternative flow cell that I can use that can handle the high pH?

I looked on the Agilent website but it was not much help.

I've done quite a bit of work around pH 12 with Agilent VWD cells with quartz windows, and never had a problem. Worst case scenario is that you have to replace the windows, which are easy to change, and relatively cheap. I'm not aware of a good alternative.

Be worried about what you leave in the cell, not so much what you run through it...

Thanks again. Very helpful

Be worried about what you leave in the cell, not so much what you run through it...

Good advice. In my experience, as long as you immediately flush the system immediately after use, you should be fine at pH 12. If you're running this method every day for months on end, you'll probably want to keep an eye on detector performance, but as another user said, a little extra flow-cell maintenance is not the end of the world...

The flow cell windows should not be an issue. However, use of strong bases may damage the autoinjector's rotary seal.