GC Brand Suggestions

[jowp]

Can i have any suggestion on which GC brand should our company buy..
We're keen on technical efficiency and of course, we also consider the cost..
We're going to use this for food and water analysis..
Any help from you guys would be appreciated..
Thanks in advance

[WK]

jowp,
What kinds of analytes are you going to analyse?
At what levels do you expect they are present?
This will determine what type of detectors/injectors/sample preparation you might need.
You must make time to take samples to instrument suppliers to see what is best.
WK

[Victor]

WK has given excellent advice.

I think probably the biggest selling GC is the Agilent 6890. I would start by looking at the price and specifications of this instrument, and see if it will do what you want it to do. Look at the local service set up to see if they can repair the instrument for you, and how much it will cost. Once you have done this, compare the prices/specifications/service arrangements of instruments from other manufacturers. If you are only looking for a single instrument, you might find that smaller manufacturers or non-market leaders may be more willing to help you analyse test samples etc. If you are looking for a number of instruments or high specification GC, probably all the suppliers will do this for you.

[skunked_once]

I have worked with both Agilent and Varian GC's and prefer the Varian.
Both, however, are good instruments so the deciding factor for me would be who has the best sales/service in your area.

[jowp]

jowp,
What kinds of analytes are you going to analyse?
At what levels do you expect they are present?
This will determine what type of detectors/injectors/sample preparation you might need.
You must make time to take samples to instrument suppliers to see what is best.
WK

for the water analyses, i would mainly use the instrument for organochlorine pesticide analysis, detections could go as low as 0.03 ppb.
actually, i still haven't run through the specifics on analyzing these parameters, so i don't know what are the actual requirements for these analyses.

thank you for your advice and i would consult our local suppliers on which combinations of instruments to use.. thanks

[jowp]

I have worked with both Agilent and Varian GC's and prefer the Varian.
Both, however, are good instruments so the deciding factor for me would be who has the best sales/service in your area.

thanks for the comments
i would check out our local varian supplier if they could give us some advice on choosing our system..
thanks again

[CE Instruments]

If you are looking at Organo Chlorine pesticides you need the best ECD, I recommend the Thermo one. It has the added advantage of being the only one that can be stacked to offer ECD/FID, ECD/FPD in series for added information without loss of sensitivity. The Thermo Trace and Focus are also very flexible when connecting into OEM data systems with full digital control and data handling from Chromcard, EZChrom, Atlas and Chemstation.
Ultimately the key decisions for GC purchase
1 Does it meet your required performance spec. Is there a benefit if it betters it ?
2 Price for system
3 Familiarity with brand especially software. Any premium GC supplier can probably match your performance specs, learning a new GC is easy they are all similar. Software is the key, it is hard to master lots of different data systems, if you are already trained on a certain system this will offer an advantage.
4 Service support, although again in most countries this should not be an issue.

Don't be a sheep and just buy the most popular, you would not do it with a car. Go out and look at what is available and choose the best for you.