Mustard Algae

[AndreaA]

Hi all.. I'm back again. With the same issue. We believe we have mustard algae and we are not getting rid of it. We've also changed out the sand in our filter so I know that's working good :-) But my water is now green cloudy mess and I have nasty brown deposits on the bottom that my husband can't seem to get rid of.

So... I need to nip this in the bud once and for all... Here are my numbers



FC: 5.5
CC: 0
PH: 7.2
ALK: 70
CYA: 25 (reading stops at 30 but I still had to add more to bottle to see black dot disappear

Please help !!

[Watermom]

Your numbers look good. Have you had any CC readings lately? I would suggest shocking the pool up to about 12 and try and hold it there as consistently as you can. Test as often as you can and each time, add enough bleach to bring the cl level back up. The more times per day, the better. There is no such thing as too often. At the very minimum 2x per day but more than that is better. Also run your pump 24/7 while you are fighting this and keep an eye on your filter pressure. If it goes up 8-10psi, backwash. What is the volume of your pool and what type of pool is it?

[AndreaA]

FC is up... b/c this morning I tested and it was 1.0 so I added a large container of bleach then tested a again a few hours later. I do think we had CC level last week when my husband tested it (maybe at 1).

Our pool is an inground, vinyl liner, (i believe we are about 25k gallons)

[AndreaA]

We've added 5 (large walmart) containers sense yesterday and the chlorine level is up. We got up to 16ppm by 9pm last night but it had dropped down to 10 by noon today. I added another 1.5 gal and it got up to 13 then I just added another. I do see A LOT of brown stuff now on the bottom of the pool. Some of it is dark brown (larger piles) and then small piles of light tan (sand like) stuff. Tomorrow I'm going to vacuum to waste but I know that I will loose a lot of water by doing this and I will have to add more water in order to finish the entire pool. I'm guessing I'll just have to add more bleach if my chlorine drops... I'm hoping that it will maintain overnight but I'm not holding my breath :-) It's def fighting something in there.

[AndreaA]

We are still battling it out. Pool is still green but I know its working because there is more and more brown stuff dropping on to the bottom. The hubby vacuumed to waste yesterday and by morning there was more. I'm wondering if I should up the chlorine? I've been targeting 15 and it keeps dropping to 10 or 12 and I'll up to 17 and it will drop down to 15 or 12 within 6-8 hours. It is hot here and I still have a bunch of crap flying in the pool (aka pollen and tree stuff). I'm cleaning out my skimmers three times a day and they are constantly full. Do you suggest uping the chlorine?

[AndreaA]

Well... I'm starting to get a little frustrated... My pool is still green and I've run out of testing stuff sense I've been tested three times a day for 7 days now. We keep having to vacuum the pool everyday and I'm brushing what I can... I've added probably 15 or 20 bottles of bleach at this point and it still looks BAD. I know my FC levels are good and I know I've maintained them at the shock level for this entire time. My husband keeps wanting to shut off the pump and let it all settle to the bottom but I keep telling him to give it more time.. I feel like I can't keep fighting him on this but I'm just not seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. Please advise.......

[AndreaA]

We do not fill from a well. But have questioned whether we have metals in the water before. We've had it tested but it comes up with nothing... I do believe we might have it but hate to sink $100 bucks in it if I'm not 100% sure.

Thanks again for helping us!

[PoolDoc]

I'm not clear what's going on. You have an algae or metals problem -- green -- and you have a brown spots problem --- which is what?? --- and you have a stuff in the skimmers -- again, what's that from?? -- problem.

Can you clarify what the different things are?

As a general rule, if stuff is filtering out, you want to keep filtering. And, if chlorine levels drop OVERNIGHT, you need to keep adding chlorine. During the day, levels can drop because of sunlight, but if they drop overnight, then than almost always means you had stuff in the pool that chlorine is 'burning up'.

Several things to consider here:

FIRST, if your CYA was higher last fall than it is now, there's a good chance you've got stuff in your pool ('waste' products from having bacteria 'eat' your CYA) that will take a LOT of chlorine to get rid of. But, usually this will show up in increased CC levels.

SECOND, if you aren't 'winning' against the algae, it's winning against you. I've seen algae develop that could consume huge amounts of chlorine, at very high levels. If you are not seeing the algae improve, it's winning. If 5 gallons added in the PM doesn't produce improvement by the AM, go to 8 gallons. And if 8 gallons doesn't work, go to 12. [IMPORTANT => I'm assuming you're sure it's algae -- slime on the rails or other smooth surface (liner, but not plaster), is one reliable indicator; yellow or green deposits that brush clear is another.)

THIRD, it's very possible to have BOTH left-over CYA and chlorine resistant algae, and that will definitely make it even harder (ie, require higher levels of chlorine) to clean up.

FOURTH, almost anything you could add to 'help' will make it worse. If you've already added 'helpers', they are probably already part of the problem. This includes things like YellowOUT or Yellow Treat or algicides or clarifiers. If you have added such things, tell us what, since it can affect how to proceed most effectively. Phosphate removers won't make the algae or CYA product problem worse -- might even help with the algae -- but will cloud your pool something terrible, so it will LOOK worse.

FIFTH, sorry you are out of testing stuff. When you refill, don't test that much. Really, the only thing you need to be testing right now is chlorine, PM and AM, and pH -- but no more than 1x per day and ONLY when the chlorine is below 5ppm (or 15ppm with a Taylor kit). But, as long as you aren't adding anything other than bleach, you don't have to test anything but chlorine.

SIXTH, turning off the filter to let things settle is a good idea ONLY after everything is dead . . . and may be not then. Don't do it before the algae has ALL given up the ghost.

SEVENTH, I may have missed it, but I don't see what sort of pool you have. If it's an AG pool with a sand filter, or a small AG pool with any sort of filter except DE, it will take a long time to get back to clear sparkly blue. Trying to hurry won't help. If you REALLY want to hurry, install an oversized DE filter.

EIGHTH, if the problem is clear green WITHOUT algae, it may be iron. Iron can come from well water or old water company distribution pipes. This is a complicated issue, that I don't understand fully, but iron can be in the water in forms that are easy to get out (turns orange instantly in the presence of chlorine) or in forms that are very hard to clean up. If the problem is NOT algae (no slime, no brush-able green), let us know if it's possible that it's iron, ie, did the water in your pool come through iron or steel pipes on the way to your pool.

Good luck!

Ben / PoolDoc

[AndreaA]

Ok. Let me start from the beginning.


We purchased the home in Nov 2010 with a clear and what seemed to be a perfect pool. The pool was maintained by a local pool store and was in good working order. It's a 16x32 inground pool with vinyl liner. The pool has 3 jets and a maindrain but only one skimmer. I have a sand filter with two pipes coming off of it.. One for the right side of the pool with two jets and maindrain and the left side runs one jet, skimmer. We knew when we purchased the pool that the liner had just been replaced the pervious year and all the pumps/filers stuff was about 7 years old. We also knew that the pool had a natural spring under it and we would need to pump the water from under the liner every few days (therefore we purchased another pump to hook up to a plumbing line that was purposely put in by the installers that runs under the pool. We have that pump in place to ONLY pump the ground water.

Once we moved in to the home.. There was a bucket of chlorine tablets that the pool guy was adding in the skimmer bucket. We continued to keep at least one tab in the skimmer (note it's winter time at this point and the water is very cold) Well we noticed that the tablets were not dissolving and the skimmer was not sucking water in. My husband figured out that we had a clog in the pipe that ran from the skimmer to the pump. We worked and worked to get the junk out of it... we were successful!! It was a mass of acorns that the pool guy prob just sucked up with the vacuum (STUPID). Well by this time is was EARLY spring here water was still cold but we live in Georgia and have lots of trees in our yard so it constantly rains (leaves, tree blooms, pollen, more tree blooms) and the water was getting really dirty so we knew we HAD to fix the skimmer problem and have the water tested. Once the skimmer problem was fixed we were told by our local pool store that we did not have any chlorine in the water (note the tabs were not dissolving) so I knew this was going to be an issue. Well we purchased two bags of powder shock and before our eyes our pool turned green. IT WAS CRAZY!!! So I marched back up to the pool store and they tested the water again said all of our levels were good and to wait it out. We did. Let the pool run 24/7 for 5 days with a high shock level. We had so much cloudiness in our water we couldn't see the bottom of the shallow end. On day 7 the pool guy told me to use a granulated shock that you mix with water and add it to my skimmer. I also started to notice a sand like substance on the bottom of the pool.. Told him about that as well and he had me add Yellow Treat.. So at this point I had added 1/2 gallon of granuated shock and a whole bottle of yellow treat... The pool ran for another day and we didn't see any improvement and were advised to add the remaining amount of shock. Started to think something was wrong with my filter since I had all of these particles floating around... Called the pool store again and they had me add Phosfree saying that I must have Phosphates in my water... Added that... NOTHING.. Then I called them back PISSED. So they had there guy come out and he tried to add DE but the DE just shot out of my jets... So he advised us to change the sand in our fliter and if we could to floc the pool once it was complete.. We didn't buy a floc just turned the darn pool off for 3 days and let it all settle (note hubby waiting on backordered sand at pool store).. It seem to work. We vacuumed to waste and would refill and again...It seemed to get the water clear but cloudy.We then changed the sand and kept water levels good for about a month. Then it warmed up and I wasn't testing like I should have and I had a thick film of yellow pollen on the top of my pool..(note I still ran the filter 8 hours a day) I tested and my chlorine was at 0.. CRAP! Added two big bottles of bleach and BOOM.. green again. I've been shocking the heck out of it... Keeping it above 15ppm but the water is green and I have sand like stuff on the bottom. When I brush I have a brown cloud.


I kept thinking I had metals in the water because I had added the some of the spring water (STUPID) but we were new to owning it and just thought i was recycling. Once I added I could see gold flakes in the water. (note-- this was before all of my issues). But I kept having it tested and NOTHING. Then people were telling me that I must have that hard to kill mustard algae because for the brown powder the brushes up on the bottom that looks like sand. My walls do not feel slimy.

I've asked the guy who took care of the pool while it was on the market if he used that soft swim he said no... I asked him if they used a metal squest he said no. But of course he tried to sell me one... But at this point I'm scared to take any advise :-(

I have been testing morning noon and night but only my chlorine and that's what I'm out of....


I hope I'm not leaving anything out here but it's a lot to write.

Thanks for your help.

[PoolDoc]

Ok, you've got a mess. (I think you may have worked that bit out already, without my help) :rolleyes:

Lessee. You've added Yellow Treat and PhosFree. You've put DE in via the skimmer and it shot back into the pool. And, there may be other stuff in there from last summer.

Also, you've got brown dust, intermittently green water and gold (??) flakes. Plus you've got a spring somewhere near that you can get water from?

Plus, you've got acorns, leaves, pollen and other bits of nature's bounty in your pool.

Eureka! I've got it -- you're trying to make hobo stew in forest colors?

Or, maybe not.

But . . . you can officially color me uncertain. I don't know what's happening. I've never known a liner pool to have algae without having a slimy feel to the liner. Of course, I've mostly worked with large concrete commercial pools, so maybe you can have algae without slime. But, adding chlorine to algae doesn't make it turn colors. I've never seen gold flakes in a pool.

There's another possibility: if you've added enough Yellow Treat (sodium bromide) you are going to create brown bromine gas when you add chlorine at lower pH. Possibly, it could look green against a blue liner. But brown dust usually either means dead algae or iron precipitating out of the water.

At least one thing seems clear. When you add DE to a properly functioning sand filter, it won't return to the pool. Let me suggest the following:

1. Buy 5 boxes or so of borax, and start adding it (slowly, 1 box at a time, thru the skimmer with the pump running -- do NOT choke the skimmer!) till you get the pH to 7.6 or above. (Some of the not-so-nice reactions that can occur when cleaning up a pool are nicer at higher pH levels.)

2. Vacuum and clean up all the leaves and large debris.

3. Have your filter serviced with new filter sand -- check the bags the service guy users; do NOT let him use unlabeled sand. (If it's labeled sandblast sand, report the sand particle size info HERE before he installs it. Only trust size info printed on the bag, or else from a mfg sheet correlating the bag label with sand particle size. "JC20" is a size you do NOT want.)

4. Meanwhile, keep your pH up above 7.5 and your chlorine up above 3 ppm.

Report back once the filter's fixed, or if anything strange happens before then. If you maintain chlorine and pH, and do NOT add anything else*, there's a fair chance your pool will be on its way to recovery by then. If not, we'll start there.

PoolDoc

* You will need to add a lot of P.O.P. -- Pool Owner Patience! If you get impatient, and add more pool store goo, you'll almost certainly make things worse.

[AndreaA]

Well. I guess I did leave out that he changed the sand during our floc process (which we never added floc we just let the dust settle for 3 days). The sand changing was in the first round of green mess about a month ago.

Our current PH is at 7.8 but we have high chlorine level of 16.5. I'm hoping and praying that I have just enough drops to check it in the morning (trying to see if I can maintain it overnight).

The natural spring is under the pool. We just pump the water every few days to keep the liner from bubbling. When I pumped the water from under the liner during the winter the water was completely clear and when we were doing all the vacuuming and wasting from all the junk the water level would drop. I only "once" added the spring water back into the pool.. Maybe 10-20 gallons when I realized I had sparkles in the spring water.. Once I noticed that I completely stopped adding the spring water.. But right after that is when we added shock and the pool turned green.

I do know that I have some staining on our steps and latter that is orange.. Not sure if that's a metal or just typical for a pool but this brown dust looks like sand on the bottom of the pool and collects really bad in the shallow end... But when I brush (not the sand stuff on the bottom) I have brown clouds.

Does this sound like mustard algae?

I am making some form of yucky stew here.. And these trees are not giving us a break.. We have 4-5 different kinds and they all shed on different days and seasons therefore I have constant crap in the pool :-(

[madwil]

There's lots of iron pyrite (fools gold) in Georgia, and lots of clay (I believe high in Iron content). The orange staining is possibly due to clay. I'm not the expert, but it sounds like somewhere that ground water is contaminating the pool- explains the orange stain (from the clay) and the gold flakes (iron pyrite). Is there anyway rain is washing into the pool? Or any way that your "spring" is more than a spring ( like, flooding around your filter/pump, so spring water is getting into the system there)?

[AndreaA]

I don't think that I have rain water flowing into the pool and/or spring water entering by accident. I did however add the spring water a few months back... One time!

I could see how I might have a metal problem but the brown dust makes me think I have mustard algae.

I did have enough drops to test last night and this morning. It was 16.5 last night and 15.5 this morning. Is that a significant drop??

PoolDoc and Watermom-- could you have a metal person look at this thread and let me know if this is a metal problem too?

Thanks so much for all of your help!

[AndreaA]

This is what my pool looked like this morning... http://www.flickr.com/photos/29501372@N06/

Let me know if that works

http://www.flickr.com/photos/29501372@N06/

[AndreaA]

Great and thanks again for helping me out.

I have another strange thing... Let me explain a little and I'll post a pic or two of my issue.

So I have the natural spring under my pool therefore I have three drains that are draining water to a creek that runs through my back yard. Drain one is just ground water and is a french drain under the pool, drain two is for my backwash/waste (the first two were installed by pool constructors), and drain three was put in by my husband to flow the water from the pump (natural spring) water from under the liner to the creek.

This morning when i walked down to the creek I noticed that drain two (backwash/waste) the water in the creek right at that point was completely orange with yucky fluffy stuff. The thing that makes it strange is I just weed whipped that whole creek sunday afternoon and the water was completely creek like "no orange" and since sunday we have vacuumed to waste twice.

So I googled the orange fluff and it looks like an iron reaction to chlorine.. My question is.. is it iron that's already in the creek reacting to my chlorine or iron that's in my pool mixed with my chlorine and then added to the creek water? Or is it even iron?

[AndreaA]

ok. posted photo of the orange goo on the same link as above.

[Watermom]

Wow. That is some yucky-looking orange stuff. Congrats on being the Pool Forum's first weird case of the year!

[AndreaA]

Any advise on what I should continue to do for the meantime?

[PoolDoc]

Looks like iron, alright. You can take a sample from the creek, add a bit of bleach, and see if you get similar fluff to test and see if the creek is iron filled.

But, I don't see why it matters, as long as you don't fill the pool from the creek.

The brown dust in the other picture just looks like dead algae.

PoolDoc

[AndreaA]

If it's algae then why is it not clearing? I've maintained at least 15ppm "no less" for more than 10 days. My filter has been running 24/7 and I've brushed and vacuumed to waste every single day :-(

Do you think it's mustard? Could I have both algae and Iron in the water? I'm seriously ready to throw in the towel. I don't know how to keep this water clear every time I shock with bleach my water turns green. I'm having a pool party on May 7th and feel like it's not going to be clear by then and my kids are driving me crazy to swim.. I'm about ready to hire someone to fix it (sorry I'm venting)...

Tears :-(

[AndreaA]

I have had the water tested many times for metals.. Including today just to be sure.. It all comes back at 0. I've been to two different stores to have it tested and they all come back as negative. I don't know what to think.. No one knows what is wrong with my pool. Everyone says its algae.. I treat for algae and it's still green. I let the filter runs for weeks NON STOP and it's still green. I'm seriously at a loss... The pool store gave me a floc today to put in the filter b/c I went up there raising heck... They took care of this pool for almost a year.. They gave me a written letter when we purchased this house that this pool was in good working order. The guy who was doing the cleaning vacuumed HUGE acorns to waste--which caused a HUGE clog and my skimmer would no longer work.. We had to fix that. Then they had me dump shock in that turned my water green... SWAMP green.. Then they sold me Yellow Out and that made it worse.. Then they sold me Phosfree.. Which made it worse!!! Then I changed out the sand and here I am.. It's still darn green. I've tried the all bleach method and that's not working either... I can't even imagine the amount of bleach that I've dumped in this pool.. My garbage guy probably thinks we are a bunch of weirdos since half of my garbage can is full of empty bleach bottles twice a week... I seriously don't know who to trust or what to do. I've put so much money and crap in this pool in a matter of 4 months and I feel like I've been taken advantage b/c I'm a new pool owner. Everyone is saying something different.... ARGGGGG!!!!

[AndreaA]

Sorry about venting!

We are getting our source of water from the hose. Our house was built in 2003 so I don't think we have pipe problems. Also, I have several neighbors that have pools and are filling from the same county water and they don't have green pools and or iron problems. I've looked under the house and all I see is regular pipes (plastic white ones) so I'm not really sure. But the liner was replaced in this pool last year in Feb so I know the pool water is not that old and from all the vacuuming and wasting I've pretty much refilled this pool in the past 2 months.

I have not tested the creek water.. But like pooldoc said I'm not using that as a source of water to fill. But very interesting to know that I have such high iron content around my house. I did check the creek today and the part that was orange is completely normal now-- STRANGE. I guess I just had SO MUCH chlorine in the waste water that I had a major reaction with the iron in the creek. I did try and test the spring water from under the pool by adding chlorine to the test water.. I didn't get any orange/brown/green from it.

I don't have any chlorine test stuff left. I've order a refill but it hasn't made it here yet. So I'm not sure about what I'm losing if any at night.

Here are my latest results.. I haven't added chlorine since I run out of testing stuff. My test 3 days ago read 15.5 so these are my numbers (from pool store) as of 5pm today.


FC: 10.4
TC: 10.4
CC: 0.0
Alkalinity: 71
PH: 7.9
Calcium Hardness: 51
CYA: 12
Copper: 0
Iron: 0
Total Dissolved Solids: 1
Saturation Index: -0.42

[PoolDoc]

-- semi closed thread! No posts here but andrea's and mine, please!! --

Hi Andrea;

I understand your frustration, but you are going to have to be patient. I mean that: if you are not patient you WILL make your problem worse! This is a common issue; you are not alone. I've written long pieces before on the secret pool owner miracle additive: P.O.P., or Pool Owner Patience; I won't reproduce them here.

Part of our (my) problem is I can't tell what's going on, because you have done, and are doing so much. Back off, slow down, and STAY AWAY FROM THAT STORE! You've got metals, possible algae, and a potpourri of chemicals in your pool, and God only knows what that combination will do. Again, I mean precisely that: there is no one on earth who understands and predict how that mixture will behave.

And without divine revelation, I have no good idea about what, of all the things you've added, is STILL in your pool. What I do know is that CHLORINE, TIME, and SUNLIGHT will remove many of those things.

You've GOT to stop going to that store. Not only are they selling you stuff you shouldn't use, I can look at your test numbers, and tell that the test results are bogus. 10 years ago, those numbers could only have come from a BioLab "Alex" system. Now, there are probably other copy-cat systems that sell chemicals by delivering bogus test results. The bottom line is, I not only have no idea what's in your pool; I don't know what the chemical conditions in your pool are, either.

You need to remind yourself of this every day: "The longer my pool is screwed up, and the more frantic I get, the more money my pool store makes." Whether they know it or not (not all do) , pool stores DEPEND on stringing you along for their financial well being.

You've GOT to back off, and work this through, one bit at a time. BUT, keep your chlorine high.

If your liner is slippery, you may have algae. If it's not, you probably don't . So I have 6 questions:

1. Is your liner slippery, or not?
2. Is your pool clear, or not?
3. Are there orange or brown stains on your steps, and inside your skimmer, or not?
4. Is brown dust still dropping to your pool's bottom?
5. Have you ordered a Taylor K2006 (links in my sig) and if so, when will it arrive?
6. If you fill the pool with same water that is in your bathroom, tell me what color the INSIDE of your toilet tank is. (Brown, orange, dark brown, light tan, etc.)

Meanwhile,

Keep filtering 24/7
Brush your pool every 2 - 3 days; vacuum as needed.
Purchase a cheap OTO testkit (Walmart!)
Add 4 gallons of chlorine every night -- unless OTO shows dark orange.
Let me know when your K2006 arrives.
Do NOT do anything else, except clean your filter, but ONLY if it needs it.


There is one more thing. If you can buy, or beg, a small amount of DE (diatomaceous earth) filter powder, you can dump some into the skimmer, and then watch the returns. If it shoots back into the pool -- your filter is messed up. You might have been sold the wrong sand; your sand might be gone, or several other things. But, a filter than won't catch DE, won't catch algae or iron dust, either. Home Depot has it online for $20 for 25#, but they may have a smaller container locally. Alternatively, if it's algae dust, a broken filter will let a stream of dust BACK into the pool if you vacuum up a pipe of dead algae dust.

PoolDoc

PS. There are several possible reasons for clear green pool water that I know of, and that could apply to you. One involves iron in an odd condition, but it still comes back to the fact that I don't know what's in your pool, whether your filter is working correctly, or what your actual pool test results are.

[AndreaA]

PoolDoc,

Thanks for responding. This is Andrea's husband, Tim. She's finally handed the reigns over to me and I can assure you I have the patience your looking for. I don't think there's as much chemicals in our pools as you've been led to believe, but we'll walk through it one step at a time to be sure. Honestly, we've been using only bleach for at least two months now. About two month ago after reading one of your POP pieces, we shocked with only bleach with chlorine levels over 15ppm for 10-14 days brushing every other day at least. While the pool was clean, the water was still greenish-brown and cloudy. I began to question the filter. I had a pool maintenance guy out who said it looked as if anything that may have been in the pool was dead but the filter was not filtering. He added some DE to the skimmer but it shot out the jet, and he recommended we replace our filter sand (no additional chemicals added). I purchased 125 lbs of good pool filter sand from a local/accredited pool store and replaced the sand in the filter myself. I made sure to clean and inspect the fingers in the bottom of the filter and all checked out good. Refilled with sand and ran the filter for days with no real change to water color/cloudiness. I decided to turn off the pump as I had seen once before that dirt/debris sank to the bottom of the pool when the pump was not running. Sure enough, after 4-5 days everything that was in the water settled out. I was able to vacuum to waste and for a few days I had a clean pool. Unfortunately days later, in late March, the pine trees rained down the pollen as they do every year and the top of our pool was covered with yellow dust. To boot early spring sprigs (for lack of a better term) began falling from nearby tees and again we had a pool that was cloudy/green by time the pollen and tree debris stopped raining down. For the life of me, I'm not sure how previous owners dared to keep this pool uncovered during the winter months. There is so much debris that falls from nearby trees, my wife and I have skimmed or vacuumed with a leaf bag vacuum attached to the hose almost every day since November. Now on to your questions:

1. Is your liner slippery, or not?
No, I don't feel it's slippery.
2. Is your pool clear, or not?
I would say the pool is clean but the water is not clear. I can see the bottom of the deep end which is about 8' and the shallow end looks pretty clean. The water has a green color, but as I'm a new pool owner, I can't determine if the water is cloudy and the blue liner makes the water look green or if the water is actually green. When I take a pool sample using a small pitcher, the water looks clear in the bottle, not green.
3. Are there orange or brown stains on your steps, and inside your skimmer, or not?
No, there are not distinct brown or orange stains on the step or inside the skimmer. I would say they are a dingy in color, but not sure if that's from age (pool is 7 yrs old) or from a metal in the water. I think it's important to note we live in GA so even the toilets will get a pink/orange ring if not cleaned regularly. We do have other neighbors with pools though and they don't have green water nor do they treat for any metals from their tap water.
4. Is brown dust still dropping to your pools bottom?
I would say the bulk of remaining dust/dirt/organic material or metals are contained in the cloudy water.
5. Have you ordered a Taylor K2006 (links in my sig) and if so, when will it arrive.
Yes, we ordered the Taylor K2006 and have been testing for more than two months. We've recorded many of our tests so I can send them to you. We recently ran out of the Chlorine test solution, but have ordered more which should be here very soon.
6. If you fill the pool with same water that is in your bathroom, tell me what color the INSIDE of your toilet tank is. (Brown, orange, dark brown, light tan, etc.).
Yes we fill our house water. The tank is orange/brown. I can send a picture if it will help.

I have been interested in adding a floc, so I did add 5 oz. directly to the filter tonight. I want to say my filter pressure has kept me guessing as well. With only the skipper open and all other valves closed, my pressure is at 10 PSI. When I open the main drain at the bottom of the pool, it raises to about 12 PSI, but when I open the outlet to far side of the pool, PSI drops to 1-2 PSI. To add the floc, I used mainly the skimmer, but opened the main drain and outlet valves only half way keeping filter pressure at 5 PSI. The pump has now been running for 6 hours with no pressure increase. I'm beginning to wonder if my sand filter is actually catching anything. Please read over and provide your thoughts.

Thanks again,

Tim

[AndreaA]

I failed to mention in my previous reply that we have again been using only bleach with Chlorine over 15 ppm for the last two weeks (min 14 days while brushing daily). You can probably go back through my wife's thread to see how that transpired, but for the last couple of days the free chlorine wasn't dropping overnight. As I mentioned we are now out of test solution so we have purchased more. Chlorine should still be over 15 ppm as I added 3 gallons of bleach last night after we ran out of test solution. Tonight is the first time I've added floc.

[PoolDoc]

Hi Tim;

If the chlorine is no longer dropping overnight, you've made real progress.

+ The fact that the pool walls are not slippery rules out algae, for the most part. You might have some black algae (not common on liner pools) or some isolated spots of mustard algae, but you don't have any significant growth.

+ If the pool is cloudy, your color will not be right. I don't understand all that I've seen over the years, with pool color. But I've gotten to the point of telling local customers not to worry about color, till the pool is clear. Now, I don't mean that slime green (from algae) or dark orange (from iron) is OK -- just that the color won't be 'right' till the water is clear.

+ Your local debris may well be a big part of the problem. I just created a YouTube account for the PoolForum, and uploaded a video my son and I made (for a Scout project) of loblolly pollen. The quantity of pollen from a single branch is amazing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kppgWFdTEMw

+ At this point, I agree that your filter is suspect. I would encourage you to go ahead and get some DE powder. If your filter is working, it will help remove fine debris; if it's not working . . . it will make that clear. Dump about a quart of powder into the skimmer -- with the pump running! -- and then watch the returns. If you don't see anything, that's good. But, the DE will cause the filter to stop up sooner (pressure will go up), also good, but can be a nuisance.

+ If the inside of your toilet tank is orange / brown, you DO have iron in your fill water. That will cause steps and plastic bits to get dingy over time.

Other than that, hang in there. It actually does sound like you are making progress. But don't put any more floc in, please. If your filter is working, you don't need it. And if it's not working, it's just one more thing that has to be removed later.

Ben

[AndreaA]

Just wanted to give you an update on our pool. This is Andrea and Tim has been meaning to drop by and post the update. Well-- right after this all came to a head... I decided to throw in the towel with the filter and just go buy a new one. Right before we purchased the new one "Tim" figured out that the cap on the sand filter was put on incorrectly back in FEB before sand was changed and the pool was just re-circulating the water and had been for 3 months. I have to say once fixed our pool was cleared in a matter of hours. I know this is all a crazy story but true... We did all of this work and knew nothing about our sand filter to know that the cap on the top was put on incorrectly buy the one and only hubby. I just wanted to let you know what happened and apologize for all the headache I caused. I had NO clue that the filter was not working properly and had not clue that my husband could of put the cap on wrong so I just assumed that all the stuff everyone was saying was CRAP and not working. LOL. I seriously was ready to fill in the pool with dirt-- but here we are with a clear pool and the kids/family and friends are all enjoying it all too much! We are still using the BBB method and it's perfect.. Again I wanted to thank you all for all of your help and most of all your wonderful pool methods. I'm still new at this but I've learned so much! Thank you PoolDoc and again I'm sorry :-(