Cloudy 24 feet above ground pool

[etorres]

I have a 24 feet, 52 inches above ground round pool, that I tried to open in late April of this year. To this date I have yet to get it clear.

It is at a cloudy stage and it's been like that since we cleaned it and turned the pool pump on. My local pool store has sold me everything they can possibly sell me. I bought it all and tried it and nothing worked. After spending several hundreds of dollars, I decided to dump them and started purchasing the products from Walmart.

I have floced it, I algaecide it, I changed the filter cartridge, I shocked it so many times that I lost count, I poured clarifier, after clarifier, I poured several bottles of Pool First Aid. I have done it all. I even have the pump running 24/7 for almost on month. I have a 75sq filter and 1 1/2 horse pump, both work well. The chlorine does not stay in and I can't get it clear. I tried calling several pool services in my area but they don't service above ground pools. I have yet to find one that does.

I toyed with the idea of draining it and starting all over, but I am afraid to do so, as most people have recommended not to. After reading your website I think I have White Water Mold. When I open the cartridge filter to clean it on a daily basis. I see little white particles floating in the cartridge container. Otherwise not visible in the pool itself. When I remove the cartridge to clean it has a little greenish, gray on it but hoses of easily.

My question is how many gallons of chlorine or bleach will I need for my 24 foot, 52 inches above ground round pool to kill this mold and clear my pool?

I appreciate any help with this, as I am at my ends wit's.

Anybody have any suggestions for me?

[PoolDoc]

Well, I've got questions, before I have suggestions.

Here's the problem: at this point, you've got such a witch's brew of pool goo in there, that any clean up process is unpredictable. It might take a week; it might take a month.

The alternative is, to make a plan based on your pool gear and fill water, prepare by getting the test kit and chemicals you need, and then draining and refilling . . . but NOT till you are READY to carry out your plan.

Frankly, if you want be be sure of swimming before September, draining and refilling is much more of a sure thing.

Regardless, I can tell you that what I'd want you to do is:
1. Get a good test kit, learn to use it, and then test your fill water.
2. Complete the pool chart, with the details of your pool info.
3. Get a NEW Unicel cartridge for your filter -- if both cartridges are actually good, then you'll have an optimum situation for filter cleaning. If your current cartridge is toast (as I suspect), you'll have at least one good cartridge.
4. Get some dichlor for start up, to add both chlorine and stabilizer.
5. Get whatever else is needed, based on your fill water characteristics.

The links you need to get started are below; meanwhile, think about whether you want save your water, but risk a 3 - 4 week clean up period, or whether you want to cut your losses, and start over, minus the witch's brew!

Best wishes,

Ben

================================================


+ It's much easier to answer your questions, when we have the details about your pool in one place. We often 'waste' the first few posts back and forth collecting information. So, please complete our new Pool Chart form -- it takes about 30 seconds, but will save much more than that.
Pool Chart Entry Form (http://goo.gl/cNPUO)

+ Get a cheap OTO (yellow drops) / phenol test kit, or if available at YOUR Walmart (check availability (http://www.walmart.com/ip/HTH-6-Way-Test-Kit/17043668)), get the HTH 6-way DROPS test kit, which is compatible with the Taylor K2006. Test the pool as soon and you can, and post the results. If you get the 6-way kit, ALSO test the water you FILL the pool with, especially if it's a well, and post THOSE results as well. (The HTH is the best available kit you're likely to find locally, but it's not the K-2006. It can only provide rough measurements chlorine levels above 5 ppm, and it measures "TOTAL" hardness, rather than "CALCIUM" hardness, which is not ideal.)

+ Having a good test kit makes pool care easier for EVERYONE. A good test kit means a kit that can test chlorine from 0 - 25 ppm, pH, alkalinity, calcium hardness, and stabilizer with reasonable accuracy. Test strips (AKA 'guess-strips' ) do NOT meet this standard. Some pool store testing is accurate; most is not. The ONLY way you'll know whether your pool store is accurate or bogus, is by testing accurately your own self. On the other hand, pool store 'computer' dosing recommendations are NEVER trustworthy -- ignore them. They are designed to sell more chemicals than you need, and WILL cause many pool problems.

+ We recommend the Taylor K-2006 test kit, which meets the requirements above, for many reasons. The HTH 6-way drops kit is a great starter kit, and is compatible with the K2006 (it's made by Taylor). There are a few alternatives; for example Lamotte makes an FAS-DPD kit that's OK -- but it costs 3x as much. But, we're not aware of any test that is better, and since we are all familiar with the K-2006 (and can help you with it) we recommend it exclusively ( Test kit info page (http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?16551) )

One caution for the 2012 season: Amazon does not stock the kits directly. So when buying at Amazon, Amato is our current preferred seller. However, they often don't list enough stock to last the whole day, so try order mid-morning. You should expect a delivered cost under $60 for the K2006A and under $95 for the K2006C. If you can't find that, wait a day.

+ Here are links to the kits we recommend (you can check local availability on the HTH kit, using the Walmart link):

HTH 6-Way Test Kit (http://www.walmart.com/ip/HTH-6-Way-Test-Kit/17043668) @ Walmart
Taylor K2006A (3/4 oz bottles) (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0002IXIIG/poolbooks) @ Amazon
Taylor K2006C (2 oz bottles) (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0002IXIJ0/poolbooks) @ Amazon



+ If you need stabilizer, and have access to a Sams Club, buy their 24 pack of 1# bags of dichlor shock (www.samsclub.com/sams/shop/product.jsp?productId=108822). Each bag will add about 7 ppm of chlorine, and about 6 ppm of stabilizer, per 10K gallons of water. Otherwise, order dichlor from Amazon:
Kem-Tek Dichlor 22 lbs (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0030BEHZA/poolbooks)We do NOT recommend buying dichlor locally, otherwise, at least until you are an EXPERT reader of chemical labels. The chlorinating pool chemicals sold at Walmart, Kmart, Costco, and most other local stores are diluted blends, sometimes with copper and other products with bad side-effects.

[etorres]

Thank you so much. I appreciate the advise. I did order another unicel. You are correct the other one is shot. I am finally getting a chlorine readings. It's low in the 3.0 and 5.0 but nonetheless I am getting a reading. I am raising the ph levels with Borax. It's still cloudy but a bit better. I can at least see some of the liner design on the side walls.

Should I continue adding chlorine or should I get the dichlor?

I really think I should start over but everyone tells me I shouldn't. Can it really cave in? I can't believe that the summer is almost over and we have not been able to enjoy the pool.

[PoolDoc]

If you are seeing improvement, and have gotten the better cartridges, I'd keep dosing with bleach at night . . . unless you'd rather drain and refill.

I just looked at your chart -- you've got well water. If your water is hard water with NO metals, draining and refilling might give be the fastest way, if your well can support that high rate of consumption. But if there's iron or manganese or something else in there . . . better not. Dealing with metals is a whole 'nother set of problems!

You REALLY need a good test kit. Do you have one on order?

And, if you can get some dichlor, do so. Bleach might be best right now, but you'll need the dichlor soon enough.

[etorres]

I am seeing improvements. I can almost see the brush when scrubbing the bottom. I can see about 3/4 of the way down. Before I could only see about a 1/4 of the way. If that much. It's still cloudy. I do have a kit. To make sure I was getting the readings I thought I was. I took a sample to my local pool store. He was surprise that I was getting better readings. Especially since I have not bought anything from him in the last month. According to him I only needed 1.8 lbs of PH. He tried to sell me on the Flocculant again but of course I didn't buy into it this time neither on the PH up. The Borax has helped a great deal. I didn't tell him what I was doing. I am buying the chlorine from them as I think it's a better buy. They claim that their chlorine is 10% sodium hypochlorite. I get 2.5 gallons for $5.98, the regular generic bleach at the grocery store is only 6% sodium hypochlorite and it cost $2.98 for 1.5 gallons.

Do the pool store really sell a 10% sodium hypochlorite?

At this point I think I am going to need another filter. The new filter is already looking pretty bad. It cleans off ok. But it's a little grayish/greenish when I remove it to clean it. I have been hosing it down and I even bought a cartridge bath for it. I let it soak in bleach for a few hours. When I hose it down, I get a better pressure on my return. Which brings me to my next question. Can I put another return on the pool for better circulation even though it's an above ground pool?

My previous pool was an in-ground pool, it had several of returns. We lived in south Florida, we had tons of pool service companies in South Florida. When we moved to Northern Florida we bought a house on 3/4 of an acre, the house is high up. We have a large deck out back so we thought an above ground pool would be ideal as we can connect the pool to the wooden deck. I never thought it would be such a challenge to get a pool service for it. I feel so discriminated against by the pool service companies. When I say I have an above ground pool. I get this silence on the phone or a look when I inquire in person. Then I get the "NO, SORRY". I don't see a difference a pool, is a pool and money, is money....That's another subject. Thank God for poolsutions.com and for your pool forum.

Yes, we are on a well. I don't know the readings/metals, etc. We have a whole house filter and salt water conditioner system. The whole house runs of it.

[PoolDoc]

Do the pool store really sell a 10% sodium hypochlorite?

They sell bleach that WAS 10% when it was bottled. Whether it IS 10% when it gets to your pool is unlikely in most places. But, in Florida a lot of stores have a bleach delivery 2 - 3x per week and fill reusable containers with fresh bleach. If that's what your store has . . . . it's probably a good deal.


I have been hosing it down and I even bought a cartridge bath for it. I let it soak in bleach for a few hours.

Read the cartridge cleaning guide . . . and then use TSP + bleach; not just bleach alone.


I feel so discriminated against by the pool service companies. When I say I have an above ground pool. I get this silence on the phone or a look when I inquire in person. Then I get the "NO, SORRY". I don't see a difference a pool, is a pool and money, is money....

You're being discriminated against, but I don't think that's a bad thing. Business has to go 2 ways: sellers can chose their customers and buyers can choose who they buy from. I don't fully understand how people got the idea that it was unfair for a seller to decide, "No, I don't want to sell to that market".

I do it here, all the time: I exclude Russians and Chinese because 99.9+% of the people who register from those places are hackers or spammers. If you've got a pool in Russia --you're out of luck. I block Russian IP space as fast as I find it! I can't afford to sift through 999 hackers to find one legit pool owner.

But, even here, I discriminate. I'm almost certain I blew off a guy this spring who was a spammer in Rats Mouth, Florida (Boca Raton) . . . but he lived there and had a pool there. I didn't care to spend any more time digging; once I discovered he'd done some spamming, I just blew him off.

And, it's perfectly reasonable for pool guys to blow off AG pool owners. YOU might be a good customer, but as a class AG pool owners are not. A service guy who tries to serve them will go broke in a summer, on any business model I'm familiar with. The reasons are too complex to explain here.

I did the same thing, with commercial service customers. I got LOTS of calls from hotels, motels and apartment complexes. But after a few experiences, I just made up excuses to get them off the phone: working for them was a seriously money-losing process. It can be done in Florida where there are strict, and strictly enforced pool codes. But not in Tennessee or Georgia, where many counties have no code, and even places they do inspect the pools only 1 or 2x per summer.

It makes sense, to someone who's never been in business for themselves, to tell businesses you have to serve ALL potential customers, no matter whether you can make money doing so or not. But, all small business people understand that doing so is to get on a fast train to a French style economy, with hardly any entrepreneurial business development. And, of course even then, the French discriminate ferociously against non-French.


Yes, we are on a well. I don't know the readings/metals, etc. We have a whole house filter and salt water conditioner system. The whole house runs of it.

Do you fill the pool with 'softened water'?

[etorres]

Yes we fill it with soft water. We never plumbed it directly to the well. We just haven't gotten around to it.

[PoolDoc]

If you used softened water, odds are calcium is not part of your problem. Of course, you won't know for certain till you can test.

[etorres]

The pool store guy said I needed to add some Calcium but he said not to worry about it until I cleared the pool.

I can finally see the bottom of the pool. It's still cloudy but I can see it. I can even see the liner. There was some dead algae at the bottom of the pool. The were some clusters of them, no dead leaves maybe one or two of them. I vacuumed to waste but as I vacuum it spreads through out the pool making it cloudy again.

Is there anything I can do or add to speed up the processes?

I clean the filter daily, I brush twice a day.

[PoolDoc]

The pool store guy said I needed to add some Calcium but he said not to worry about it until I cleared the pool.

He's right that you don't need it now: but you don't need it later, either.

OK, what can you do to speed it up.

1. Relax. You do not need to brush or clean your filter 2x per day!

2. Your cartridge is probably shot. If you will send me pictures of your filter, filter label and cartridge, I'll see if I can locate the correct Unicel replacement for you. Do NOT get a replacement from your pool store. Most retail replacements are Asian made and poorer quality. A new GOOD cartridge would likely fix your vacuuming problem.

I was going to make more suggestions, but they won't help much if your cartridge needs replacing. Cleaning 2x per day + dirt shooting through the cartridge is a VERY strong indicator that you need new!