Totally Frustrated!!!!!

[kecsmom]

I have been battling my pool for three weeks or maybe longer. i have used lots of bleach, but it remains cloudy. the readings at the pool store today were: FC 3.9; TC 4.4;CC 0.4;ph 7.9;hardness 10 ppm ;alkalinity 139;cya 70; phosphate 1000. the pool store advised me to (1)add 5lbs of ph plus over pool and wait 2 hrs;(2) broadcast 10 lbs of alum over pool, let pool run for 3-4 hours and then shut pool for 24-36 hours(3) vaccum and refill pool to replace water lost by vacumming. i think the ph is already slightly high so i can't see adding ph plus. also i haven't read any posts on this forum regarding aluminum sulfate. i have added bleach all last week,and stll had a cloudy poolthough it did kill some of the algae. it has been very humid in northeast texas, and also raining. i am very discouraged. thanks ,jennifer (my pool is 40k vinyl inground with a sand filter.)

[JohnT]

the readings at the pool store today were: FC 3.9; TC 4.4;CC 0.4;ph 7.9

You won't get anywhere letting your chlorine get that low or relying on the pool store for testing. The water will have to be tested several times a day, with chlorine added as required. You also need to push your pH down with muriatic acid.

[mbar]

John T is right, you need to get your chlorine level to 20ppms consistantly - lower your ph to 7.2 and bleach, bleach, bleach. By lowering the ph, your chlorine will be more effective. Do not test ph after you have brought the chorine up to 20, because high chlorine will make the ph test inaccurate. If you test 3x a day and bring your chlorine back to 20 ppms each time, I promise you will have a clean clear pool in a couple of days:) Consistancy is the main ingredient - follow the best guess chart:


Use the info in this chart to help you figure out what levels of chlorine you need to maintain in your pool based on the amount of CYA (cyanuric acid, also called stabilizer) that you have in your pool. (FC = free chlorine)

Stabilizer . . . . . . Min. FC . . . . Max FC . . . 'Shock' FC
=> 0 ppm . . . . . . . 1 ppm . . . . . 3 ppm . . . . 10 ppm
=> 10 - 20 ppm . . . . 2 ppm . . . . . 5 ppm . . . . 12 ppm
=> 30 - 50 ppm . . . . 3 ppm . . . . . 6 ppm . . . . 15 ppm
=> 60 - 90 ppm . . . . 5 ppm . . . . . 10 ppm . . .. 20 ppm
=> 100 - 200 ppm . . . 8 ppm . . . . . 15 ppm . . .. 25 ppm

Don't listen to the pool store, you will be fighting the pool for a couple of more weeks. I know it is hard to believe, but using the bleach really does work.:) Let us know how you do, and if you have any other questions

[gwrace1]

There are several actions you can take to minimize pool maintenance.
We have a 26000 gallon round above ground system and use the following:

Salt Water Chlorination system - Had our system for two years and the pool is always sparkling clear. I do add Muriactic acid about twice a month to keep PH in check. At the beginning of the year I had to add some additional salt and stabilizer this year as we had so much rain during the spring it overflowed the pool and though off the chemical balance.

Pool Skimmer - Looks like a little miniature toilet bowl. Works off your pool return line. It skims the top of the water before it goes into the skimmer basket. Makes a major reduction in the junk your pump and filter have to deal with.

We purchased one of the the larger (SD 80) sand filter systems but instead of sand are using Zeolite. We've had to backwash the Zeolite 4 time in two years and the pool still looks sparkling clean.

We use a combination of a Pool Rover and Pool Buster to pick up the debris that the skimmer misses. The Pool Rover takes about 2 hours to complete the job but works great.

Pool maintenance is not hard if you try to automate where you can and spend about 5-10 minutes per day making sure nothing has changed. When I get home I usually start up the Pool Rover, check the display on the Aquarite for any messages and do a quick chemical test.

Chemical adjustments and changes require patience but are simple to learn. If I add or change anything I wait at least 2 days for measuring results. If the water is cloudy it's because you have sediment floating around in it. Start with the filter system and make sure it is doing what it's supposed to. If that's not working right then chemical balancing and treatments will have a hard time trying to clean up your water.

[Sprocket]

Good stuff all said .

I might add this

cya 70 <-- bingo :eek: do a search on my name Sprocket and see my problems and how I solved them using this bb's board good advice .

Untill I got my CYA down it was very hard to keep the green away , now mine is 30 it's a breeze again . High CYA = having to have high FC readings in your pool to do the same cleaning action that lower FC does .

From what I have learned to high CYA just defeats the cleaning action of chlorine . While having no CYA lets your pool chlorine disapper in sunlight in just a few hours time .

The way I did my fix was to get the water lvl down and add new water without CYA in it ( well water ) and to use bleach to shock till CC went to 0 and for everyday use I keep FC to 3 - 6 .

I was using pucks and powder shock and both of those have CYA in them , causeing my CYA readings to go to high and then the green appeared .

Plus untill you fork over the coin to get you a really good test kit , your gonna be at the pool stores mercy IMO . That's a MUST as JohnT pointed out .

I am using about a quart a day of Ultra beach atm and it's so nice to jump in and not see GREEN on my sand dimples anymore .

Read , learn and follow advice , way cheaper to do it the right way then to "think" your saving money any other way IMO .

I "shocked" my pool just once this year when I opened it up ( 5-27-07 )after being covered for 9 months , using 6 3/4 gals of Ultra Beach from Save a Lot store at 1.18 USD a jug :)

I did spend 67 bucks on a Good Test Kit though .

I learned , and now I go to pool store and laugh when I leave cause they didn't sell me but what I wanted to buy :) Last trip they told me that the more CYA in my water the better , how nice of her to tell me wrong info just to sell more of their product .

enough said .

=====
gwrace1 , I want a Pool Rover next time I buy for my pool , I been reading nothing but good reports like yours on using them in AG pools :)

I read about that skimmer also , good item , but I have a light on my return and don't think that will attach , at least from the pics I have seen of it online .

[heymom1]

I have a mild case of mustard algae right now. I think I understand some of the chemistry behind the BBB method - the pucks have stabilizer which can get too high, but you need some stabilizer or you can't keep your chlorine level high enough to kill the bugs.

If you use household bleach instead of pucks, since it contains no stabilizer, how do you keep your chlorine levels steady? Do you add a gallon or two every single night? What happens if you leave town?

I don't have a reading on my pool levels yet - son is out doing a test now - but we've added some shock to start killing the algae.

Well, son just came in and said the CYA is 100. 29K pool. Is that high?

[mbar]

Yes, cya of 100 is high. It doesn't matter how many gallons the pool is. The level of cya acts the same in all pools. It is ok to have a cya of 100, but then you need to keep a minimum of 8ppms of chlorine, and your shock level would be 25ppms.

[heymom1]

Thank you for your answer. The algae is not visible this morning, so I guess the shock level is high enough. I will test all the levels myself today, and post the results. And keep adding bleach if I need more chl.

How do you deal with vacations if you are using just bleach added every night?

[aylad]

Thank you for your answer. The algae is not visible this morning, so I guess the shock level is high enough. I will test all the levels myself today, and post the results. And keep adding bleach if I need more chl.

How do you deal with vacations if you are using just bleach added every night?

If you have a neighbor or nearby teenager that you can trust to pour a gallon in every couple of days or so, that's really the best way to deal with vacations. My down the street neighbor comes to my house daily to deal with my animals, anyway, so it's not a problem for her.

In the absence of someone reliable to stop by to put bleach in, you could shock it really well before you leave (if you're only going to be gone for a week and have a CYA of 100, then it would probably take a week for your chlorine levels to come back down. Or you can buy a floater and put cal-hypo pucks in it for a slow constant chlorine feed.

Janet

[heymom1]

Janet, thanks for the response. We don't have any nearby teenagers, and we're taking our with us, so the option to pour bleach in is out. We'll be gone 10 days total. My FIL can come by and check on the pool, but he can't come every night. We have the inline feeder anyway, so I can just keep that going until we get back from our trip. Why can't they make the pucks with less stabilizer anyway? Well, maybe it just builds up no matter what...

I can leave the chlorine very high - the CYA level today is more like 90, so I don't think we will have a lack of chlorine. The chl level today was way over 5, but the kids went in for a while just now. My kit doesn't test free and combined, just total. I need to get one of Ben's kits - is he selling them now?

Thanks again for the help. This forum is invaluable.

[aylad]

Unfortunately, Ben doesn't seem to be in the kit business just now--it's been awhile since he's paid any attention to the forum and in fact has a very long list of people who have already bought kits and are waiting for them to be delivered. My suggestion is the Taylor K-2006, which is almost the same kit, and can be found at most pool stores or online.

In answer to your other question about vacation, if your FIL can come by and check on the pool say every 2-3 days, can he pour in a gallon of bleach? If you shock it before you leave with a CYA of 90 and he comes over, say, twice to add more bleach, then you should be fine. An alternative would be to get a new floater and cal-hypo tabs. THey don't add stabilizer. The newest ones really are not great because they dissolve too quickly and get kind of mushy, but they might do in a pinch.

I think personally I'd just shock it to the upper end of the recommended chlorine range, ask FIL to come by in about 4-5 days and pour in 2 gallons of bleach, and then take my chances. Beats worrying about it the whole time you're gone!

Janet

[Sprocket]

I need to get one of Ben's kits - is he selling them now?

I have a Taylor test kit , works good and easy to use . You
can buy refills from Taylor themselfs online , it's seems to
be the cheapest spot .

I bought my kit online , just did a yahoo search and then hunted for the
best price "with" shipping .
====
When you get your CYA down , it will stay steady also till you drain and refill your pool . Or you drain alot because of rain .

When mine droped I just added Cond. to the pool again , 1.5 quarts and then wait a week to retest . It's fine again , taking about a 1 quart of Ultra bleach a day .

===

how do you keep your chlorine levels steady?

I check once every other day and add a jug (3 quarts ) of Ultra
bleach when the FC drops below 4 . But my CYA is only 30 , and yours
is 90 -100 I guess . Your gonna have to have your FC much higher readings
to kill the "bugs" as u stated .

Or you can check each day and add a quart at a time .
===

Every time you use a tab or a powder shock product your adding more CYA to your pool and making it so you have to have more FC to kill the "bugs" .

I have 40 plus lbs of tabs and 4 bags of "shock" left that I don't use unless my CYA drops below 30 .

===

Did you do that search ? I used that alot , search for answers from other peoples problems . We mostly have the same ones over and over .

===

Yes Vac :( I am dreading it . Last year my "friend" helped me by adding cond. to my pool as he said "it helped my clorine to work better" :(

I am hopeing on someone to come every other day and check FC and all bleach . So far my wife hasn't found that certain someone .

--

Get that test kit asap . Lower your cya lvls . Don't use anything with CYA in it till you want to raise that reading . Your gonna be alot happer . Just cause you can't see green "yet" doesn't mean it's killed . Trust me .

[heymom1]

Thanks, Sprocket - that answers a lot of questions. I won't hold my breath waiting for one of Ben's kits then.

I can't do the BBB method until all the trips are over - there is no way anyone will do that for me and even hubby is skeptical of the bleach-only method. So the CYA will just stay up there until I can get back and do a drain, or if we keep getting rain. The pucks are feeding and the pump is running 24/7. I'm a bad forum member right now!

Next year we are planning to go to Europe. Sigh....

[Sprocket]

Nice u read up on my troubles and fixes <S> .

It does work , I am living proof of it . I don't buy poly anymore either :) All I have to do so far this year is bleach , about 1.5 quarts of conditioner because when I refilled the pool alot ran out of the waste drain on the filter
:( . That's it , my alky is a bit high but I have a rubber liner and they say that's ok for me .

So much cheaper than last year and no headaches .

I get so mad at the store that sold me the pool . They never bothered to show me the "correct" way even after I asked . Just kept selling me stuff that would help them sell more product in the long run .