Store chemicals vs. bleach

I've been on here for awhile now and the obvious concensus is that the store-bought chemicals are mostly no good for the pool (tabs, bagged shock, etc.) and that bleach is far better for regulating chlorine. Why exactly is this? For years before I found this forum I was using HTH dual action tabs and HTH bagged shock, along with their pH plus and alkalinity plus, and I never had problems. Why are these chemicals so bad, and what damage can they do (I understand they may contain "fillers" and metals and whatever, but why is this bad?) I'm not trying to start an arguement, just learn a thing or two, God knows the bleach worked for me when my pool was a swamp!

For me, its about the cost and the philosophy here of not putting anything in my pool that it doesn't need. Hard to do when you don't know what's in the latest greatest kit the pool store wants to sell you. It needs chlorine. The chlorine needs properly balanced water to work to it's best potential. Maintain it at the proper levels and you avoid problems.

They are not "bad" (well, the dual-acting HTH is--it adds copper as an algaecide). They are misused. Testing, testing, testing is the key to controlling and correcting their usage.

For example, if you have a new gunite pool, your water will need a steady flow of chlorine, a sound buildup of stabilizer, and additions of acid to off-set the alkaline nature of the concrete's curing. As such, Tri-Chlor tablets are ideal:
For every 10ppm of Free chlorine they add 6 ppm of CYA (stabilizer). They are also EXCEEDINGLY acidic, helping to counteract the curing process's pH-raising characteristic.

But if you have sufficient CYA already, and your pH is a bit to the low side (7.2-7.5), Tri-chlor tabs are exactly the WRONG form of chlorine.

Bleach, on the other hand is pH neutral and adds nothing to your water.

pH Up! Balance Pak 200 and other brands of pH raisers are simply very, VERY expensive repackaging of $.80/lb Arm&Hammer Washing Soda.
Total Alkaline Raisers (by any name) are simply very, VERY expensive repackaging of $.79/lb Arm&Hammer Baking Soda.
"Liquid Shock" at 6% concentration should not cost a single cent more than the same amount of generic ultra bleach--it's the same stuff.
"Liquid Shock" at 12.5% concentration should not cost more/gallon than 2 gallons of 6% generic ultra bleach.
Any algaecide with copper or an ammonia ingredient is a recipe for trouble.

Di - Chlor powder is similar to Tri-chlor tablets only not nearly as acidic.

Cal-Hypo powder adds calcium. If you have low calcium and a vinyl pool or need to add calcium to a concrete pool, the stuff is fine. But it can push your calcium level too high, enough to cause scaling.
There are some situations that PoolDoc knows where Cal-Hypo, applied correctly can clean up a major problem.

It's all about correct usage.

Carl

Interesting stuff, thanks for the info. Why is copper as an algaecide bad?

copper in concentration high enough to kill algae is also high enough to turn hair green and stain pools!