Cloudy Green well water pool-first time pool owner

Just filled my above ground 14ft x 42 inch pool 3 days ago (3500 gal). Water started out kinda rusty looking. After shocking, the water now has a green tint to it.Today my ph is 7.6 and chlorine at 3 ppm. I tried Vitamin C in the pill form, 1000mg about 150 pills-some in filter but most just thrown in the pool. Not much difference in color. I just put in 7 fl. oz,( what was left of a bottle a friend gave me) of hydro-flocc 10 minutes ago and notice some water clearing near the surface. I have been flushing my paper filter every 4 hours or so. I also put a sock over it and have flushed quite a bit of rust (iron, maybe copper?) out of it. I hope persistence pays off. Should i wait to put a clarifier in. Also will the filter take out the metal after the floc "clumps the metal" or should i vacuum? I dont like that the vacuum uses a garden hose hooked up to it-more metal. thanks for the site, and any info is appreciated. Keep up the good work!

Hi jeff,

I would not put anymore floc or clarifier in the pool--unless it's Polyquat 60, most of those are a combination of stuff and can create more problems than you already have. If your water is clear, no algae, holding chlorine overnight and just tinted due to the metals, you could either shock it again and filter out the metals, or you can add a metal sequestrant, which will keep the metals in suspension so they won't stain the pool (or people). However, chlorine breaks these down, so it's something you'll have to add on a fairly regular basis.

the Vitamin C is used to remove the stains after the liner has been stained--but you have to deal with the metals first. If your filter is working and taking the stuff out, which it sounds like it is, then let the filter do the work. If your vac uses additional water with metals in it, then you're pretty much going to be wasting your time removing the metal in the water but adding more during the process.


Welcome to the forum!!

Hi Jeff;

Dealing with iron in well water in Intex type pool is tough. Probably the easiest thing is simple to forget about them, run your filter, maintain your chlorine, and wear old swimsuits. The iron won't hurt you, or your kids.

If you do this, you will probably end up with some stains and some dingy looking swimsuits.

If you want the iron out, then it gets hard. An Intex does NOT have the sort of filter that makes it easy to remove the goo. Vitamin C is only helpful for taking stains off the liner, and putting the metal BACK in the water, but it's no good for dealing with metals already IN the water.

How hard do you want to work on this? If you want to try to get the iron out, it's much easier to answer your questions, when we know something about your pool. 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.

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By the way, I'm not seeing a 14' diameter pool on the Intex website; what make and model pool is this?

Intex metal frame 14x 42inch. The hydo flocc i put in has cleared the water up very nice, but the rusty 'clouds' are on the bottom of the pool. I have been running the filter steady and have been flushing out the filter often. I took the surface skimmer off the bracket and put it at the bottom of the pool. It worked great for the area that it could reach. I might rig up a longer plastic hose to reach more of the goo. When i have to add water to pool, is there something I can put over the hose to "trap" the metal, and stop it from entering the pool- like a t-shirt or some kind of filter? Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Sounds like the floc has down what it was supposed to do . . . settle precipitated metals to the bottom. Of course, as you are finding, the next problem is how to get them the settled stuff OUT.

Regarding the fill, a lot of people have used a bunch of nested long cotton athletic sox, or wrapped old towels, with some positive results. What ever you use will be badly stained when you are done.