Ready to Cover the Pool for the Winter...and it's still June :)

We've been studying the pool forum for suggestions on our problem. We have 24' round above ground pool in Ohio. Our pool was clear for a few weeks this summer after opening, and then it turned green. It's hard to believe it was an algae bloom since I am never without chlorine pucks in the skimmer, but maybe it was. We had to add water due to a drought in our area, and since we are on well water that is orange with Fe, perhaps the green color was really orange against the blue pool liner?

In any event, after studying the forum, we think our cyanuric acid was too high anyway (making the Cl ineffective?) - before we didn't realize high stabilizer was a bad thing, but now we know better. We drained the pool 3/4 and refilled. We are on that orange well water though, and so our pool is "green"...or maybe orange with a blue liner backdrop...still. We have a white ladder and the water just looks filled with suspended particles that are orange/green. The first few inches from the top are about all that is see-through.

We were using test strips and just pH/Cl drops. We have invested in a Taylor titration test kit recommended on your forum, via Amazon and are anxiously awaiting its arrival. Meanwhile, we are looking at an orange/green pool. Our stabilizer looks about 100 ppm now, or maybe less (color strips are near worthless). Our chlorine remains very high - at least 10 ppm (the highest on the scale). The pH looks around 7.2. We are running the pump on high 24/7, changing our filter every morning and night (we have two filters - we clean the one while the other is in use - we even soaked them in electric dishwasher soap as someone suggested on the forum, to be sure they were clean). But after three days, this seems like an exercise in futility. Our water temperature has been cold since it was mostly fresh well water (below 70 deg). But the past two days it has been above 70 degrees. (We are having 90 plus deg weather - the kind you REALLY want to be using the pool in. But we read a comment about how a dead body could be in that water and you wouldn't know it...and now everyone is squeemish about using the pool :) We want to drop the Cl level, but we're afraid to go too low with the 100 ppm cyanuric acid possibility, and risk an algae bloom.

I had some "First Aid" and some "Metal Free" which have worked beautifully in the past to clear the water (hard to believe we've had a pool for 5 years I know...just lucky I guess on keeping it clear this long). Neither of these have appeared to make any difference in the appearance of the water this time around.

Any suggestions while we wait for our Taylor test kit?

Hi, and welcome to the group!! There are literally hundreds of posts around the forum just like yours--so many that Pooldoc made a sticky exactly for folks with AB pools with well water. If you'll log out, go to the main forum page, then go to the second Sub-forum called "Pool chemistry for Intex-type pools", open that up, then click on the first sticky, called "before you fill your Intex-type pool with water" and read through that sticky, it will give you an idea of what you're dealing with. We'll be glad to be here to help with questions, but there are a few decisions you have to make first, that are outlined in the sticky.

Just let us know what you want to do, and we'll be happy to help!

Sorry your post & membership got lost in the crush; not sure if you still need help, but your membership has been upgraded. -ben

Thanks. Yes and No - we are still dealing with our problem.

We've lowered the water level three times on the pool to get the cyanuric acid down 55 ppm so far. Would like to take it down further, but summer is slipping by and the kids want to swim. We are completely switched to the grocery store chemicals now. We are simply super chlorinating to clear the pool, and running the pump on high 24/7. The color of the water has switched from green to brown to light green to now it is cloudy white and blue. So we are hopeful we are headed in the right direction. Our other problem is that our TA is 210 ppm with pH at 7.6. We've tried muriatic acid in the middle of the pool without the pump on (it lowered TA from 240 to 210), but it lowered the pH to 7.2 as well. On a low Cl day we let the kids splash around in the pool to aerate it and try and bring the pH up so we could hit it with another muriatic acid dose to bring TA down. That worked so far. Anyway, we just live with it the color it is, hoping it will clear up soon...

A CYA level of 55 is just fine. Just use the Best Guess Chlorine Chart in Janet's signature above to keep your chlorine in the proper range.

Instead of using the "slug" method to lower TA as you have been doing, please read the information at the following two links:

Lowering Alkalinity Step-by-Step

Using Muriatic Acid Safely

Also, please fill in your pool's information into our pool chart as that makes it easier for people here to help you.

Pool Chart Entry Form
Pool Chart Results

One last thing, you have given us some of your readings, but we need chlorine readings taken with a drops-based kit. Then, somebody here will try and help you.

55 ppm is FINE; let them swim! (But watch them, since you can't see if one get's lost underwater!!)

Read the muriatic acid page linked in my signature; get some, and lower your pH to 7.0 - 7.2. Keep it there, and your TA will begin coming down. Every body can swim at that pH!

If you don't have a test kit, get one:

+ Get a cheap OTO (yellow drops) / phenol test kit, or if available at YOUR Walmart (check availability), 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 )

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:

HTH 6-Way Test Kit @ Walmart
Taylor K2006A (3/4 oz bottles) @ Amazon
Taylor K2006C (2 oz bottles) @ Amazon