Needing some direction with testing and treatment

well i dont know what all i need to be testing for kinda need some direction, was taking test samples to local place for testing they had me focus on my PH and Alkalinity well i got them balanced and i shocked the pool and that took away what green haze and slippery substance away and the pool looked awsome it still looks okay but my ph is now 8.0 and TA is 140 i dont know how much clorine needs to be added so havnt yet added any except for what was in the shock was just wondering if i can get some advice and guidance on this
thanks to all

Do yourself a big favor and order a Tayor K-2006 or 2006C test kit from the link in my signature so you can do your own testing. It will make taking care of your pool so much easier. In the meantime, go to Walmart and pick up a cheap OTO/Phenol Red test kit (red and yellow drops) and test and post your readings. Also, buy several jugs of their generic bleach (plain, unscented) and a jug of distilled water. Did the pool store give you a CYA reading? Also, tell us exactly what all you have put into the pool meaning ingredients and not just product names. Lastly, tell us about your pool: volume, liner or gunite, etc., size of pump and type and size of filter.

Repost with the information and someone here can offer you some advice. I would also suggest doing a lot of reading on the forum, especially the stickies at the top of each sub-forum. Also read on our sister website www.poolsolutions.com. Lots of great information there as well.

thank you for the reply...
ill be ordering one of them test kits asap
for now i do have a full Taylor K-2005 kit if that will help untill i get the new kit in
i have on hand 3 gal. of bleach and 1 gal. of muradic acid can get the gal. of distilled water first thing in the morning

no the pool store did not give us a CYA reading just a PH and Alkaline reading they said that was all we needed to focus on ,
okay what all have i put into the pool lets see at first we did nothing for about 3 weeks then it got greenish tint and slippery the pool store did a reading for us and said that our TA was 190 and PH was 7.2 they told us to add a half gal. of muradic acid every 24 hrs till the TA dropped into the range of 80-120 so that was my first of adding anything to the pool ended up taking 3 gal. of muradic acid to finally get the TA to 120 ( NOTE: while the pool store was testing our water sample i to was doing my own water testing at home and my results matched theres) now after all the muradic acid our PH dropped to 6.8 we then bought some PH increaser from wal-mart and added 9 oz at a time untill our PH level reached 7.4 and was holding for 24 hrs it ended up taking a total of 5 lbs of this PH increaser to get our level to 7.4 and it held firm for the 24 hrs and our TA was holding firm at 120
the pool store sold my wife 2 bags of crystal shock they said when we got both our PH and TA with-in range and holding for 24 hrs to add the 2 bags of shock ( Note our pool was still a greenish tint and slimmy and cloudy) so i added the 2 bags of crystal shock and let my pump run for 24 hrs and the pool cleaned up some no more greenish tint and slimmy feel but still cloudy thats when i found the forum and read about adding bleach well at that time i had 1 full gal. of bleach as discribed so i added that to the pool and wal-la the water cleaned up almost perfect looking but i tested my PH and it was 8.0 and TA was 130the pool has not been touched in 2 days now because i want to ensure i do things right and keep a nice looking and safe pool


the size of my pool is 24' x 52" intex metal frame above ground vynal dunno what the horse power of my pump is but i change filters on it regular the filter size is B its a dual switch click it down for running on timer and up to constant running

+ Post your test results --- especially the CYA test --- from the K2005. CYA levels are critical info, and pool store test strip results are horrendously bad.

+ Get a local OTO / phenol red (yellow / red drops) and test your chlorine. Do not worry about the alkalinity, but do keep your pH at the lower end of the range (7.0 - 7.4).

+ DO keep your chlorine in the dark yellow to orange-ish yellow range (higher than the OTO kit shows).

+ The Intex OEM filter cartridges are low quality. Better cartridges will not only last longer, but will filter out the residual cloudiness better. Read this thread:

Cleaning-your-Cartridge-Filter-wiithout-Damaging-It!

and use these links to order the cartridges you need:

Unicel C-4607 Replacement Filter Cartridge (Easy Set Size A or C) @ Amazon
Unicel C-5315 Replacement Filter Cartridge for 15 Square Foot Intex B Filter @ Amazon

I highly recommend using those links. Unicel or Filbur cartridges are what you want, but many online retailers make it hard to find them, by using deceptive language that is based on cheaper Asian made cartridges that are 'replacements' for Unicel or Filbur models. Unicel makes the OEM cartridges for many US filters.

If you already have a K-2005 kit, you don't need to buy the K-2006. Instead, you can pick up the K-1515 which is the part that the K-2005 is missing and then essentially you will have a K-2006 complete kit. That will save you some money. You can get it through the test kit link in either Ben's or my signatures.

If you go that route, just make sure you still have enough R0013 to do several CYA tests this summer.

Right. You can also just buy some more R0013 separately if you need to.

just tryed to test my CYA in the sample bottle given in the test kit that i have and i followed the directions as stated on the kit, filled CYA dispensing bottle to 7 ml mark with pool water to be tested, then added R-0013 to the 14 ml. mark and mixed for 30 sec. im guessing the solution is supposed to turn cloudy if Cyanuric Acid is present? mine did no change at all but i continued the test anyway i filled the small comparator tube as directed but the little black dot at the bottom never disapeared and i filled to the top
is this bad?

i have plenty of the R-0013 looks like 2 -3 oz bottles i got this kit from a friend along with the 2 bottles of R-0013

ill defnatly get the K-1515

and the filter that came with the pump we used and threw out i bought a cple more filters from wal-mart that i rotate threw daily just rinsing them out with sprayer on my hose and they come perdy clean but ill go agead and get the ones you stated and use them

i also tested my other levels today :

PH 8.0
FC 0
TC 0
CC 0
TA 160

No change = 0 ppm CYA.

If you've got extra R-0013, the R-1515 will fix you up. But still get an OTO kit for fast and easy testing between careful tests.