First-time owner trying to get CYA right

Hi all! I've been reading the forum for a few days and I'm going to try to fill in as much info as I can off the top of my head, but I'm at work and can only give you what I know right now.

We're in Louisiana, using a 12' x 33" Intex Easy Set inflatable. It began to turn greenish (but was not yet slimy), so I shocked it with a liberal dose of bleach yesterday and left the filter running. By mid-morning, it was clear again but the FC was still off the chart of my 1-5ppm test kit.

I called and asked my girl to test it just a few minutes ago, she said the FC is at 3 (I think it's FC, we bought a HTH 6-way kit from walmart and I think it only tests FC, correct?) and the pH is at 7.8. The CYA isn't enough to be registered by the test yet (the dot never disappears).

I have HTH Stabilizer, which she just told me lists "1 pound per 10,000 gallons" on the label. Should we just extrapolate the amount down from 10,000 gallons to our pool's 1400-1500 gallons? How should we add it? I've read here that people use skimmers or socks? Any help is much appreciated!

Hi, and welcome to the forum! It's nice to have a fellow Louisianian around!! What part of the state are you in?

The WalMart 6 way kit only measures TC, so you don't really have a way to break it down into combined and free. However, if the water is turning greenish, you need to shock it by getting the chlorine up to 12 ppm and holding it there until it clears, which you already have done.

Without the stabilizer, the chlorine is being eaten up by the sun as well as anything in the water, so until the stabilizer dissolves and registers in your water, you're going to need to keep the Cl at 3-5 ppm, by frequent additions during the day. Also, if you'll bump it up a little at night, it'll have the whole night without sun interference to work on anything "nasty" in your water. Just as a point of reference, each 1/2 cup of 6% bleach will raise your Cl by 1 ppm if your pool volume is 1500 gallons.

I would suggest that you start with about 1/2 cup of stabilizer and put it in an old tube sock or old knee hi hose and hang it in front of a return. That way you can keep an eye on the rate at which it's dissolving--but don't bother to test for it for at least 4-5 days or you'll just be wasting reagent. In the meantime, keep up the chlorine additions until you have the stabilizer to help you keep it in the water. After 4-5 days, test again and you can go from there. A good target to start with is 20 ppm but depending on your pool location you might find that you need to raise it a bit. You might also find that the pH starts to come down some with the CYA addition. If not, you can either leave it alone at 7.8 (my pool likes it there and returns to 7.8 even if I try to fight it) or add a little muriatic or dry acid to bring it down to the 7.2-7.6 range.

Janet

Thanks so much for your help! We're in Walker, a short distance outside Baton Rouge. I have the CYA dissolving and will let you know when I get the results. As expected, the TC is dropping but I am trying to maintain it around 3ppm for at least the next few days until the stabilizer has a chance to do its thing.

Let us know how it's going.....

Janet