Printable View
Hi, I am new to the forum. I am switching to the bbb way this year due to the cost of chlorine now. I have a 16*32 vinyl inground pool what I would like to learn is how much bleach to use for daily use and how to super shock my pool. And also want to know if it is safe for dogs to swim when using bleach and sometimes my cat drinks from the pool. And I would like to know how often should I shock my after dogs have been for a swim.
Welcome to the forum! We need a little more information about your pool. There is no set amount of bleach to add each day. It depends on what your current water testing results are. I can tell you this, in a pool this size, each 3 qt. jug of bleach will raise your chlorine level by 2 ppm. Super shocking is simply adding a large dose of bleach at once to raise your cl level up. How high you need to shock to depends on your CYA level. Post some current water testing results taken with a drops-based kit (not test strips) and we'll take a look and be able to better advise you. If you don't have a good test kit, we recommend the Taylor K-2006. A good price for it seems to be at this place. http://www.amatoind.com/taylor-k2006-test-p-555.html
Re: pets --- All I can tell you is that my sister has a pool and she lets her dogs swim all the time. How often to shock after dogs swim? Depends on if your CC (combined chlorine) goes up afterwards. Safe for cats to drink? I have NO idea, but I wouldn't think so.
Hi eartha and welcome!
Our two German shepherds swim daily. I keep the chlorine level between 3 - 5 ppm and have never shocked the pool just because the dogs swim in it. They ingest a lot of water when diving and retrieving and the FC hasn't hurt them. I don't know anything about cats, can't help you there.
What have you been using to sanitize the pool? If you've put in such products as trichlor or dichlor tabs/ sticks/ pellets/ flakes you've really been using chlorine all along.
I have been using 3" tablets of triclor from leslies. My test kit is very old I need to go buy a new one. But here are the numbers when I took water to leslies on 5-30-10
FC= 5
TC= 5
PH= 7.6
TA= 120
CYA= 30
But we have had some rain here in the last few days. I will take some more to Leslies again today until I get a new kit. So some of those numbers may have changed a little.
So what should I do after dogs and people have been in the pool and the water gets cloudy?
Your numbers all are where they should be. I wouldn't use any more of the trichlor, though, because your CYA will continue to rise. If your water gets cloudy after dogs and people have been in it, then you will need to shock it if the filter doesn't clear it up within a few hours.
Janet
That is what I did Monday night after we were done swimming. And the pool was clear the next morning. I have less than a half of a bucket of Triclor left to use so they don't go to waste. But now that i know it raises my CYA I will use them less often now. Just enough to keep my levels where they are now. Then I will switch to bleach. I am going to call around and see where the best deal is on bleach or if anyone can help me find a place I live in NE Atlanta area.
Eartha, we had a barn cat that lived 100% outside and drank from our pool steadily for 3-4 months a year. He lived just shy of 17 years. He was one tough dude, so maybe it was that, but I don't worry much about the cats drinking it. The darn raccoons wash up on my top step, take a drink, laugh at me trying to chase them away and seem fine? We even had Muskrats move in once. Tried everything imaginable to get them out. Nothing worked. Then... See above. One tough dude! After he killed a couple they took off. Great cat!! Still miss him.
hi eartha,
i have the same size pool, so i can help you out. (i'm also a mathematician, which helps, although i'm not a major geek so get that thought right out of your head.)
anyhow, if you're using "ultra" bleach, which is what most bleach is now (6% chlorine), a full 96oz. bottle will raise the chlorine level in your pool by about 1.8 PPM. if you're using "regular" bleach, which is 5.25%, in the full gallon jugs, each full bottle will raise FC by about 2.1 PPM. if you're using "liquid chlorine" marketed for pools, most of which is 10%, a full gallon jug will raise the FC by about 4 PPM.
so after testing if you find that you need to raise the FC by 1 PPM, that would be about 53 oz. of ultra (6% bleach), about 61 oz. of regular (5.25%) bleach, and about a quart of liquid chlorine (10%).
the frequency at which you'll have to add these amounts depends on a variety of factors, the most important of which are swimmer load and sunlight that the pool gets. i've found that keeping my solar cover on when we're not in the pool cuts the chlorine demand at least in half, so if you're trying to save, that's a good option. on average, when i was using ultra bleach, i would put in about 48 oz. each night, which worked out to about half a buck a day. not bad!
for what it's worth, in my area (SW ohio), the best buy in terms of PPM per dollar is the 10% liquid chlorine at meijer, which they sell for $10 for a case of 4. the 96 oz ultra bleach bottles at cheap places like aldi used to be best, but the price went up and meijer is the new winner.
one final thing: ALWAYS check the label when buying bleach to see what the concentration is. some cheesy bargain brands have been reported to go as low as 2.5%. if it doesn't list the concentration, don't even think about buying it.
hope that helps.
ps - our dogs swim in the pool constantly, and have never shown any ill effects, even the morning after shocking when the FC might be close to 10.
Doscobeck: You might want to try Aldi again. Our local store just lowered their price of a 96 oz. jug of bleach to $1.09. Not a bad price for 6% bleach.Quote:
Originally Posted by docsobeck