Help

I will have to go with option 1 as I have started the bleach. I put in 18 gallons of bleach Monday and the pool has gone from yucky green to the cloudy pale green. I have been sweeping the sides and floor down as much as I am able to. I tested the water every 2 hours Monday and added bleach if it dropped any. I am using a kit from Walmart and I have ordered a Taylor pool tester kit to be able to get better readings. I will add more bleach tonight and just go from there. As soon as the Taylor kit gets here, I will send you my numbers.

If you have any other suggestions, let me know and THANK YOU!!

At this point, you're on the right track--just keep hammering it with bleach and keep your filter running as much as possible (24/7 is ideal), but keep an eye on the pressure because the algae can clog it up quite quickly. You'll eventually see it go to blue/cloudy, then you know you're almost done--then it'll be a matter of letting your filter remove all the dead algae.

I am highly suspicious of your CYA result if your pool was that green--keeping in mind that CYA is a turbidity test, sometimes bad algae blooms will give falsely high results. In any event, once you get the water clean and clear, then let's get another set of test results before you add anything other than bleach to the pool.

Janet

I just received my Taylor K-2006 test. The CYA is 70.

Wow! You got that kit fast! Glad to hear the CYA is only 70. That is much better than 100 or 100+. Test as frequently as you can and each time hit it again with bleach. You'll have that pool clear in no time! Keep an eye on your cartridge. You'll probably need to clean it frequently.

Test results at 11 am 02/19/11

FC 85
10 CC
130 TA
350 TH
60 CYA

Bottom of pool is black onyx, so I won't be seeing Blue

Right now the pool is a cloudy gray/green

How's the pool looking?

Janet

Very cloudy....it has been 3 weeks now and it is just a hazy grey color. Our polaris was in the shop 2 weeks ago, so, I took a water sample to have it tested. Their test showed everything was ok except it was scaling. I have just been keeping the chlorine level high and keeping the other numbers in range. We have two sets of filters, so, we have changed those as well. I didn't realize it could take this long.

It would probably be helpful if you could post a current set of water testing numbers for us to look at.

.20 FC
.10 CC
7.6 PH
90 TA
380 CH
60 CYA

Pool is still a grey color...can see bottom to about 4 feet, but cloudy

Your chlorine is WAY too low, especially for your climate. I suspect that it hasn't cleared up because you either didn't kill the algae all the way, or that your chlorine level has been too low for too long and let it get started again. Either way, you're going to need to take the chlorine back up to shock levels ( 20 ppm for a CYA of 60) and hold it there until the pool clears and you are not losing more than 1 ppm of chlorine when measuring at night after the sun is down and again in the morning before the sun hits the pool. Only after you are not losing any more chlorine can you let the chlorine start coming back down again. This may take chlorine additions up to 3-4 times daily, or however often you are able, to keep it above 20 ppm, but that's the only thing that iwll kill the algae off and allow your pool to clear.

Janet