What to do next? High Alkalinity & Combined Chlorine, Well Water & Iron issues

Hello - I'm a new pool owner with lots of questions, and a general loyalty to online forums such as this to gather info, rather than relying on retailers who push unnecessary things at me... looks like I found the right place!
Here's the start of this pool project - long story... For starters, it's a 35 year old gunite pool with a 4' fiberglass wall. It's ~14-15,000 gallons. Bought house in MN in October, pool hadn't been open since '09 season. We drained the pool and re-painted early spring with a water-based acrylic paint and started filling over about a 2 week period from our horrendous well water. The previous owners had rigged together 2 whole house water filters and said that those worked well for the pool water. We ran the majority of the water through those filters, but didn't change them through the entire fill-up (lesson learned). Anyway - we have really bad iron in the area and the water we used to fill did not go through the softener. We ended up with very, very nasty black water.
Day 2 in our filling process (not even 1/2 up in deep end) we got the bright idea to throw in 2 - 1lb bags of shock. Dumb - It wasn't mixed well enough and it bleached our new paint job, lesson learned. So, after diligent filtering using the homemade filter setup on this site helped some, along with lots of vac'ing, swapping out filters and running the output back through filters we're making progress. It's been an uphill battle to say the least but we're making progress.
Pool store test yesterday:
FC - 1.2
TC 4.5
CC 3.3
PH 7.6
Hardness 270
Alk 280
CYA 10
Copper 0.01
Iron 0.08
TDS - not run.

The water sample was pulled from the top, with lots of air. Found out the right way to do it after more research today. The instructions from the store said 4+ gals of muratic and nearly 6 lbs of granular chlorine - seriously? That sounds crazy to me?! It says "in order for superchlorination to be fully effective a breakpoint concentration of 34ppm must be attained" - Is this for real? After the pool store, we put in 32oz of sequa-sol last night to help get more iron out and it really seemed to help, today you could actually see the bottom. Vac'd more and it's looking pretty decent. In an attempt to start working on the alkalinity, we added 1 gal of muratic acid this afternoon. Right now I have the pump running, and a sump pump running with the hose propped on the diving board in an attempt to aerate a little.
Where do we go from here? I plan to bring another sample for testing tomorrow and I have 2 more gals of muratic on hand if the alk is still way high. Once the alk is lowered, what can I do to take care of the chlorine? I would like to do the BBB method but how much bleach will I realistically need? Where do I start with the staining? it's pretty bad (iron staining, not the bleach rookie mistake).
Thanks in advance for reading this - I really appreciate any advice!

Hi Lady;

Well, it could be worse. You could have algae, too. To be fair to the pool store, your's is a hard pool to deal with.

Having been fair, I'm going to tell you: DO NOT TRUST THEIR ADVICE ANYMORE! Don't burn your bridges; just get your water tested, smile sweetly, and say "Maybe next time", when they try to dump all that stuff on you.

#1 - Get a cheap OTO / phenol red test kit (Walmart, or whereever)
#2 - Turn your pump on, and leave it on 24/7 till you are ALL cleaned up.
#3 - Starting tomorrow EVENING, add 2 gallons of bleach each evening, unless levels are above 4 ppm.
#4 - Starting tomorrow MORNING, add directly to the pool 2 quarts of muriatic acid (gloves, glasses, watch the fumes) at a time, wait an hour, and retest.
#5 - Keep your chlorine above 1 in the AM, but don't add more stabilizer yet.
#6 - Keep adding acid till your pH goes just below 7.0, and then stop.
#7 - Test chlorine 1 hour after bleach additions and again in the AM, no later than 2 hours after sunrise.
#8 - Order a K2006 or K2006C -- Amazon link below -- and report results once you have it. Don't over test CYA -- 2006 only contains 3 - 4 CYA tests.
#9 - See if your pool store will test your fill water for iron -- 0.08ppm does NOT sound high enough for your problems.
#10 - If you start to see any algae, add polyquat-60 algaecide. (Also will help slightly with filtration.)

Regarding stains in acrylic -- I wouldn't hold my breath till they are removed. More likely, you'll need to remove the acrylic and recoat with epoxy . . . but not this season. (There may be some epoxies now that can go on top of acrylic.)

Regarding your well, and iron: water discolored by iron is usually orange or orange-brown or maybe brown. Black is manganese, which can be present in well water. Are you sure it's iron?

Finally, most of the time, I tell people some version of "It won't be that hard, once you get the hang of it.". But I'm not going to tell you that -- metal contaminated well water is hard to deal with, and if you've got manganese, it's really, really hard. You need to understand that none of the 'metal removers' do -- all they do is redissolve the metals, but ONLY for awhile.

The ONLY way to remove iron is with a zeolite (softener, NOT zeolite filter media) OR by persuading the metals to precipitate on your filter, but not on your pool (stains!).

Regardless, start with the list above, and go from there. If you are careful, you can probably work out a way to operate your pool fairly trouble free -- you just won't have much room for error.

Ben

One thing to add ----- We only advise people to order the kit from Amato Industries through the Amazon link below. When I checked earlier this evening, Amato was not the listed seller for the K-2006, so apparently they are currently sold out of that one. However, Amato Industries is listed as the seller for the K-2006C which is the same kit but with larger bottles of some of the most used reagents, so I would advise that you order that kit instead of the 2006.

Thank you!
I do have a drop test for chlorine and ph, which was consistent with the pool store tests. Also have strips which were not all consistent with store tests. I will order the Taylor as recommended. Right now, we're testing right about 7 for PH. Muratic went in 6 hours ago and filter has been on most of that time.

Hubby is worried about pump overheating while we are at work and burning out pump house to the ground. We've been running the pump when we're home but both work during the day. It gets really hot while running for long periods of time. Is this realistic or just a crazy paranoia?

Also - I may have been a little dramatic when I said the pool was black. It was more like a dark-roast coffee. I'm fairly certain it was iron and most was at the bottom of the pool at that point, hence the test that wasn't registering much. In the house our porcelain has an orange tinge to it where water sits.

Based on the current PH should I just start with the chlorine tomorrow night? What's the stopping point for the chlorine?? Thanks again!

Normally, you should be able to run your pump 24/7 for weeks or even months on end and while it might get hot, it shouldn't get too hot to touch. If it does, something else is going on.
Have you back washed recently. If not, do so. A pump works better with a clean filter. Watch the pressure gauge. After you backwash, note your "clean" pressure. When the pressure goes up 5 psi, or the pump starts getting hot again, backwash again.

Carl

Ok - ran my sump pump overnight for aeration and the pool sat all day without the filter running because our pump really overheats and we don't want to risk leaving it on all day. I'm really not trying to ask for advice then not take it, really. After reading Carl's post I think we have an issue - If you splash water on it, it sizzles - and I don't even know where to start with the pump. We have been back washing a lot, with the iron cleanup we did it at least 6 times over the weekend and pressure is in normal range.

Got more water tested today (pulled it following Ben's test sample instructions on website this time), and here's the results:
FC 0.8
TC Not run
ph - 6.9
Hardness 160
Alk 190
CYA 10
Copper 0.03
Iron 0.12
Nitrate 0
TDS not run

pH is where Ben said to stop the acid, and that is only after 1 gal. I didn't add any since yesterday. Should we add more to get the alk down or leave it and move on to the chlorine?

Also - I do have 3" tabs, should I throw one in the skimmer or just start with bleach? Is household bleach stabilized - will I need to add CYA?

Thanks again!

Don't add any more acid until the pH comes up. Household bleach is not stabilized so you will need to add CYA.

Janet

if your 3in pucks are trichlor, you can add them in a floater along with adding bleach- they will slowly add CYA along with Chlorine. Just stop using them once your CYA is built up where you want it!
They do tend to lower pH, so you need to watch it while using the trichlor...
Or just add the CYA direct, and don't use the pucks!

Fiberglass pool? Alk= 190? Hardness=160? Nothing to worry about now. Seriously, it's not going to cause you any problems in the short term, so ignore it for now and fix the other stuff first.

I would STRONGLY recommend against using Tri-Chlor puck given a pH of 6.9. It's asking for trouble. Now is the time to rely on bleach and aeration.

Meanwhile, if your pump sizzles, something is definitely not right and needs to be addressed.

Carl

Quote:

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Originally Posted by CarlD

I would STRONGLY recommend against using Tri-Chlor puck given a pH of 6.9. It's asking for trouble. Now is the time to rely on bleach and aeration.

---

I agree with this--if the trichlor pucks drive your pH down, then it won't rise enough to let you make any progress on your alk. Stick with bleach and aeration.

Janet

didn't see the 6.9, saw the earlier pH reading... so retract the trichlor for now, keep using bleach!

Ok folks - here's my update: A combo of the homemade batting/sump pump filter, a 1 qt. bottle of GLB Sequa Sol ($26 @ local pools store), a whole-house filter hooked up to the output, rigorous vacuuming, nightly doses of a 1.5 gal jug of bleach and we have a clear pool! We swam last weekend but I didn't have my Taylor Test kit yet so I refrained from posting. Haven't put anything in since Sunday (1/2 lb of Stabilizer).

1st try with the Taylor test kit (K2006) tonight -
FC - 0
CC - 0.5
pH - 7.5
TA - 150
Calc. Harness - 250

-Tried to test for CYA and the black dot never disappeared so I don't know if we just don't have enough to register (???)
- We haven't gotten the chlorine levels up to shock level yet (that I'm aware of) and I don't know where to go from here.
On hand, I have: bleach, borax, baking soda, muratic, 1 lb bags of sodium dichloro-s-triazinetrione (9.53% avail chlorine), and pucks that are tricholro-s-triazinetrone 93.5% copper sulfate pentahydrate 1.5% (93.50% avail chlorine), and ~3/4 lb stabilizer. The shock and pucks are from before I did my research and found the BBB method - if I could use them, great. If they will mess up the good thing I have going then I don't want to use them yet.

Do you all think I would be ok to put the pucks in and shock with I have - or just stick with the bleach? I still haven't figured out what the heck I'm doing! Thanks all - I really, really appreciate the input!

ok, if your CYA isn't reading, the dichlor is ok to use. the pucks, I wouldn't use because of the copper...
your pH is fine right now, so just hold on to the acid, soda, and borax for later when it's needed
add bleach- 1 gal will give you 6ppm in 10k gallons, so add enough for FC 2 to start, and add more later as needed.
As long as your pool stays clear, slowly get your FC up to maybe 5. I'd use the dichlor a little later, after you get some FC in with bleach first, then add CYA to get to 30ppm.

I agree: Dichlor is a good option as it will add CYA as it chlorinates. It WILL tend to drive your pH down so be ready with Borax or lots of aeration to maintain.
I can't give you all the chemistry as to why Dichlor which is pH neutral, drives pH down anyway (but not nearly as fast as Tri-Chlor), but it has to do with chlorine in the water is acidic and dichlor doesn't counteract it.

Carl