Losing chlorine

[joecus]

Thanks Janet and Watermom. - I've decided to empty the pool right after the holiday. I can't get the cya and ph stabilized. Any recommendation on the refill? Do I need to scrub the liner when it's empty? Anything I need to watch when I empty it?

[Watermom]

You do NOT want to totally empty a liner pool or you will ruin your liner. Do a partial drain and refill (maybe 1/2 to 2/3 of the water) which will get your cya level down to a more manageable level, but do NOT drain all of it!

Did you get the kit you ordered? What kit is it?

You haven't posted a complete set of current water testing results for several days. Can you do that, please? Also, please list exactly what all you have put in the pool -- meaning ingredients, not just "tabs" or "shock."

[joecus]

Ok - I got the kit taylor 2005. I just ran the tests and here are the results.
fc 5
tc 5
ph 7.8
alk 120
ca 70
cya 100+
As far as ingredients, I started the year using, powder shock with the 3" tablets. When I started losing chlorine I added about 4lbs of cyanuric acid. Then I added a algaecide to stop the chlorine loss.
Once I realized my ph was too low, I started adding borax, I would guess 15 boxes up to this point. Then I realized my cya was too high so on Tuesday, June 30, I emptied half the pool and refilled. I've been using bleach only for about a week. I'm checking the chlorine very often and adding bleach as needed. So, what do you think? Thanks for your advise.

[Watermom]

So even after draining half, you are still at CYA over 100? Wow! You will have to either do one of two things:
-- Do another drain and refill of 1/2 to 2/3 water again to try and drop cya further or
-- Run higher than normal chlorine levels to compensate for the high cya. That would mean that you would have to keep your cl between 8-15 ALL the time and when you need to shock, you'll have to take it up to 25.

You need to get some bleach in there and bring your cl level up ASAP.

No more tabs or powder shock for your pool as they both have cya in them and yours is WAY high. Stick with bleach.

How does the water look?

[joecus]

The water looks great. My cl and fr cl are both at the max on the scale in the taylor kit. I must be using the kit wrong since I only see a 5 at the top of the "cl" and "10" under the bromine column.. You mention keeping the levels higher, how do I do this with the kit? How do I differentiate the higher numbers?

[aylad]

The "shotglass" method is here: Take one part pool water and one equal part distilled water and mix these together. Run your test with this water and then multiply your result by 2. If that doesn't take it high enough for you to get a reading, use one part pool water and two parts distilled and then multiply by 3, etc. (The dilution method does lose accuracy with each dilution but it is better than nothing when you have no other way to get a reading with such a high cl.)


This will help you force your kit to test higher chlorine numbers than 5 ppm. I agree with Watermom, if you've already replaced 1/2 your water and STILL have a CYA of 100+, there's no telling how high it actually was. Rather than drain it all, just drain another 1/3-1/2 like Watermom suggested, just to drop it down into manageable ranges.

Or, as an alternative, you can just run your normal chlorine no lower than 8 ppm, staying in the 8-15 ppm range. It's hard to do, though, consistently.

I absolutely would not use anymore trichlor pucks or dichlor to shock--definitely only bleach if it were my pool!!

Janet

[joecus]

Hello all, today I emptied and replaced 1/3 of water, cya didn't move and is still way above 100. Is there anything else that could be causing this? I've been using bleach only. How much water can I safely remove without destroying my liner? Thanks

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Hello all, I'm really baffled. Like I said, I've been using bleach instead of chlorine and my cya is still going up. I just looked at the bleach bottle and it is brand name "Home Basics". I can't find any percentages to determine the strength. However, I did notice something I found suspicious. It states, "contains sodium hypochlorite", "contains no phosphorus". Can that sodium hypochlorite be raising my cya? Please help. Thank you very much.

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OK, sorry for the previous post. Bleach = sodium hypochlorite. So, I will push forward with another partial drain. What is the ideal cya? Can anyone recommend a place to get refills for my test kit? I'm going to need r013 soon.

[PoolDoc]

Hi Joe;

Sodium hypochlorite adds sodium and chlorine to the pool, but no stabilizer (cyanuric acid, CYA). However, you need to find a bleach that shows % -- should be around 6% sodium hypochlorite. Some highly dilute bleaches are sold 'cheap', but are actually a rather bad deal.

Regarding CYA and draining, with most kits it's very hard to accurately measure CYA levels above 100. In other words, your level could have been 300 ppm and you may have now reduced it to 200 ppm . . . but it would 'test' the same. If you do a 1/3 drain again, you'll reduce (hypothetically) that 200 to 130 or so, and STILL look pretty much the same.

As to how far you can safely go, without knowing more about your pool, I can't tell. If you want to take some pictures and email them to me, I'll post them and reply. (poolforum AT gmail DOT com)

Ben
"PoolDoc"

[joecus]

The pool is crystal clear and I'm keeping the chlorine up high. I know my ph will change when I do a refill but why else would it go down. I'm having trouble keeping the ph up, it drops to low 7's, I add borax and it goes up to good range. Still losing a lot of chlorine. If I have an algae trying to bloom, would the high cya reduce the effectiveness in the bleach killing the algea?

[Watermom]

You'll have to shock really high if your cya is high to do the same job as a lower chlorine level in a lower cya pool. But, as long as you get to shock level, the chlorine will kill the algae. Not sure why your pH is dropping. Have you added anything other than bleach to the pool?