I know NOTHING! Where do I start?

[lbmoore]

Carl Thank you for your reply. Last night I kept reading and with your advice to someone else earlier I went out at midnight and dumped 1/2 gallon of bleach in. The pump has been running all night.

I just retested and these are the results:

Total Hardness is up from 100 to almost 250
Total Chlorine is up from 0 to 1
Free Chlorine is up from 0 to almost 3
Ph is up from 7.2 to 7.8-8.4
Total Alkalinity still at 120
Stabilizer is up from 50 to not quite 100

Why would the Ph and stabilizer have changed? Is it because I added the bleach?
Or is it because I'm viewing the strip in totally different light this am? With us living in a rural area, I figured the water was very hard.

Our water is still crystal clear with no signs of problems. Should I add another 1/2 gallon of bleach?

Being rural, I will have to check in to finding a pool store to test water and a different test kit.

[CarlD]

OK. Do you have an OTO test kit that tests just chlorine and pH? If not, get one. They are cheap--$5-$10, or if there's a Walmart, get the HTH 5-way drop test kit--for $12 to $15 it's a bargain!

Your change is too drastic--that's why we don't recommend strips--it's too easy to make BIG mistakes with them.

Until then I'm not convinced everything changed so much. The ONLY thing you can safely do is add more bleach. But bleach won't change your pH, your CYA, or your CH levels. (actually it CAN change pH but you aren't anywhere close to where that can happen, so don't worry about it).

[aylad]

Carl's given you excellent advice, as usual--I just wanted to reiterate that having your own drop-based kit is a necessity--even if it's the 6-way from WalMart. You've now seen first hand why we don't like strips.

Welcome to the forum!!

Janet

[Watermom]

Unless I missed something, I don't understand how you can have a cya (stablizer) reading at all. You said in the first post that you hadn't added any chemicals yet you report a cya reading of 50. That isn't possible. CYA is something that has to be added either directly or through a stabilized form of chlorine such as trichlor pucks or dichlor powder. It is not in your water supply.

Also, another option for buying the Taylor K-2006 we recommend is to order it from Amazon. com through this link so that PF gets a donation in the process. More info in the following thread:

http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?t=10006

[lbmoore]

Watermom: As far as the stabilizer readings-There was no chemicals in the pool when I took the first strip test. There was no mistaking that reading. The strip was a burnt orange.

After adding 1/2 gallon of bleach last night at midnight, then retested at 7am today, that burnt orange color turned to a very deep orange.

I thought I read last night on here that there shouldnt be a reading for stabilizer when just filling a pool and no chemicals had been added, but couldnt find the post again.

We'll see what the pool store readings are and I'll get me a different kit.... unless there is something in our rural water?????? eeeek! lol

[Watermom]

There isn't any cya in water supplies of any type. Your cya reading is 0.

BTW -- Welcome to the forum. Glad you found us!

[CarlD]

So...if your REAL pH is fairly high, and the powdered stuff is Di-Chlor, we may have you add that. If it's Cal-Hypo, then no (until we get a CH value we can rely on).

For now stick with bleach.

[lbmoore]

Thanks for such a quick reply Carl. Just as I suspected. I found a store that does water testing on the way to hubby's work. He will be getting the results in a bit. I forewarned him they were going to try to sell him unneeded products. lol He's tough, so I have confidence in him not to buy their "stuff". lol

I'll post results when I get them, and try to find me a better testing kit.

Your help is sooo appreciated!