Cloudy water

[aylad]

I would think you could drain as much as 1/3 to 1/2 at a time without a problem--as long as there's at least 2-3 feet of water in the shallow end I think you're fine. Alternately, one of the other mods has posted a "sheet" method, where you take a large piece of plastic and pump from underneath as you refill from the top so that the pool basically stays full throughout the process.

In order to shock the pool, you really need to be measuring the chlorine levels instead of just dumping "some" chlorine in and hoping for the best--your method may work sometimes in a hit-and-miss way, but to get reliable results you really need to measure your levels to keep them where they need to be and to get rid of the algae.

You definitely need to stop using cal-hypo at this point, though--I suggest you switch to plain, generic bleach. How many gallons does your pool hold?

Janet

[stanley]

I will go to plain bleach.

A quick online calc shows my pool is 19,200. It's a free form that is 16'X32' with a 3' shallow and an 8' deep.

Time to drain!

[aylad]

In 19,200 gallons, each 1.5 gallon of bleach should raise your chlorine by 5 ppm. Each 1.5 quart should raise your chlorine by 1 ppm. (That's 6% strength).

Janet