chlorine levels

[fhorta]

purchased the k2006 kit through amazon. hopefully wont be a bad experience (delivery and item delivered). thanks .

[fhorta]

i had a pool tech come out to look at my pool for free. specializes in pool construction and has a pool supply store.

he said that brown dust is a result of previuos owners covering up the pool surface with "epoxy" paint to make it look decent when selling the home. he said this is not algae i'm dealing with.

this was his prognosis:

the epoxy paint is coming off in some places and getting very thin in other areas. due to the thinning and wearing of the epoxy, the plaster beginning to be exposed; aso understand that plaster has sandmix in it.
so the brownish looking dust and brown spots (pool floor does have several small brown spots in different areas) are due to sand that is mixed with the plaster, especially where the plaster is very thin.

how does this sound? kind of makes sense to me.

my question/s then:

if not algae, why when i poured clorox pool floor cleared up quite a bit? i will note that i was having no success with granular chlorine.

his explanation was that there must of been some sort of reaction that bleach caused on this plaster/sandmix or that granular chlorine coupled with other water chemicals did not have the same affect that pure bleach coupled with other water chemicals balances had on the pool floor, or something to that effect.

so basically then, the coat that covers the pool surface is wearing thin and therefore plaster, sandmix, cement, etc... are being exposed and thus when i brush i will always be brushing exposed areas and will always have this brown stuff pick up whenever i brush. so to solve the problem, i need to repaint, or replaster...

just wanted to share and ask for yoour oppinions, thoughts. what do you all think. thanks

[madwil]

The epoxy story is believable, but maybe doesn't explain it all...
If it cleared up some initially, then got to a hold point, and the cloud really is sand/epoxy crud, I would guess initially you also had algae as part of the mix and killed it, and left now with just the other mess.
If it really is epoxy flakes and sand, it should filter out

[fhorta]

i was thinking the same. must of been something else in the mix that was killed off with chlorine.

i also asked if this stuff should be filtering out. he said some may but some may filter through because so fine. i really dont have big flakes floating around, but just that light colored dust cloud ..that can be white in color too. i imagine is the actual plaster residue coming up when i brush. kind of makes me think i'm damaging the floor by brushing.

but even if all this stuff on the pool floor is vacuumed or filtered out, when i brush again, the brush will brush more of this stuff off the pool surface because it's exposed????? so until i replaster and paint over to protect the surface, then as long as i brush i will always be scrubbing this stuff up??
thats what my understanding was.

i have a pool blaster vacuum and the finest filter cloth that was made for that vacuum. i know it's not fine enough. already tried vacuuming with it and i see the white stuff pass right thru the cloth and back in the water. i will try to line the inside of the filter cloth with a nylon panty hose see if i can catch some of the stuff.

[fhorta]

i poured 4 lbs of cal hypo granular chlorine into pool last night. this morning right on the areas that i poured granules there was this whitish clouds setting on the pool floor. look just like what i was allgedly dealing with (brownish dust deposits) during this posts. so i concluded that: this same stuff i was trying to get rid of was being caused by the same chemicals i was using to get rid of the stuff; at least by in large part.

can some one shed any light on the reaction that cal hypo would have on a plaster pool; plaster that is fading..would this whitish cloud be something to be expected. not all over the pool floor, but just on those areas where the granules settled. looks like the residue left behind by the granules...dont have my kit yet to get other chemical readings but cl is over 5 (dark yellow) and ph about 7.5-7.8. cl was about 1 when before i poured the granules last night.

thanks.

[madwil]

I'm not sure- maybe Chemgeek or waste will have an answer (or one of the others)

[chem geek]

Cal-Hypo should usually be pre-dissolved in a bucket of pool water and then when added to the pool by pouring over a return flow with the pump running, any residue should be swept with a pool brush. You do not want to add concentrated chemicals quickly in one place since some of them can settle to the bottom and cause problems. You are fortunate you have a plaster pool because with a vinyl pool such settling of Cal-Hypo could have bleached the liner.

If this white powder is easily brushed away, then it's undissolved Cal-Hypo. If it doesn't dissolve with circulation, then it may be residue from the Cal-Hypo -- basically filler -- which is probably not harmful, but is annoying and yet another reason to use chlorinating liquid or bleach instead of Cal-Hypo, or at least to use another brand.

[fhorta]

so i heard (dissolve solids in water first before pouring in). and all this time i was trying to get rid of it as i poured 8lbs at a a time thinking it was something else...now i know. thanks.