New pool owner, need some guidance please

[SteveInFLA]

Hi,

I moved into a house with a pool last year and I have no idea how I kept the pool looking decent most of last summer, I just dumped in chlorine when it looked like I needed it and put some 3" tabs in the Hayward CL200 feeder.

But this season, I'm already having a very hard time keeping the algae away, and even when I got rid of the green, the water has been very cloudy and the green seems to just keep trying to come back. I do have the drop and vial type test kit and tested today. Below are the results and other info.

Also, last year I took a sample to a local pool supplier (chain) and some kid said I needed about $180. bucks worth of all kinds of bags of stuff. I chose not to listen to him and just got some more chlorine and tabs. I really need to get this under control and maintain it as inexpensively as possible as money is very tight at the moment. I really want to learn all this and be very good at it.

Happy to provide any other info needed.

Please advise on what I should do, thanks very much,

Steve


Pool is in ground, approx. 20,000 gallon
has a vinyl liner
3 inlet jets, one skimmer
Jaccuzi cartridge filter (I wash cartridge regularly)
Hayward CL200 feeder set all the way open to number 7 on dial, I maintain 2 to 3 tabs in it
Pump set to run about 6 hrs each day (I sometimes run it 24 hrs at a time)

Test results:

FC= 3.0
CC=3.0 (combined chlorine)
PH=7.4
Acid Demand= did 35 drops of solution 3 and still no change in color
TA= 7 drops of solution 3 then turned clear

[Watermom]

Hi, Steve.

What kind of chlorine (ingredients) did you use last year other than pucks? Do you have a CYA reading? That is going to be something we'll need to be able to give you very good advice. What all have you put in this year, meaning ingredients. Do you know what type of kit you have?

Re-post with the requested info and somebody here can try and help you get this figured out. Also, spend some time reading through a lot of the posts here on the forum and also on our sister website www.poolsolutions.com . Lots of good info for you to learn about taking care of your pool!

[PoolDoc]

Hi Steve;

Yesterday, I wrote so many versions of the outline I'm going to give you, they are all running together in my heap. (Yea, running together in my "heap". Uh, I meant "head") Hopefully, I can keep them straight.

#1 - if your pH is below 7.0, add borax a box per 10,000 gallons at a time SLOWLY in the skimmer with the pump running. Test before adding more. I'm guessing 1.5 boxes for you.
#2 - Turn your pump on and leave it own 24/7 till your pool is clean. Clean your filter as needed.
#3 - Do NOT worry about alkalinity now.
#4 - Get your CYA (stabilizer) tested and report those results. THIS IS NOT AN OPTIONAL STEP!
#5 - Get a cheap OTO / phenol red testkit (Walmart, etc.) and start using it.
#6 - Add 4 gallons of 6% household bleach this PM, within 2 hours of sunset. Test an hour after adding.
#7 - Test again in the AM -- no matter what the pool looks like, you are not 'cleaned up' till your pool holds chlorine overnight.
#8 - If you can afford it, purchase a K2006 or 2006C -- Amazon links below -- and start testing. Do NOT overtest CYA; there are only 3 - 4 CYA tests in a 2006
#9 - Physically remove all the algae & goop you can -- vacuuming, skimming, filtering. It's cheaper to take it out, than 'burn it out' with chlorine.

Report back, as you get these things done.

Ben

[Watermom]

rwhitsel,
Hi and welcome to the forum. It will be best if you start a new thread about your situation instead of tacking onto the middle of this one. We'll look for your new thread and will help you there!

Thanks.

[SteveInFLA]

Watermom and PoolDoc, thank you very much for your helpful replies, and I apologize for my delayed response. As for what else I used last year, I used the liquid chlorine from pinch-a-penny, I think it's 65% chlorine and their chlorine pucks with stabilizer and I think they are 90% chlorine. Also, I think I used s little bit of clarifier and an algaecide. The latter didn't really seem to do anything.

The test kit I've been using is the "basic 4" also from P-A-P. I have the strips but didn't trust them. No I don't have a way to test for CYA, in fact, I didn't even know about CYA unti reading here.

PoolDoc, I'll get the water tested for the CYA and post back as you said. Thanks for posting the steps, I will follow them. I do try to remove the algae from the surfaces, I had vacuumed it but now I took the wide pool brush and "swept" it off and get it into "solution" and let the filter take care of it then I wash and backwash the filter.

It will be a bit tough on us right now to purchase a K2006 or 2006C so maybe having it tested will get me by for a little while (???).

Thanks very much again, I really appreciate the help. Please post anything else that you think of that I can and/or should do, I'll report back as soon as I have some result on the CYA result.

Steve

[SteveInFLA]

Okay, I went to P-A-P and they tested for CYA and said it was "low around 20" and advised me to buy a 6lb. bag of Coastal stabilizer at $30. I did not buy it as I wanted to see what you experts thought first. I have vacuumed the pool and rinsed the filter cartridge several times. also added 10 Gallons of their chlorine. Maybe I'm wrong, but thier (P-A-P) chlorine seems to be much cheaper than buying bleach, or am I looking at it all wrong ?

Please let me know what you recommend re the stabilizer, etc.

Thanks very much,

Steve

[BigDave]

Does the P-A-P chlorine list it's concentration? Adjust for concentration and size (of bottle) and then compare price.
I would think it would be better to wait until you've cleared your algae to set up your CYA (stabilizer) as stabilizer inhibits chlorine's abillity to eradicate algae.
Turn off the chlorinator for now and battle the algae with Bleach / Liquid Chlorine whicever you can get cheapest (concentration * size) / price - they're both sodium hypochlorite solution.
When you can hold your Free Chlorine at shock level overnight (no feeder) + one more day at shock, then, if you have tabs left, you can use the tabs in your chlorinator until you get your CYA where you want it. Maybe someone here can tell you how many tabs you might need to raise your CYA level. Why buy CYA if you already have a bucket of tabs that contain CYA. Be cautious, too much CYA is a BAD thing (so is too little) and may give you an algae problem that is much harder to fight. Read the stickies on this forum to guide you regarding proper CYA level.

Good luck, Be well.

[Watermom]

i agree with what BigDave told you. Clear up the pool first, then use your trichlor until you get the CYA level to around 40-50. At that point, you'll want to just use bleach so your CYA level won't get too high. (For every 10ppm of chlorine that trichlor pucks add, they also add 6ppm of CYA.)

[madwil]

the pucks will also drive your pH down, so you may need to adjust it up over time- but clear the algae first!

[SteveInFLA]

All the green is completely gone now, yesterday the FC reading was over 3.0 (my test kit only goes to 3.0), I would guess it was around 3.5 or 4.0 as the color was darker than the 3.0. Today it reads maybe 3.2, the water is blue but cloudy, I assume that is dead algae causing the cloudy water (?)

I have been out of pucks for a few days which is why I added the liquid chlorine but I'll get more tomorrow. Thanks Watermom for the info re the amount of CYA in the pucks (and all your info). I'm running the pump 24/7 as advised.

BigDave, the P-A-P concentration is listed as 10.5% on the 2.5 gallon jugs. Thanks for the warning re too much CYA, I think I did read that too much keeps the chlorine from working, I'll continue reading, I'm very good at many things but chemistry has never been one of them, I'm trying to learn this though !

Is it recommended to use a floater for the pucks or continue using the CL200 feeder ?

Thanks for the help,

Steve