Major Chemistry Problem on open

[psciotti]

Good Morning - glad I found you guys!

Pool: 15120 gallon, 16x28 rectangle, Vinyl Liner, currently water is crystal clear

Opened pool here in the northeast 2 weeks ago and at the time I shocked it with 2 bags of crystal shock. Week later I put 1" tabs into the skimmer and floater thing and have maintained. I have a Leslie DPD test kit and just got the following results which, after reading posts appears to be some major chemistry problem:

FC=0 (even tested with vial only 1/2 full of water and could not get color)
TC=0
PH= much yellower than the 6.8 scale mark
Acid Demand= put in 100 drops and barely a color change
Base Demand= put in 25 drops and turned yellower
TA=put in 2 drops of #7 then 5 drops of #8 - it turned red immediately. Thought I used the wrong chemicals and repeated with the same reults
CH = 650ppm - took 65 drops to change color
Cyanuric Acid = more than the 100 number - probably 120

Is it possible that the test chemicals go bad? I will go buy another test kit today but obviously need to do something.

Thanks

[PoolDoc]

Go to Walmart ASAP and

#1 - Buy all the borax they have (up to 12 boxes)
#2 - Buy 10 gallons of plain unscented 6% household bleach.
#3 - Buy a cheap OTO / phenol red test kit
#4 - Go home and test your pool with the kit
#5 - If the results are comparable, starting adding borax: pump on, skimmer basket in place, add slowly through the skimmer.
#6 - Add 6 boxes, wait 1 hour and retest. If no change, add the rest of the boxes, and go back to Walmart for more borax, or if they are out, 5 boxes of "Washing soda" (sodium carbonate = pH up)
#7 - Retest, and if no change, add 6 more boxes of borax or 3 boxes of washing soda.
#8 - Wait 1 hour, and retest. Add 2 more boxes of washing soda if no change.

And, so on.

You need to get the pH up. Low pH kills liners. Use borax if possible, washing soda or pH up if not. Add a gallon of bleach once you have a pH near 7.0.

Post results here.

[psciotti]

thanks - just came back from Target and now wish i bought more Borax and Bleach. I'll do ASAP and followup up with a post later today. Thanks again.

[CarlD]

The OTO test will show if you really have chlorine in your pool or not.
DPD will bleach out at high chlorine levels and give a false value of 0. If the OTO test is clear or very, very soft yellow, then the DPD is correct. However, if the OTO test is strong yellow, orange or brown, the DPD was bleached out and cannot be relied on.

The Borax will raise your pH, and add "borates" to your pool which can make the water feel softer and inhibit algae. But for now it's to get pH up into the 7's range. 20 Mule Team Borax and Arm&Hammer Washing Soda are sold in the laundry section of most supermarkets, especially here in the North East, so you can try them as well. And, of course, they sell bleach.

You need to raise your pH ASAP as vinyl liners can be damaged when pH is below 6.9, so the faster you can get it above that the better--just follow Ben's instructions. The washing soda will add to your Total Alkalinity, but let's get the pH up first--that's far more important.

Meanwhile, you can upgrade your kit to be the full equivalent of the Taylor K-2006 kit we recommend by simply purchasing the Taylor K-1515 kit through Ben's Amazon link above. It's about $20 and is the FAS-DPD test kit that can test FC up to 50 or 100 parts per million, which neither the DPD nor OTO tests can do. I have one of the Leslie's DPD units--it's merely a Taylor re-badged K-2005 kit, which we don't recommend SOLELY because it lacks the FAS-DPD test. But with the K-1515 single FAS-DPD test, you'll have the same thing and will probably never use the DPD test again!

Carl

[psciotti]

ok - 1 hour ago I put in 4 box of Borax (all I had) and 6 gallons of Bleach (I know I was suppose to wait on the bleach until the ph got up but I panicked. Just got back from another trip to buy product and retested water. Results for ph and FC were still non-existent with new test kit - slightly better color to the good side.. Just added another 4 boxes of Borax. total so far 8 boxes of Borax, 6 gals Bleach.

Would adding the initial 6 gallons of bleach have any effect on trying to increase ph at the same time?

Test results in 1 hour from last adds.

Thanks again!

[psciotti]

Just waited about 1.5 hrs and took tests - good and bad news:

FC+TC = 5+ off chart....obviously I put to much bleach in
PH = 7.2 range
TA = at least the initial drops formed a green color this time....100 + drops of #9 could not change to red??
CA = still approx 120+

I'm thinking of adding 1 more box of Borax and checking tonight or in the morning giving the FC/TC level time to subside. Not sure what to do with the TA/CA levels but I guess I'll ignore for now until TC and PH stay in control.
I'll continue to circulate with pump and keep pool rover on to circulate the bottom of water.

Thanks

[Watermom]

Ummm, yeah, I think you overdid the bleach a little. Adding 12 gallons to a pool with this volume would have added approximately 48ppm of chlorine! I hope your liner isn't toast!

Obviously, don't add any more bleach for awhile. As Carl said, you do ultimately need to get a good kit. As a temporary measure only, you can use a dilution method to force your current kit to read higher readings than 5ppm. More info about that here:

http://www.poolsolutions.com/gd/lowe...p-by-step.html

I'm assuming by CA you mean CYA? If so, then your CYA is really high. I'm assuming that you have been using trichlor pucks for quite a while, maybe even for several seasons? They cause CYA to build up over time and that is how people get CYA levels like you have. The only way to lower it is to do a partial drain and refill but you do NOT want to totally drain a pool. Your other option is to keep the high CYA and just run higher than normal chlorine levels. Take a look at the Best Guess chart in my signature below for more info. At any rate, NO more pucks in this pool or dichlor shock. Both of these are stabilized forms of chlorine which will continue to add CYA and that is something you do not want.

Hope this info helps. By the way -- welcome to the Pool Forum.

[CarlD]

Probably the worst that will happen to your liner is it will be bleached. Beyond that, probably little chance of damage....but don't do that with Muriatic Acid ever or it WILL melt your liner.

Carl

[psciotti]

Thank you all - actually I only added 6 - 1.4 gal containers so not too bad I guess beyond just basically shocking it again. The other problem that arose after fixing the PH and adding the bleach is a VERY cloudy pool. Will this clear up as the TC/FC comes down?

[Watermom]

The cloudiness is not caused by the bleach. Probably from all the Borax that you have put in, (which was a major necessity!) combined with high calcium hardness.

I assume you had been using cal-hypo for a long while in addition to the trichlor pucks? NO more of either at this point.

Let the chlorine drift down and keep it between 8-15 all the time. With a CYA that high, if it dips below 8, you risk an algae bloom.

Run the pump 24/7 right now.