low pH and TA.. help!!

[Watermom]

Most household bleach is 6% sodium hypochlorite. Occasionally you still find 5.25% but not very often. But, don't waste your time buying 3% if you find that.

I usually wait a couple of hours after adding something before retesting.

[tleigh0212]

Ok, got my bleach. This may sound like a silly question, but how should I pour it in? Do I pour a little bit all around the pool, or just one area, or into my skimmer or how so? And also, how much should I start with pouring, I don't want to pour too much at once. And lastly, for future references, how long should a person wait after pouring bleach to enter the pool?

[aylad]

In a 4K gallon pool, each cup of 6% bleach should raise your FC by 1 ppm. With a CYA of 50, you need to keep your chlorine levels between 3 and 6 ppm at all times, so that should help you figure out how much to add. When adding it, you can either pour it in the skimmer, assuming you have no other chlorine source like trichlor or cal-hypo in the skimmer, or you can add it into the return stream, pouring slowly so you don't splash it on you, your clothes, or your liner. You can walk around the perimeter of the pool and pour it in, too, being careful not to splash it--just use a broom, net, or other equiment to help stir the water up after you add it.

Once you add the bleach, no need to wait to swim--just make sure it's well mixed into the water, and go! (That's why I put mine into the return stream--it helps dissipate it faster). Might want to make sure eyes are closed underwater for a bit, just in case...

[BigDave]

When we had the Intex donut, I would measure the bleach into a cup and pour a little in at a time as I walked around the pool (the Intex pumps don't really seem to mix the water up very well). Be careful not to splash. When I would put in a few cups, I would stir the pool with the oar from a small inflateable raft. Watermom figures that you need to raise your chlorine to 6 and that each cup of bleach will raise your chlorine by 1 ppm. So... if you start at 1ppm - add 5 cups to get to 6ppm.
If the water's well mixed, you can measure the chlorine soon after you put it in and if it's not out of range you can swim. Look at Ben's Best Guess Chart (in Watermom's sig) to for guidance regarding chlorine levels.
The Pool Calculator figures that it would take 11 oz by weight of Washing Soda or 22 oz by weight of Borax to bring your pH from 6.8 to 7.5. You can probably safely put this much in; this will take a little while to dissolve so give it some time and some mixing. I wouldn't put it in the skimmer with an Intex type cartridge filter as my experience is that they clog up pretty quick. Put it in the pool, mix and test in an hour. Mix some more. Test another hour after that - if the pH is the same both times, it's probably all dissolved. If you're still low, you can add more.

[tleigh0212]

Well after my last pH check and it was still low I was getting frustrated and decided to just pour the bleach in and focus on it. Put the bleach in and checked the water an hour and a half later... everything is in normal ranges!!!! TC: 3, Bromine: 6, pH:7.4, TA: 120, and Stabilizer: 50. So glad it's all under control now. Thanks everyone so much for all the help, if it hadn't of been for ya'lls help I might of just given up! So now how do I maintain? I already have a big jug of chlorine tabs so I would like to use them some so they're not a complete waste. To maintain is it a basically just test daily then add whatever according to results? Or is there certain things I need to do daily/weekly no matter what?

[BigDave]

Sounds like you got there, Congrats!
To maintain:
Don't use anymore tabs or sticks or dichlor powder - your CYA (stabilizer) is 50 and that's plenty for most pools. If it goes much higher, it will cause you alot of trouble. If your bag of shock is dichlor, don't use anymore of it.
Get a test kit that allows you to test Free Chlorine and Combined Chlorine (or Total Chlorine : TC = FC + CC) at high levels. With the amount of CYA you have right now, your normal FC will be at the limits of color-matching type kits. The Taylor kit everyone here recommends K-2006 (See WateMom's Sig) allows you to test high chlorine levels and may be eaisier to read.
Keep your FC between 3 and 6 all the time; test FC, CC a couple time a day if you can and adjust - you'll learn how much chlorine you pool uses and then you won't need to test as often. If you start getting a consistent CC reading, you'll need to shock. You can read the procedure for shocking in several places on the forum. (remember: shock is a verb not a noun)
Test you pH at least once a day at the beginning less as you feel comfortable with it raise it with Borax if it's low and muriatic acid or dry acid if it's high. * Be careful when handling Muriatic acid - there many good descriptions of safer handling procedures on the forum.
Test your TA every few days - it shouldn't change much but keep an eye on it.
If this seems like a lot, it's not - really.
Come back here whenever you need help or are unsure, these people are great!
Have Fun!

ps: Close the bucket of tabs and keep them for next year. If you keep your water over the winter - you might lose CYA. If you empty the pool you will definitely need it.