Oil Slick in the Pool - what to do?

[jsboat]

The wood fence next to the pool was recently stained, oil base stain. Well, it appears that some got on the cover and in the water. Washed the cover, but I still get an oil slick everytime the cover is opened. This happened last year too (none too pleased with the neighbor with the trigger happy spray gun in the wind). Anyway, is there something I can use in the water to break up the oil slick? I suppose I could light it on fire one night for an interesting pool party.

thanks

[KurtV]

Evaporation will also take care of the lightest oils and for what's left you can probably pick it up with sorbent pads like these: http://store.andax.com/index.asp?Pag...RODGROUP&ID=39. That's not an endorsement for those pads or the company that makes or sells them, just an example.

I'd hesitate to use dispersants to break it up; no telling what those would do to your filter medium.

[jsboat]

Thanks, good idea, it seems like that type of pad would work. I really don't want to just throw more chemicals in the water unless it is known to work. Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.

[KurtV]

I also should have said that a dispersant will only break up the oil and suspend it in the water, it won't get rid of it.