Re: noob with cloudy water
Again, more information is present in your post: "pea soup" is more than just cloudy green water; it's opaque green water, as in "my fingers disappear before they are a foot down". If you've got pea soup . . . you've got a long tough road ahead of you. That much algae creates an ENORMOUS chlorine demand. Cleaning it up can take as much chlorine as you'd otherwise use in an entire summer!
There are plenty of shortcuts . . . just none that work well!
So do this: (explanations below)
#1 - Hold the chlorine in the 10 - 15 ppm range, and add acid every 4 hours till you get the pH to near 7.0. (note 1 below)
#2 - If you like, add 1/2 dose ONLY of a sodium bromide based product. See note #2 below.
#3 - Once you reach pH 7.0, add sufficient bleach to take your chlorine level to 30+ ppm, and hold it there for 48 hours. While it is that high, BRUSH your pool thoroughly, whether you can see the bottom or not. If you have algae layers on the bottom, you'll need to add MORE bleach after every brushing, to maintain your chlorine level. See note #3 below.
#4 - Let us know how it goes.
Note #1: Once you do, it will began increasing again on it's own because of the high alkalinity level. (You can read here: if you want to understand what's happening.)
Note #2: There are no GOOD shortcuts for cleaning up a swamp. But there is one short cut that may help somewhat, without too high a price later. There are pool products that contain sodium bromide and are sold for situations like yours. "Yellow Treat" is one such product. They work, because chlorine oxidizes bromide to bromine, and bromine is NOT affected by stabilizer. While your algae is present, this is good, because the cloudiness protects the bromine from sunlight, and the UN-stabilized bromine can be more effective against algae than stabilized chlorine. So, using these products *may* give you a somewhat faster (not fast, just somewhat faster!) cleanup.
But, there still is a price!
Once your pool is clear again, the sunlight WILL break down the bromine, into bromide, which will then be converted back to bromine . . . using up chlorine in the process. The result will be a HIGHER chlorine usage with clear water than you would have had otherwise. Eventually, the bromide will be converted to bromate, which is not easily converted to bromine, and this chlorine loss will stop. But unless you drain your pool, it will probably be sometime into NEXT pool season before it does.
Note #3: It's not common, but I've encountered algae that did not start dying until chlorine levels reached 40+ ppm . . . and that pool had less than 40 ppm CYA. This sort of algae is not common, but it does occur. If you have a plaster pool, it would probably be best just to take your chlorine up to 50+ ppm. But, unless your CYA level is higher than you reported, I can't recommend that on a vinyl or fiberglass pool. There is just too much risk of bleaching out the color on either liners or fiberglass.
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks