Opening swampy pool, high PH

[River Gronkowitz]

I'm estimating about 26700

[Watermom]

You can either use bleach or dichlor. With such a large volume pool, it might be easier to use dichlor so you won't have to fool with so many empty bleach bottles. Dichlor will add chlorine and CYA at the same time. It will also drop your pH, so you'll need to watch it closely and add Borax. You do NOT want pH to drop below 7.0.

With no CYA, a shock level for your pool for now would be around 10ppm of chlorine. It will take approximately 4 lbs. of dichlor which you can add slowly to the skimmer while the pump is running. Make sure there is nothing else in your skimmer when you add it. When you buy dichlor, make sure it is only sodium dichloro-isocyanurate and not a mixture with other things such as copper, alum, etc. Sam's Club sells PoolBrand dichlor which doesn't have a bunch of other junk in it. Keep your pump running 24/7 and watch your filter pressure.

Test a couple times per day and each time add enough dichlor (or bleach) to get back to a chlorine level of around 10ppm. By the way, in your pool, each gallon (4 quarts) of plain unscented 6% household bleach will add about 2.2ppm of chlorine.
(For every 10ppm of chlorine that dichlor adds, it also adds 9ppm of CYA. So, you'll have to stop using it after awhile and swich to an unstabilized form of chlorine. But, for now, it would be a good choice for shocking since you have a large volume pool.)

[River Gronkowitz]

Thanks for the advice!

Got the dichlor yesterday evening and added 4 lbs. Brushed the sides and the bottom as much as I could, and within a few hours, the chlorine level was reading around 10. The water turned a sea green looking color.

Checked it this morning and the FC and CC were both around 3. The water is still the sea green color, but I can sorta see the bottom in the shallow end, enough to make out shadows of some of the trash I missed with the leaf rake. The top of the water was foamy, but I'm almost positive it's because the skimmer got full last night and air bubbles were coming out of the returns, and I haven't added anything besides the recommended amount of dichlor.

One other thing I noticed, the PH level stayed at 7.8, but the total alkalinity dropped to 50. Should I add anything to bring that back up now, or should I wait?

[PoolDoc]

The dichlor will drop the pH AFTER the free chlorine is used up. I wouldn't worry too much about the alkalinity. However, the pH will tend to drop too. Use borax, a box at a time, to keep the pH above 7.0. Add the borax SLOWLY to the skimmer, with the pump running. Here's what you're looking for:

[aylad]

I would wait on the alk--get the pool cleared up first, and then the rest of your numbers can be adjusted later. If you try to adjust the alk now, it's just going to move again every time you add dichlor. It's not going to hurt the pool for the TA to stay where it is, so just worry about that later.

Janet

[River Gronkowitz]

So just to double check... for now, I should just continue to keep my chlorine level around 10 and keep a check on the PH, (which has been holding steady at 7.5 the past few days) until it gets cleared up. Anything else I should be doing for the time being?
Thanks again everyone!

[Watermom]

Run the pump 24/7 while you are working to clear the pool and watch the filter pressure. When you get an 8-10psi rise over clean filter pressure, it is time to backwash. Also, as you said, maintain the chlorine level and pH levels that you mentioned above. How does the water look? Once you get to the point where the water looks clear, and you can go from sundown one day to within two hours of sunrise the next morning without losing more than 1ppm of chlorine and your CC reading is no greater than 0.5, then I'd hold the chlorine high for one additional day for added insurance and then you can let your chlorine drift back down and maintain it per the Best Guess Chlorine Chart below. How much dichlor have you used thus far? At some point, you'll want to test your CYA again to see where you are with that. A CYA level of 40-50 is good for most pools. Since this a large volume pool, for convenience sake, I'd use the dichlor for maintenance doses of chlorine even after it is cleared up until your CYA is up. Then, you'll need to switch to either bleach or liquid pool store chlorine so your CYA won't get too high.

[River Gronkowitz]

Got the filter running 24/7. Have had to backwash once daily since I started, but checked it this afternoon and the pressure gauge isn't working at all. Gonna pick one up at the pool store tomorrow morning and get that squared away.

As far as the water goes, first thing in the morning, it's a light blue color, can even see the bottom in the shallow end enough to faintly see the design of the liner. Can't see the bottom at all in the deep end, but I am starting to see a lot farther down the sides than I was when I started. It's still fairly cloudy though. Also, as soon as I start brushing the bottom, it clouds up and even greens back up a little. At first when I would brush it, thick 'clouds' of really dark green would come up to the top, now the 'clouds' are a dusty white looking color. After a couple of hours, the stuff settles back down and looks like gritty, dark yellow/greenish sand on the steps. Dead algae or pollen maybe?

I've added somewhere in the neighborhood of 13 lbs of dichlor so far. I last tested the CYA a couple of days ago, but my test kit only measures levels of 30 and above, and I could still make out the black dot at the bottom a little at the 30 mark.
I think once I get everything cleared up and my CYA level where it should be, I think I'd like to use the bleach to maintain my levels.