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Thread: Zero Free Chlorine Reading

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    Default Zero Free Chlorine Reading

    My husband & I bought a house w/ an inground pool last year. Here's the specs on the pool: inground 18x36, vinyl liner, holds 36,000 of water, 4' at shallow end & 10' at deepest end, new Hayward filter installed 2011, chlorine feeder. We opened the pool May 1, had to truck in water to fill it an additional 6-7". A company opened it for us, explained what we thought was everything & added 8 gallons of liquid chlorine. Two weeks after opening the pool & $400 less in our bank account, we've added slightly over 100 pounds of Aqua Blast shock (granual form that you mix w/ water before adding to the pool) 8 additional cases of liquid chlorine & we've been running our filter 24/7 since it's been open using 3" chlorine pucks w/ the setting at 3 on the feeder. I should add we've been working w/ another pool company to straighten this out; he's the one who told us to use all the shock. I use the AquaChek 6 way test strips & they're constantly reading ZERO FREE CHLORINE. Everything else is decent for now. Here's the water test results we had done yesterday: Free Chlorine-.55ppm, Total Chlorine-5.16ppm, Combined Chlorine- 4.61ppm, PH-6.8, Hardness-231ppm, Alkalinity-112ppm, Cyanuric Acid-21ppm, Copper-.05ppm, Iron-.06ppm, Nitrate-6ppm & Borate-60ppm. We do have well water which is why we had water trucked out to top off the pool. We do have confidence in the person helping us, but I wanted to know if anyone else has experienced this or if anyone has any explanation as to why this happened. Could it be the mild winter, the 80 degree temps we had in March, the fact the pool had 2 tarps covering it w/ water in between of the tarps (this was how the pool was closed using 2 tarps)? The pool guy also told us this is becoming a more common thing where the pool store is located as well as further north of the store. So much so that they just started carrying 25# buckets of AquaBlast shock instead of just the 1# bags we've been using. Any thoughts are appreciated. Thanks! p.s. I should also add the pool's no longer cloudy, almost totally clear!

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    Default Re: Zero Free Chlorine Reading

    There have been ALOT of poeple on this forum this year suffering huge chlorine demand at opening - the warm winter / spring may very well be a contributor.

    The short of it is that there are bacteria that can thrive in an unsanitized (closed) pool that convert Cyanuric acid to amonia or urea. These bacteria by products will be cleared by chlorine but it will take alot of chlorine.

    Do you know what your Cyanuric Acid (CYA) level was before closing?

    Do you know what chemicals are in Aqua Blast shock? Tell us if you can.

    You can't trust the test strips. They are unreliable and potentially misleading. The best thing you can do to free yourself, take charge, and clean up your pool is to buy a Taylor K-2006 test kit (or the K-2006C - larger quantities). Please see How-to-Get-the-Right-Testkits-for-your-Pool. While waiting for the K-2006, pick up a cheap OTO-phenol red test kit wall mart probably has 'em. Some wall marts have the "HTH 6-way test kit" pick that up if you see it.

    The people here will help you take control of your pool, but, if you end up bouncing between the advice here and the pool store or pool service, your posts will get less attention.

    For now, pick up the OTO (or HTH 6-way from wall mart) and alot of plain, unscented generic 6% bleach. You'll need seven gallons to get to a shock value of 12ppm from your present 0ppm. Put that in as soon as you can, let it mix for a couple hours measure again. You need to bring the chlorine up to shock level and keep it there until the CC (combined chlorine) clears.

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    Default Re: Zero Free Chlorine Reading

    Wow, we call that being "pool-stored". As Dave said, you'd be doing yourself a HUGE favor to get your own test kit and run away from your pool store. The kit is easy to use, reliable, and doesn't have selling you more stuff to throw at your pool as a motivator. It can be gotten at a really good price online, or through the link in my sig.

    The reason you're not getting a chlorine reading is likely that the chlorine levels are probably bleaching out the strips. In most cases, strips are good for telling you if there IS or IS NOT chlorine in the water, but not reliable for telling you HOW MUCH. And in cases of high chlorine, they bleach out and are completely useless.

    I also have a problem with the test results that you printed out from the store--they appear to be computer-generated results that were acqured by reading strips. No CYA test that I know of can discern a CYA level less than 30 ppm, so I especially don't trust that one. If you have a pool store near you that uses drop-based testing, then try taking a sample there.

    You also need to decide, as Dave mentioned, whether you want us to help you get it cleared up, or whether you're going to go with the pool store advice. We don't mean any offense, but quite often our advice conflicts with what pool stores advise, because we're giving advice based on tested, proven methods in our own pools, not advice geared toward selling you anything. So..if you try to merge advice from both places, you'll likely be wasting time and your money, and frankly, we are at the peak of our season so time is sort of critical when we have so many folks needing help. I know that we can help you get it swim-ready, we just need to know if that's what you want us to do.
    Janet

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    Default Re: Zero Free Chlorine Reading

    @ Janet -- in this case, I'm not sure yet that she's been pool-stored. If she closed last year with very high CYA, and it all converted to ammonia . . . then she may be simply cleaning up the mess. What I'm not sure about is the Aqua Blast product -- I can't find out what it is, and she would have had to have EXTREMELY high ammonia to consume 100lbs of cal hypo.

    @ killr
    1. Get that OTO kit, like Janet told you.
    2. Tell me EXACTLY what the Aqua Blast chemical ingredients are, and ALSO the EPA Est. (establishment) and product numbers are.
    3. Add borax (20 Mule Team, detergent section of Walmart) 2 boxes at a time (slowly, to the skimmer, pump on). Wait 4 hours, and test pH with the OTO kit. Repeat till your pH is getting near 7.8.

    For what it's worth, we find that pool store computerized strip testing is VERY unreliable. That said, this portion of the results
    Free Chlorine-.55ppm
    Combined Chlorine- 4.61ppm
    Total Chlorine-5.16ppm
    suggests that you may have closed with very high CYA last year, and ended up with sky-high ammonia this spring. Ammonia takes HUGE quantities of chlorine to clean up -- but I'm suspicious that the Aqua Blast product is some highly diluted form of 'shock'.

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    Default Re: Zero Free Chlorine Reading

    A HUGE thanks everyone for your suggestions, I really appreciate it!

    @ Big Dave: We just bought the house last October & the pool was already closed, so we don't know the cyanuric acid readings. Had we known more about water testing we definately would have asked the previous homeowner a ton of pool questions. The chemicals in Aqua Blast are 68% calcium hypochlorite. The previous owner did leave a water test kit, but it's the Taylor K-1001 so we're heading out to get the one you recommended (the K-2006 one).

    @ Aylad: The water test wasn't a strip test, they used a syringe type thing & poked a hole in a small foil sealed retangular container squirting the water into the container. They then placed the container in a small machine thing which was how they got the water analysis. Is this what's called a drop test?

    @ PoolDoc: The Aqua Blast chemicals say 68% calcium hypochlorite & "other ingredients" 32%, contains no cyanuric acid. It's manufactured by a company here in MI called KB Leisure, Ltd. & there's no product # other than the bar code #'s. And yes, the Aqua Blast as well as the Induclor we're using now is a shock treatment. What would cause the high ammonia?

    Good news is we finally have freed the chlorine. Hopefully it'll be in the high 70's tomorrow so I can get in the pool & brush the walls instead of walking around the pool & doing it!
    ~Sue **Domesticated Country Diva**
    25K gal 18x36 IG vinyl liner - 4' shallow, 10' deep, new Hayward filter installed 2011, chlorine feeder.

  6. #6
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    Default Re: Zero Free Chlorine Reading

    + CAUTION: you can NOT "head out" to get the K-2006. As far as we know, no pool stores ANYWHERE sell them. They are only available online. (Why would a pool store sell a kit that makes them obsolete?)

    + I'm not familiar with testing that used sealed cells - it is potentially an rather accurate photometric method. However, because of the limitations of photometric testing for chlorine, you STILL need either the K-1515 or K-2006 titration.

    + "68% calcium hypochlorite" is the good stuff -- but you need to test your TA and Calcium. Odds are, it's way too high now. Until you've tested, don't operate an SWCG or a heater, if you have those.

    + The high ammonia would be caused by bacteria eating (pretty much literally) chlorine stabilizer (CYA) and pooping (again, pretty much literally) ammonia. *IF* this happened, you probably had high CYA last fall, and none now. If that's not the case, we need to back up and reconsider: we're not aware of any other routine events that cause such enormous chlorine demand, except inch-thick layers of algal slime.

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