Cloudy water

[poolpuppy]

Got a sock with stabilizer in it floating in front of output. Going to order Unicel cartridges and test kit. Right now I just want to make sure there's nothing wrong with the pump or plunger valve. I say this because the cartridge doesn't look anywhere as dirty as the ones I had with the old 1000 gph pump when first cleaning out the pool and the output didn't dimish then. They were completely covered with algae from top to bottom.
Sent pics to Admin so hope he can post them.

Also noticed a bit of water on top of the output plunger valve...not a leak, just standing water on the top. Is it possible there is an air leak in the gasket of the valve that would eventually slow down the pump output? It does not leak when the plunger valve is closed and pump off tho.

I had some HTH 6 way strips that were testing the water so far off from what the pool store tested it at that I took them back. The strips showed my levels too high for alkalinty (240) and a couple others showed colors that weren't on the container. The pool stores test showed these to be in normal ranges. Guess I got a bad batch. Expiration was 5/12. Also want to stay away from pool store so joined here.

[BigDave]

You didn't get a bad batch of strips, they just don't work - none of the batches.
This filter is working better because it's catching smaller stuff the other just passed through. It's a pain but you are cleaning the water. When the stuff is out of the water, the filter won't clog.

[poolpuppy]

Thank you. I sure have hope now. I'll keep it up and see what happens. It's Memorial Day weekend in Florida and I want to get in the pool Thanks for all your help. Will keep you posted.

[poolpuppy]

Is there a guide for how long stabilizer lasts in different sun conditions? I've searched but couldn't find anything. My pool now has no algae and is blue but still cloudy. I have the new 2500 gph pump running for over a week now, kept the chlorine at dark yellow to orange but after putting a pound in a sock over the side of the pool a week ago, it's not holding well now. Not much crud on the filter cartridge anymore and the pump doesn't slow down water output now. I want to order the 2006 kit but new tires took that $ out of my wallet so any help would be appreciated.
I don't want to add stabilizer

[PoolDoc]

Stabilizer does not deteriorate in amounts you'd notice, so long as the pool is algae and slime free.

Unfortunately, without knowing your current stabilizer (CYA ppm) level, there's no way to answer your other question, about how much chlorine you need -- since the answer to that depends on your CYA level.

[Watermom]

Walmart sometimes stocks an HTH 6-Way kit that can check CYA. That will suffice until you can order the K-2006. If they don't have it, can you let a pool store run the CYA test but just don't let them sell you a bunch of stuff! (Not a test with strips, but the "disappearing black dot test.") Then, report that back here.

[poolpuppy]

Thanks. Will take water in to test tomorrow since you said the CYA shouldn't disappear that quickly.