Hello,

I've been working on getting my just opened 30,000 gal pool to go from black to blue (current status - blue green and cloudy).

My pH is reading REALLY low. It doesn't even put any color on my multi-test pool strips (which start at 6.8).
I have two sets of homebrewing strips I tried out in the pool - 0-14 & 4.8-5.8. The 0-14 strips put the pH roughly in between 4 & 6, and it looks like the 4.8-5.8 strips are reading 5.0. (These strips are a few years old - what's their shelf life?)

So, after reading this site, I dumped in two boxes of borax and got no reading this morning (mutli-test 6.8 min only, I was in a hurry) on the pH again.

Could my pH really be that low?

If so, what should I do? More borax? Bite the bullet and pay for Soda Ash? Lye?

Thanks,
Matt

(I've also dumped probably over 50 lbs of Cholrine shock in over the last couple days, and still can't hold a non-zero free chlorine reading - could the pH mess up the strips?)