new to the forum / pool details

[argile]

Thanks for the quick responses.

To try to get my pool on the right track asap, I checked for the hth 6 way test kit at my local walmart online. They had one in stock. I get there, and it's definitely been tampered with. So, I got the 6 way test strips instead. I know that's prob. not the best way, but I figured I'd try that while waiting for the super test kit to arrive. Results from the test strips were as follows:

Free Chlorine: about 4
Bromine: about 8
pH: 7.5
TA: 40
TH: 100
CYA: 0

I tested twice and the results were the same both times. Free Chlorine and Bromine was between the two shades of pink on the box, hence the "about."

Is this information useful, or should I not have bought the crap test strips in the first place?

[aylad]

Well......strips are pretty much ok for telling you if there"is" or "is not" chlorine in the pool--but are not reliable enough to tell you "how much", especially if you're trying to correct a problem. If they have the cheapie OTO kit (red and yellow drops for pH and chlorine), it wouldn't be the best thing, but would be better than the strips. They only test for chlorine up to 3 or 5 ppm, depending on which one you get, but you can dilute your pool water with distilled water and force the kit to test higher until your 2006 kit gets there.

By the way, you don't have a bromine pool, so there's no bromine in there unless you've added it......

To continue clearing up the green, if you really have 0 CYA, you need to have your chlorine up between 12-15 ppm, and hold it there, until the green starts to die off and become cloudy/blue.

Janet