Quote Originally Posted by bssage View Post
I was under the impression that it is hard to maintain the Chlorine levels until the PH is where it should be. Did I misread that?
No, but it's not particularly true, or relevant.

You need to both maintain chlorine levels AND lower your pH. 1 gallon of 6% bleach will add about 6 ppm of chlorine to your pool. If you add that gallon each EVENING, your pool will stay in pretty good shape, while you take care of other things.

Read the muriatic acid page linked in my signature. Then get a gallon or two from Lowes, etc, and start lowering your pH. I'd recommend an 'estimated' pint of acid poured directly from the bottle into the pool. Do NOT try to measure it. Wait 4 hours, before retesting and dosing if necessary.

Get some dichlor, which will raise both chlorine AND stabilizer:
24 lbs PoolBrand bagged shock @ Sams Club
Kem-Tek Dichlor 22 lbs @ Amazon
Read the Intex recipe: http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?17055