Bleach and Chlorinators

[zelmo]

I am concerned about damaging my solar cover by adding the strong concentration of bleach and water, and I'm wary of dumping it into the skimmer. Now that I am using bleach the Hayward automatic chlorinator is not doing anything. Has anyone tried putting the bleach into those since it is located downstream from the filter and heater? Seams like it should mix the bleach with pool water and return it in a diluted state.

[prh129]

If you pour your bleach into the skimmer it is getting diluted - first if your pump runs at 30 GPM, that would be 1 gallon of water every 2 seconds going through the pump. How long would it take to pour in a gallon of bleach? If you tried to do it as fast as possible, I would guess it takes at least 10 seconds so at the bare minimum you have diluted the bleach 1:5 before it even hits the pool. Then when it does hit the pool, the return is several inches below the surface where the solar cover is so even if you have the jet pointed up (which you probably don't) the bleach gets further diluted before it would ever get to the cover. After you finish pouring the bleach, then you have water without the added bleach continuously coming out behind it to keep pushing it away and quickly mixing it with the rest of the pool water. I don't see how the bleach could possibly damage the solar cover unless you add enough to bring the entire pool too high - I can't recall if my solar cover mfg. recommends not using the cover when shocking or not.

Peter

[zelmo]

I wasn't worried so much about the solar cover when putting bleach in the skimmer as I was the pump and heater. Won't the bleach damage seals?