next steps for well water pool?

[PoolDoc]

Hi 33;

1. Turn off the Nature2, unless no one in your family has light colored hair. When it works at all, it adds copper, and copper turns light hair green.

2. Go to Lowes (HomeDepot, possibly a big AG supply) and get 4 gallons of PLAIN (not safe, not diluted, not non-fuming) 31.45% muriatic acid. Get some nitrile rubber gloves and safety glasses, if you don't already have some. READ the muriatic acid page in my signature, and then begin adding acid, 1/2 gallon at a time, till your pH is near 7.0. Keep it there till your alkalinity is below 100 ppm.

3. Go to the Sams Club in Peoria, and get their PoolBrand bagged dichlor shock (24lbs). Sams is one of the VERY few retailers selling undiluted, unblended dichlor, and the price for this is excellent. Dichlor tends to lower pH and alkalinity over time, so this is a good product for you, at least for now. On your pool, 24lbs will add about 70 ppm of chlorine and about 60 ppm of CYA (stabilizer), which is about perfect. Since it's bagged, you can buy 2 boxes if you like; what you don't use will keep fairly well till next year. Alternatively, order the Kem-Tek dichlor from Amazon. But do NOT buy any other dichlor, without first becoming an expert 'label inspector' -- most of the dichlor currently sold by Costco, Kmart, Walmart, Lowes, pool stores, etc. is a MESS.

24 lbs PoolBrand bagged shock @ Sams Club
Kem-Tek Dichlor 22 lbs @ Amazon

4. You'll need to switch to another form of chlorination once you've used about 1/2 of the dichlor. Look for a source of PLAIN 6% household bleach. You want a store brand that turns over quickly, so it's fresh -- bleach loses strength rapidly at summer temps. Walmart is usually ideal.

5. If that's not available, you can use cal hypo -- but it adds both calcium and alkalinity, and is tricky to use on a cartridge filter pool.

6. You need a spare cartridge, so you can rotate the one you have. But Hayward's website is down at the moment, so I can't look that up.

7. Run your pump on LOW speed, 24/7, EXCEPT when you are vacuuming, or cleaning up leaf debris via your skimmer, after a storm.

8. Meanwhile, add 3 gallons of household bleach EVERY evening, till you can begin using the dichlor.

[33feet]

thank you for the guidance.
July 8 evening added 2 gal bleach ad one gallon muriatic acid
July 9 7am
ph 7.5
total chlorine 8-10+

Have a cartridge ordered; will take off Nature2.
Will continue to run pump 24/7 on low.
will add more muriatic acid

water is clear and sparkly. No metal deposits! Been rinsing the filter about every 2 days.

Thanks again!

[33feet]

Step from above:
"2. Go to Lowes (HomeDepot, possibly a big AG supply) and get 4 gallons of PLAIN (not safe, not diluted, not non-fuming) 31.45% muriatic acid. Get some nitrile rubber gloves and safety glasses, if you don't already have some. READ the muriatic acid page in my signature, and then begin adding acid, 1/2 gallon at a time, till your pH is near 7.0. Keep it there till your alkalinity is below 100 ppm."

question: I need to to have ph near 7.0 and alkalinity below 100ppm before doing anything else (except adding bleach daily and removing Nature2)? I think that may take awhile!

[33feet]

I found some values on our well water:

Calcium 66
Magnesium 33
Alkalinity 380.
Iron 1.78

This evening:
ph 7.0
alkalinity 210
FC 0.6
CC 0.2

I will keep working to get alkalinity down. Then what?

[aylad]

Just keep chlorine in the pool so it doesn't go green on you. What is your current CYA level?

Janet

[33feet]

Forgot to post that.
Cya. 0. (Or at least less than 30 there was no cloudiness at all with the test)

[PoolDoc]

Were you able to get the dichlor?

You need to add chlorine; you need to add stabilizer, AND you need to keep your pH down. And, dichlor will do all three things!

Note, that this doesn't mean dichlor will ALWAYS be the best chemical for you: when your alkalinity is low enough, and your stabilizer is high enough, using dichlor would NOT be a good idea. But, for now, it's a GREAT idea!