Can't control CHlorine levels..

[Anonymous European in California]

Hello all.
Last sunday we bought an above ground, frame pool. 18ft diameter. Installed fine, although we noticed there was a slight dip on one end, bought some slabs to even it up and when we filled it (2 days later) one leg had sank a little. There is about a 2" drop. I have been reassured (thanks google) that this should not pose a problem.

We bought a liquid water testing kit. (we have tropical fish and we only use liquid testers, so this made sense). Just a HTH liquid test from Walmart. We also bought a HTH start up and maintenance box too.

I added a chlorine tablet into the filter let it run a about 4 hours. Next day it read '0'.
Threw in 1lb of Shock powder, this raised the Chlorine a little and the pH. Next day tested again, Chlorine was back to '0', but the pH was a little higher. Our Alkaline wasn't registering so we went out and bought some HTH liquid to raise the alkaline, threw that in that evening along with a new chlorine tablet.
Next morning we tested and the alkaline was at 80ppm, pH was about 7.2, and FAC was at '0' again.

Went out today and bought some liquid chlorine. After the filter had been running I dumped 70 fl oz (as recommended) into the pool. We registered 8 FAC. We thought Eureka, the chlorine smell had gone now too.

2 hours later we are back to 0 FAC. We tested Ammonia levels and they are at 0.

At this point I am pretty stumped... your advice is greatly appreciated.

[Anonymous European in California]

Tests Today:
CYA - 0
FAC - 0
pH - 7.5
Alk - 80

I went back to the 'setup box' we bought from Walmart and it didn't supply any Stabilizing fluid, so I presume this is the problem. Going to go buy some chemicals to raise to 50ppm and then add Chlorine tomorrow morning and see what happens.

[BigDave]

You are right that you need stabilizer - chlorine will be very quickly destroyed by the sun without it.

Ben wrote a fantastic startup guide for pools like yours, find it here: http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?17055-Super-simple-pool-chemistry-recipe-for-Intex-type-pools-start-up-amp-routine-care. I don't know what you've done so far, but reading through it should help. Reading through the stickies here, on the forum and reading through the material on PoolSolutions.com will help alot too.

[mroll]

Tests Today:
CYA - 0
FAC - 0
pH - 7.5
Alk - 80

I went back to the 'setup box' we bought from Walmart and it didn't supply any Stabilizing fluid, so I presume this is the problem. Going to go buy some chemicals to raise to 50ppm and then add Chlorine tomorrow morning and see what happens.

I raised my CYA last year by using some dichlor powder I got from Leslies. Then went to the BBB method. Good Luck..

[PoolDoc]

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