First test readings of season

[michael3]

Were going to try the turn everything off for 48 hrs and keep chlorine over 20 and see if anything will settle approach, that Ben recommended, make sense that maybe with everything still it will settle. When we first started this season I was just dumping bleach and for a very brief period I got the start of the water from going green to a grey color. Ran short of funds and it went green again, when I started back that when I figured I was short on stabalizer and began throwing shock a it, never got that grey look back, just like green and cloudiness

[Watermom]

Good luck. Keep us posted how it is going.

[stma]

@Michael3: Any headway ?? i think i may be seeing a little bottom..although we have had torrential rains here the past 36 hours... Dont know if i need to start the "holding" process agin due to the rain...Let us know..

[michael3]

No headway at all here, tomorrow morning will be my 48 hr mark but its showing no signs of a slow settle. Tomorrow afternoon I will probably start a partial drain and refill, I am also going to install a valve between pump and filter and see if I can slow my water flow. Want to also check my sand again, I'm not convinced the sand I put in new is big enough, it seemed really fine

[PoolDoc]

@stma, I'm moving your posts back to your thread. Let's discuss Michael's pool here,
http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?20216
and your pool, there:
http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?20437

@Michael3: you may want to reconsider the partial drain -- if you drain 1/2 of your pool, and refill, your pool will be LESS cloudy, but it will still be cloudy. Unfortunately, once you get a cloud of particles that won't settle and won't filter . . . it can take a VERY long time to remove them unless you install a DE filter. Even if you drain 90%, you are likely to have a 'hazy' pool when you refill.

Of course, you do not want to drain more than you can safely do -- with an AG pool, you may be able to drain 100%, but with partially buried, or oval pools, you may only be able to drain 80% without risking pool damage.

Also, I would encourage you to make SURE you're good to go, on refill. You got where you are, thanks to algae and additives. You want to make sure you're prepared to avoid a recurrence. For example, if you are going on vacation in 2 weeks, you might want to hold off on the drain till you get back. You'd hate to drain, refill, and then re-cycle due to algae while on vacation!

At a minimum, you probably want:
+ A K2006 + any refills needed.
+ A bucket of undiluted dichlor (Sams Club or Amazon)
+ Floater and some tabs, if you have a vacation to manage in the next few weeks.
+ 2 - 4 quarts of polyquat

Everything else, you should be able to get locally.

[michael3]

Thanks Ben, I really dont want to do the drain/refill. I just got my shut off valve installed between pump and filter, got psi reduced down from 17 to 10 and the flow into the pool has slowed. Will keep the chlorine up and run it like this and see what happens. At what pressure do you think it would be ok to try and add alittle DE to the skimmer? Cheapest I have found that stuff is lowes and they want $24 for a 24 lb box, I dont need that much lol

[PoolDoc]

You can add DE at any time. But test it first: if it blows through the filter and out the returns, you need to work on filter (slowing flow, adding sand) before adding more.

Buying small amounts of DE is hard, and if you want to clean up a cloudy pool, it may end up taking quite a bit anyhow, since filter runs may be very short. If you store the leftovers in a covered plastic bucket, it will last indefinitely.