I've had my pool for a while and haven't had any problems. This year, it was opened on Friday, and when we tested the water on Saturday, we were told by a local company going out of business that we were "locked". He didn't try to sell me anything, but told me to call the company who does our opening and closing.

I had another sample tested elsewhere and was told that it had similar numbers to all the other pool water she'd been seeing, and sold us a bunch of crap to add to get the numbers right. Among these was 3 gallons of liquid shock.

Still no Free Chlorine reading. So I called the opening company who assured me that I did not have any problem, and he advised me to add 5 pounds of shock, which I did. Still no FC reading.

I will be purchasing a better test kit this afternoon on my way home, but my most recent test - on a dip stick test kit are as follows:

Free chlorine = 0
Total chlorine = 1-3 (ideal range)
Alkalinity = 80-100 (ideal range)
pH = 7.2 - 7.6 (ideal range)
hardness = 250-450 (low)

Some other info:
18' x 36' Roman Shaped pool
DE Filter, currently running 24 hours/day.
Water looks pretty clear. There is still some algae in the pool that we will be vacuuming up, from opening.

My question is whether I have a problem or not. Obviously we need to complete the vacuuming from the opening of the pool (we vacuumed for many hours over the weekend and rinsed the bag out every hour). Beyond the obvious, from what I have read on the internet, it looks like we have a big problem and we need to superchlorinate the pool. Is this right? I did a calculation I came across and it sounds like I'll need 16 pounds of EITHER non-chlorine shock OR chlorine shock to fix the problem.

I want to know if this will do it or is it possible to need another 16 pounds. Also, how is this added? Mixed in a bucket of water one pound at a time? I read that it will corrode the metal in the pool to do it all at the same time. So, over how long should this be added? I don't know if this is even the recommended approach.

OH - and the other problem to note is that we have a Luau scheduled for 6/15. PLEASE HELP!