New Pool Owner

[PoolDoc]

. . . membership upgraded.

[mchale76]

Thanks for the upgrade...nice to see everything.

This morning's test:
pH 7.4
Free 9.5
CC .2
CYA 35

A couple days ago, I saw a link to a pool chemical calculator...but I can't seem to find it this morning. It seems that my CYA is finally going up, the dot never used to disappear. I am using the last of my chlorine tabs and then plan to go with the BBB method, but would like to have my head wrapped around the basics of it a bit more. What should I do concerning the CYA?

[PoolDoc]

I could give you the link to the pool calculator and I will if you insist, but I'd rather not. It tends to encourage people to obsess over numbers, rather than focusing on their pool.

=> Your CYA is fine.
=> Your pH is fine.
=> Your chlorine is fine, if a bit high. (Shoot for FC= 10% of your CYA level, unless there's a problem).
=> Don't keep testing CYA: it only goes up when you add some (via stabilizer granules, or dichlor and trichlor use), and it only goes down when water drains out of the pool (backwashing, leaks, but NOT evaporation!)

When testing chlorine, use the 10 ml sample size (1 drop = 0.5 ppm) rather than the 25 ml sample (1 drop = 0.2 ppm). Knowing your chlorine level to the nearest 0.5 ppm is plenty accurate, and uses less reagent.