Baquacil to Bleach conversion (help needed)

[CAPTCHEMCL]

Hello Revhendrix,

We just completed our conversion over Memorial Day weekend so my advice will be from a satisfied newbie to a "new" newbie!
In answer to your questions, I think you will only need the Clorox (6%) but buy a lot. We have a 14000 gal IG Fiberglass and we used about 65-70 gallons. We found that by testing it every 2 hours (since we were home) and keeping the FC at 15ppm (free chlorine which you will test with the FAS-DPD kit) the conversion went extremely quickly (started on Friday night, were in the pool on Monday afternoon!) We tested and added bleach every 2 hours to keep it to 15ppm. (Make sure you continue to backwash the filter, watch the pressure, if it builds, it is getting restricted with the "gunk" from the pool. We backwashed several times per day.) When adding the bleach, be ready, the color and cloudiness will shock you the first 4 times (minimum) you put bleach in the pool. I guess you could use the shock from the pool place but it may have other ingredients or solids in it that you do not need. The bleach worked EXTREMELY WELL!!! We put the bleach in with the filter running normally, pouring it at the return to the deep end. Your goal is to keep the pool chlorine level at 15ppm till it maintains that reading overnight AND to have a CC (combined Chlorine) reading of 0. Once you achieve that, you can add your stabilizer and that is where the sock comes in. We put ours in an old white cotton sock and tied it to the "eye" that the rope between the shallow and deep end goes through. That worked just fine, took about a week to get all dissolved. As far as harming the vinyl, I have seen other threads on this site regarding that and it seems that 15ppm will not harm the vinyl (anyone can correct me here if I am wrong on that issue). Changing the sand is not difficult, but if it was changed last year, I doubt if you need it changed. You can ad a little Diatamatious (sp) Earth (DE as it is called) to your sand filter, that will help it get smaller particles out of the water.
You will not be sorry you are doing this, we have never (I repeat NEVER) had water so clean and clear!!! I cannot say enough about finding this site!
Looking at your ph, it does look a little high since other threads here have said that ph a little lower works best with the CLorox level. Ours during the conversion was about 7.2-7.5. When we started this, we knew NOTHING about what the water chemistry should be and I was extremely overwhelmed! I had Ben rush ship a kit and BOY WAS THAT WORTH IT!!! In just a few short days, I feel I learned what it takes to get the water right and how to test it to make sure it is right. I learned all the acronyms (i.e. FC, CC, TC, ALK....etc) all of which I knew none of. I was amazed how quickly I understood it all once I got the kit and started testing.

Good Luck and keep us posted. Give it a few days, it is SOOOOO worth it!

[revhendrix]

Thanks for your responses and here's an update...

We began yesterday by buying 5 cases (I know I'll need more) of 6% bleach and had a final water test done at the pool store:

Bacquacil: 10
Ph: 8.0
TA: 90
Ca: 110

We put in 5 gal of bleach at 7:30 pm and inserted a nylon sock over the skimmer basket. The water immediately turned pea green and I was excited to see it (for now)!! At 11:30 pm we checked the FC levels and they were almost nonexistant (maybe 1.5 to be generous) so I put in 4.5 gal of bleach (per the bleach calc), backwashed and rinsed the sock (there was an orange gummy substance already there).

At 7:30 am I checked the FC levels and they were at 6 so I put in 3 gal of bleach and again backwashed and rinsed the sock. I'll check it again in a couple of hours. Here's a few more questions:

Do I need to vacum to waste?? If so, when and how much. I really would prefer not to do this too much becuse I don't want to have to refill the pool.

Do I need to worry about the other water chemical readings?? My Ph is a bit high and I'm wondering if I ignore everything but the FC until the process is done.

I can't thank this forum enough...........and I can't wait for this to be over.

[CAPTCHEMCL]

My recommendation would be to not worry about the other chemicals till you reach the goals of 15ppm overnight with 0ppm combined chlorine. As far as sweeping to waste, I suppose you could do that but I think I would wait and let the clorox do its thing, kill off the baquasil (and anything else), let it start to settle out on the bottom then sweep to waste. Making sure you backwash your filter periodically so that it does not get overloaded with the junk it is filtering out. The rest of your readings may not change much (ours hardly changed at all from the beginning till we were done). The clorine level is the most important thing right now. Check it often during the day and keep it at 15ppm. It will burn off quickly till it eats up the baquasil. (Again, anyone reading this who knows more please correct me if I am mis-stating any information. I just completed our conversion with no problems and that is all I have to go by...that and the multitude of postings I read throughout the process!)

Again, trust me, in a few days you will not believe how beautiful the water will be!

[chemstick]

I just finished my conversion to chlorine from baquacil (we are in CT, by the way). I even started dumping in bleach with my baquacil level around 30. I began on Wed and by Friday evening the pool was crystal clear. I believe it went fast because of the "beautiful" cloudy, cold, rainy weather and I was able to keep a high level of chlorine around the clock (and don't worry about bleaching the liner at these levels). I just changed the sand and it was very gunky; you should probably go ahead and change yours anyway. I found lots of yellow stringy junk floating around and throughout. Keep the faith!!!!

[chemstick]

i forgot to add, we have a dolphin and LOVE it. got it on ebay but can't remember how much it was.

[revhendrix]

Hi - 2nd update....

Still in the process.... I'm checking the levels at least 4-6 times a day from 7:30 am to 11:30 pm. The FC levels have ranged from 6ppm to 12ppm after checking it and I've used the bleach Calc to figure out what I needed to put in for bleach to keep the levels at 15ppm.

The water has gone from merky pea green to clearish green (we can see the bottom in the shallow end).

I clear and rinse the nylon sock (on the skimmer basket), which has had orange muck on it everytime, and backwash everytime I've added bleach.

I would imagine I have a couple days left, but here are a few more questions. Thanks in advance:

1. My Ph was at 8 when I started this...when do I care about it again. Should I test the levels or wait until this is over?

2. When I backwash it's not that dirty...is this because the bacquacil is all being caught in the sock?? I really thought it would be much more dirty and cloudy. I never had the globs of orange or rust baquagunk floating..is this because I started with a low level of bacquacil (10)??

3. CYA - I know I need to do this when my conversion is over. Is the cotton sock method a good way to go and how much do I use to stablize the high levels of chlorine (20,000gal pool)?? How do I keep from adding too much stabilizer??

thanks again...REV

[eyesfinallyopened]

Rev,
I'm experiencing the same clean-looking water when I backwash, too. Very surprising. I really expected to see a lot of solids and at least the same color water as is in the pool, but maybe the water color is so bad because we're seeing the whole depth of the pool compared to the amount in the little spyglass.

I'm taking pictures as I continue the conversion and will post them when I'm done. This is soooooo time consuming, isn't it?!

--Deborah