Hi

I have a 10,000 gal inground fresh water pool. Purex Clean and Clear 320 Cartridge type filter. 1 hp pump, also a connected (discharges to the pool) 1000 gal spa. Pump runs 8 hours a day , since I am in Southern Arizona, it is hot and sometimes afternoon rains, I feel may be I should run it for longer periods

The pool has been resurfaced Pebble tec about 2 years ago and restarted by the resurfacing company. Initially a pool guy was taking care of it. However since his service has deteriorated day to day we started to taking care by ourselves. I bought a bucket of tablets from Sam's club and kept the pool in good order for another year or so. However recently I have realized that it started to take more tablets just to keep the pool clean.

I have a 3 way HTH test kit from walmart and used it to test the Ph, Chlorine and one more thing i guess.

Anyway long story shot, this summer went for a vacation and when we return we have a green pool. Actually before we left it was greenish and cloudy (we were already giving up on it) and after finding this forum I started dumping Walmart Chlorox into the pool about the rate of 5 gallons a week or every ten days or so.

When I returned from vacation I added Chlorine tablets (3 inch) it started clearing a little bit but (we started to see the bottom of the pool at the shallow sections) still very green and I can see insects all over.

Yesterday I took a sample of the water and took it to Walmart as they now have an HTH machine which tests the strip that you dip in your sample. And my test results are ;


Free Chlorine 0 ppm
Alkalinity 80 ppm
pH 7.8
Hardness 800 ppm
CYA 200 ppm


So not looking good I guess.

As far as I understood from this forum for excessive CYA levels we need to discharge and refill the pool and I am OK with that. I am on a budget ( read I do not want to be robbed by the pool guy, they asked $ 300 just to discharge and refill the pool, using my own power and water, basically he is renting the submersible pump to me for that price, unbelievable !!!) so it will be a DIY job.

I want to buy new cartridges for the filet, on the net and at local branch of well known Pool Supply Chain they run about $ 69 each I need 4 of them.

Here are my questions, those probably have been asked before but please bear with me as I am trying to learn how to do this thing scientifically. and since this will be a start from scratch I want to do it right this time.


- I guess I need a better test kit, or is the HTH machine at local Walmart OK

- Is there a better place on the web to get the supplies at more reasonable prices, which stores other members are using to get supplies, chlorine tablets etc.

- Anything I need to do when the pool is empty ( I am planning to brush the walls with some mild detergent and clean the pop ups)

- After I discharge the pool what do I need to restart the pool. Walmart sells some HTH restart kit, but I want to do this the correct way by testing the water and adding chemicals as needed, however do not want to miss a step in the beginning. I think this is an important step to a happy and healthy pool.

Thanks very much

Matt