Unable to maintain chlorine levels

[medstudy]

This morning the chlorine level was undetectable. I went to the Wal-Mart and bought 10 one gallon jugs of the generic bleach which is 6% sodium hypochlorite. I put in 6 gallons. We will see what happens!

[waterbear]

That should bring you up to 18 ppm chlorine....check your chlorine levels througout the day and if they drop add more bleach. You have to keep doing this until the chlorine is holding...it might take a lot of bleach.

[medstudy]

Just an update. I put 6 gallons of the 6%bleach in this am at about 10am. I rechecked the levels at 3pm and they were down to zero. I only had 4 gallons left so I put it in. It sounds like I am going to have to make another dash to the Wal-Mart

[waterbear]

Keep it up and you will find that you solve the problem!

[medstudy]

Well, I am still keeping up the fight, but now a new problem.

I am leaving to go out of town for 7 days and I still don't have a stable concentration yet. ( I put in another 6 gallons today). What would you guys do? I have an automatic cover (saftey cover) for the pool. I was thinking about just covering it for the 7 days and leaving it alone. I just can't afford a pool man yet and we don't know any of our neighbors yet (we just moved in).

[Poolsean]

What are your stabilizer and pH levels? If the pH is too high and the stabilizer is too low, you're going to go through alot of chlorine. What is your combined chlorine level? What are your Total Alkalinity and Calcium Hardness?
How many hours per day is your pump running?

You're best to take a water sample and have it tested (or test it yourself) and report the results back here. We can advise better with this information.

If these are within proper levels, you may want to ....gulp...get a cheap chlorine tablet floater and let it float in the pool, but make sure your pump is running the whole time. This will add chlorine, stabilizer and drop the pH slightly while you're gone. It's a better option than letting the pool turn green.