jo,
I'm sorry if you misunderstood, I was referring to the first post where poolmom06 said she was lowering her ph because it measured 8.2 - I was just making a note that when you have very high chlorine levels in the water the ph test can give a false high reading. It happened to me, luckily I remember reading that info on the forum and waited to retest my ph when the chlorine level came back down - it was normal. So if I had added acid when I thought my ph was over 8, I would have taken the ph way below 7, which is acidic and can cause damage.