Opened early

[jbalcorn]

Here in cleveland we just had our first 70 degree day. I'm looking to replace the broken heater (been broken much longer than I've had the pool) so I thought I'd pull the cover off and start working my water.

Pool was very dirty, with green algae. 4 dead chipmunks, too.

I put in 6 gal of bleach 2 days ago to start, just to try to start killing the nasty stuff.

25,000 Gal inground vinyl pool. Used only bleach last year.
Temp: VERY cold.
FC: 0
CC: .5
Alk: 110
CYA: 0
Ph: 7.2

I "shocked" with 8 gals of 5.25% bleach after taking measurements. Should I get some polyquat? I scrubbed the pool and the dirt and whatever algae there was came up very easily, I got the pump turned on and the filter is now on for the summer.

Do I need polyquat? I had NO algae at all last year (my first with a pool), so I'm not 100% sure what to do. I assume that my next step is to raise the CYA, but should I do that first, or algaecide? Or should I just put in some borax (I like to keep my pool 7.8 or so) and avoid the algaecide?

I have tomorrow off, so that's my day to do whatever work I need to do on the pool!

(Questions about heater will be asked in a different thread)

[Watermom]

Polyquat algaecide is a better preventative than cure. I would say skip it and just keep hammering it with bleach. I also wouldn't worry about cya until you kill the algae. Test your water 3x a day and each time shock it back up to around 8ppm. The key to killing algae is to maintain the high cl level and not let it yo-yo up and down. I also would not raise your ph right now. Chlorine is most effective at fighting algae when the ph is a little low. As long as you are above 7.0, I would leave ph alone. After you get the pool cleared, then you can add some Borax and raise it a little. Hope this helps.

Watermom

[jbalcorn]

That helps a lot! 8ppm bleach, testing as often as possible. got it.

Hmmm, maybe I'm not in as bad shape as I thought - I just saw Watermom's picture. As much as the bottom of the pool was covered with dirt and algae, the water was clear - I could see the bottom. I guess that means it's in good shape. ????

(I have a mesh cover, so there was a lot of dirt last year, too).