I wish I had found this forum and read every word of it earlier. We have 52" 24' round pool, which I believe has a volume of 13,600 gallons. I'm about to close our pool for the first time so I want to be extra careful that it's balanced. I don't want a mess on my hands in spring.

I took it in to a local pool place that provides more accurate water testing than many of the home tests. I found that my pH and alkalinity were high (7.9 and 216) despite the fact that my stupid test strips had been showing the pH at about 7.2. I added about 1.5 quarts of muriatic acid and went back to the same place a few days later for another test. I probably should have added more, but I wanted to see the effect first.

I found that my pH was still 7.8 and my total alkalinity was still 176. The guy at the pool store told me to add 1 gallon of muriatic acid. I thought that sounded like too much, especially at one time. I asked him 'you're sure one gallon and your sure all at one time'. He confirmed that it would not be a problem.

I added the gallon of muriatic acid two days ago. I did try to spread it out since I figured I probably shouldn't be adding so much at one time. I just borrowed a neighbor's 'drop' test kit and tested the water. It tells me the pH is 7.2+ and the total alkalinity is about 160-170 ppm. (Seemed to be 16 or 17 drops when it changed from purple to clear.)

I am going to take one more water sample back to the pool store to verify my results, but my question are...

1. Are these results in an acceptable range to consider the pool water balanced and ready for closing or do I need to bring the alkanity down and the pH up?

2. If not, how do I bring my akalinity down to closer to 100 ppm without lowering my pH?

Thank you.

Dave