Chlorine Lock ????

[waterbear]

Thank for all your replies , my numbers stated were corect :

Total Chlorine 4.6

Free Chlorine 0

The pool store guy said to dump 2 gallons of amonnia in to break up the organics ???? but according to your replies it sounds like high ammonia is the problem !!! Do I need to drop the water level ?? if so how much ??/ THANKS

Pool store guy missed the mark. Adding anhydrous ammonia to a pool with algae and then shocking will produce monochloramine which will quickly kill the algae http://www.poolsolutions.com/tips/tip08.html but it creates a hugh chlorine demand and you will have NO FC and all CC. http://www.poolsolutions.com/tips/tip40.html

It is NOT what you want to do when you already have a situation where you have all CC and no FC. My suggestion is to test for ammonia using an aquarium test kit. If you have a lot of ammonia in the water then all you can do is either drain and refill to dilute it and then shock or shock repeatedly with bleach. Non chlorine shock is not that effective against ammonia and CC that have already formed. Shocking with chorine and UV from sunlight are.