water problems

[CarlD]

Poor Guy! You've been colossally "POOL-STORED"!

That's why we exist--to make sure you NEVER get pool-stored again. They take advantage of pool owners who lack good knowledge and are scared they have "ruined" their pool and will have to drain and refill.

First: You do not and will never need to add calcium to your pool again, unless you line it with concrete and plaster! Calcium's ONLY function is to prevent the water from leeching calcium out of the concrete or plaster--and you have a vinyl-lined pool. That's why it's cloudy. And that's why you don't need calcium.

2nd: All these gazillion bags of "shock" have probably unbalanced your pH and over-added stabilizer--unless they were Cal-Hypo which adds.....calcium. You now should stick with bleach or liquid chlorine (same thing, only stronger).

3rd: We WILL need a set of numbers. The pool store should give them to you since you've just put their kids through half a semester at a private college--least they can do. We will need:

Chlorine measures
FC (Free Chlorine--the good stuff)
CC (Combined Chlorine or Chloramines--the used up stuff) OR
TC (Total Chlorine--either CC or TC is enough because TC=FC+CC and if we have 2 of the 3 we know the third)

Acidity measure:
pH: This tells us how acid, alkaline or neutral the pool is

Chlorine measures how you are sanitizing. pH measures acidity. They are the most important measures.

But the others, while ancillary, are needed, too.

T/A (Total Alkalinity--mis-named but tells us how well your water maintains pH)
CYA (Cyanuric Acid, aka, Stabilizer, aka, Conditioner. A 2-edged sword. Too little and you cannot keep FC up. Too much and you have troubles fighting algae)
CH (Calcium Hardness, or Hardness. Usually you don't care about this in a vinyl pool--unless it's too high from too much calcium flakes and/or Cal-Hypo)

That's it! Acid demand, base demand, phosphates--all those tests are USELESS

Finally: when you next go to the pool store, they will try to tell you that your phosphate level is too high and you need phosphate remover. It's expensive and you do NOT need it--but it's the latest scam to scare people and separate them from their money.

They will also try to scare you with talk of "Total Dissolved Solids" especially if they find out you are using bleach. Ignore them. Politely decline and don't waste time arguing. It's nonsense. If your TDS is too high, it's because THEY told you to put in too darned much calcium that you don't need!

Good luck!

PS: Don't feel too bad--we have ALL been pool-stored at one time or another. We've all learned from the experience. Funny thing, the pool stores NEVER figure out that if they give good guidance, people will pick out THEIR shop to buy parts, toys, pumps, and those chemicals they cannot get at the grocery store or Home Depot/Lowes.