Ascorbic Acid Treatment

[Chrissymok]

This is our first season owning a pool (came with the house we bought). After opening and running the pool for a week we started to notice stains that, with the help of this forum, we determined to be from metals in the water. After lowering the ph and chlorine we used a metal out product and ascorbic acid to get rid of the stains. The ph is now back to about 7.2 but I am confused about how to go about raising the chlorine level back up since I have seen several posts about not shocking for 2 weeks. What is the best way to do this and avoid getting algae in the process? The pool store suggested a non chlorine shock? Just don't want to leave the chlorine level low for too long...any help is appreciated!

[aylad]

Hi, and welcome to the forum!! Just start adding the chlorine slowly, watching for signs of staining. If you see them, add more sequestrant. If not, just slowly raise it to whatever your target Cl is, based on your CYA level (see the Best Guess Chart stickied at the top of the Chlorine forum). It may take a good bit of chlorine to get back up there, my understanding is that both the sequestrant and the acid eat up a good bit of it. Most of us on this forum use plain, generic, unscented bleach for chlorine--12.5% liquid chlorine is not available in my state, but others on the forum prefer to go that route...

Janet

[Chrissymok]

I added a small amount of chlorine last night and by this afternoon I already see the staining returning! I am so frustrated by this. I guess that means I need to add more sequestrant, but my question is how often will I need to do this? I am on city water and don't have a heater...I can't figure out how metals could have gotten in the water in the first place. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Watermom]

You may have to add sequestrant each time you add water. Marie, our metals expert, can better advise you. She'll be popping on here at some point and I'm sure will take a look at this thread. Hang in there ........

[mbar]

If you give us a full set of numbers we can help you. Sometimes the water needs to be balanced before the stains will stay away.

[Chrissymok]

Here are the numbers that we got from having the water tested:
Free Available Chlorine .2
Total Chlorine .2
Total Alkalinity 103
ph level 7.2
calcium hardness 23
Cyanuric Acid 99
copper .4

we were told (by pool store person) that we needed to drain 1/3 of pool to get the cya level down and add calcium. Then add more stain out. Does this sound right? Of course, everytime we talk to someone else, there are more chemicals and lots more $!!! Thanks for all of your help!

Pool Info: inground 16,000 gallons, sand filter