Disappearing chlorine...

[chem geek]

Is this an educated guess or a result of experience / experiment?

Multiple reports from users of clear and blue covers. I have a mostly opaque cover myself so no surprise that it cuts down on daily chlorine use. There were at least two separate pool owners who had tried both types of cover -- clear and blue -- and both found that clear did not significantly lower chlorine demand but that the blue one did. Other people using only one type of cover also reported not much change with the cover on vs. off with clear, but noticing a difference with the blue cover.

See this post for one example (you were on that thread so might remember this post). This post is another. This post is another. It is consistently reported that the covers that let more light in, so are more clear, heat the pool more during the day (which makes sense). So the tradeoff is between daytime heating vs. chlorine loss. The ideal cover would block UV but let infrared and visible light through, but that doesn't seem to exist.

I had initially hoped that the clear cover would block UV but let infrared or visible through, but that apparently is not the case. Plastic doesn't behave the same as regular glass which does block a lot of UV (quartz glass lets UV through).

[nthach]

I haven't had time to fool with the pool - but the pump impeller was trashed. $140 of parts from Leslie's(only place locally that had Hayward parts) and 2 packs of HTH later the pool's somewhat back in shape - algae is starting to rear its ugly head but the pool was scrubbed down yesterday.

Levels:
Free Cl: 2ppm, I had it at 3.5 yesterday
TA: 120ppm
CH: 350ppm
pH: 7.5
CYA: 65ppm

I told my old boss to dump in 84oz of bleach per the TFP calc. His next purchase will be one of those blue solar covers - but I'm trying to get him to invest in an Liquidator.

[CarlD]

CH:350?, CYA:65? FC: 2?You should now ONLY be using bleach or liquid chlorine.

HTH (cal-hypo powder) will rapidly push your CH over 400--the max recommended for plaster/concrete pools.

Tri-Chlor tabs and Di-Chlor powder will push your CYA up which is ALREADY very high at 65.

FC is far too low and NOW needs to be between 5 and 10ppm just for maintenance.

You are still within normal, recommended ranges for everything (but your low FC). But I would STRONGLY recommend you stick with bleach/LC given your CH and CYA numbers.

[Watermom]

And to add to what Carl said above, if algae is trying to start again, you need to shock the pool up to 20. Then, try and hold it there for a few days until you can go overnight with no more than 1ppm cl loss. Test and dose with bleach at least morning and evening when the sun is off the pool, and if someone can test and dose a time or two during the day, all the better.

[nthach]

Also, I'm noticing some reprocity error with the CYA tests - when I do them, I drop in the CYA/melamine reagent mix until I cannot see the black dot - between 40-50. When me and my friend did it in the sun, he dosed it in the tube until the dot just disappears between 60-70ppm. Could age and vision have anything to do with this?

[waterbear]

So you have a 10 ppm discrepancy. This is within the precision of the test. Split the difference and call it a day. It was from the different lighting conditions since I assume you did not do the test in full sunlight when you got the 40-50 ppm.
BTW, I prefer to do this test in open shade and not full sun. It makes it easier to determine when the dot disappears because there is no glare on the surface of the sample.

[chem geek]

Taylor recommends that you stand outside with your back to the sun so that you shade the tube in front of you looking down into the tube. If you have the sun shining directly on the tube, you'll get a reading that is too low. If you do the test with insufficient lighting, you'll get a reading that is too high. It's a finicky test, especially compared with the titration tests.