new to pools. pool guy has me confused

[the pool store]

As a pool store owner, we deal with these problems all the time. The first thing I see is you have no Cyanuric Acid AKA Stabilizer AKA Conditioner. Without this product in your pool, the sun takes out your chlorine in 3-4 hours. That is why I think you have no chlorine showing up on your test strips. Since there is no Free Chlorine in your pool, there is no protection for your swimmers against bacteria and your pool is free reign for algae to grow. So you need some chlorine ASAP and Cyanuric Acid. We have our customers administer the Cyanuric Acid to the wall skimmer at 3# per 10,000 gallons of water if there is none in the water. Our store sells Liquid Chlorine, powder shock, and tablet chlorine. (Shock is another word for "lots of chlorine".) Your Total Alkalinity should be 80-100 per Taylor test kit parameters, which is the only testing kits we use. We recommend Muriatic Acid poured in one place away from the return water of your pool every 8 hours until you check your water 24 hours after the last dose of Muriatic Acid. It takes 24 hours to get a true reading after using Muriatic Acid.
CarlD gives some great advise and seems to know alot about water chemistry. Our store does not sell Chlorine Tablets with Copper, but we do sell Copper Algaecide which is needed for mustard algae or black algae. Just remember any copper administered to a pool causes blonds and gray haired people to get that green hair look. We know that copper in the 1ppm range or less is not likely to cause green hair, so we use the Taylor copper test kit to confirm copper levels. We also have used the CarlD shot glass method when chlorine is too high to get a proper reading for high chlorine.
And no one can tell you how much of the above chemicals to use until the amount of water is known that is in your pool. To figure out how much water is in your pool, use this formula:

length x width x average depth x 7.5 for a rectangle (5.9 for a circle) Take off a 1,000 gallons or so because no pool is filled to the rim. Hope this helps.

[Watermom]

we do sell Copper Algaecide which is needed for mustard algae or black algae.

@The Pool Store ----- Though eradicating mustard or black algae is difficult, we do not recommend copper products here on the forum. Again, as I mentioned in a previous thread that you had posted in, we are glad to have you join us on the forum. But, please for now, refrain from giving chemistry advice. Our methods taught here are not the same as most places and we find it best that our new 'in the pool biz guys' are better off just getting to know what we are all about instead of coming here and immediately starting to give advice. Thanks for understanding.

@justin1795 ---- the test kit that Carl recommended can be found through this link:> http://pool9.net/tk/ (And, if you prefer to just buy the HTH 6-Way drops-based kit at Walmart, the K1515 kit which will give you just the important chlorine test that you will be missing can also be purchased through that link.)

(Until your registration is completed, you will not be able to see the rest of the forum nor follow links while you are logged in. So, copy that link and paste it into a browser window after you first log out.)

[justin1795]

ok I have some info I can provide. the pool is 15,000 gallons. we used htc algae guard 3x concentrate. listed is alkyl 15% alkyl 15% inert ingrediants 70%

the chlorinating granules are 47.6% calcium hypo and 52% other. per you stated these are bad and we will not use these anymore

the tablets are 99.7% trichloro s triazinetrione

[CarlD]

ok I have some info I can provide. the pool is 15,000 gallons. we used htc algae guard 3x concentrate. listed is alkyl 15% alkyl 15% inert ingrediants 70%

the chlorinating granules are 47.6% calcium hypo and 52% other. per you stated these are bad and we will not use these anymore

the tablets are 99.7% trichloro s triazinetrione

Ok, you'll need to re-run the test numbers with the HTH 6-way drop kit, if you have it.

ASSUMING your numbers are correct (and that's an assumption), you should NOT use the Cal-Hypo powder anymore because it keeps raising your calcium level, and 400 is the upper limit.
Do not use the "Algae Guard"--it will only make a bigger mess.

One jug (121 ounces) of Clorox 8.25% bleach will add 5.2ppm of chlorine to your pool. A pound of Di-Chlor powder will about 4.8ppm of chlorine to your pool, and about 4.3ppm of CYA/stabilizer.

[CarlD]

The Pool Store:

I second Watermom's request. We do NOT recommend copper products, we do NOT recommend the "column" method of adding Muriatic Acid, and we recommend a far wider and more flexible range of T/A adjusting to individual conditions.

This is based on many years of experience by our entire support team and many of our long time members. None of us are new to the game. We also have the chemistry science as well as empirical evidence to support these recommendations.

Meanwhile, you are correct about the volume of the pool being critical. It CAN be difficult to estimate the volume, but we don't take away the 1000 gallons because we recommend the height measured being the height of the water--but that's pretty much the same thing. It takes a good bit of solid geometry to get an accurate measurement if the pool isn't a simple box. On larger pools, it doesn't really matter if you estimate 19,000 or 20,000 gallons, because it won't affect the amounts of chems you add. But you do need to be in the ballpark.

You WILL need to add your commercial affiliation to your signature as per our AUP.

For example, one of our support team, PoolSean, has the following sig ALWAYS appear:
"Sean Assam
Commercial Product Sales Manager - AquaCal AutoPilot Inc. Mobile: 954-325-3859
e-mail: sean@teamhorner.com --- www.autopilot.com - www.aquacal.com "