How often to test & how much chlorine to add daily? Also, vacation upcoming...

[blessedbeingmom]

So last night when DH got home, he added enough bleach to get it up to 19.5 ppm (the 1.42 gallon jug) at 12:30 (just after midnight). This morning the chlorine level tested at 13 ppm at 9 a.m.
We'll see what we can do about the relative. The problem is that they are Matt's parents and they are joining us midway during our vacation.
What would be the hazards of superchlorinating while we are away (like going up to a higher than normal shock level, or adding a bunch of bleach, and then having them add a bunch more on their way out of town)? Would that hurt the liner or anything?

His parents are on the older side and don't live super-close to us either.

[aylad]

Your shock level right now is 15 ppm...you could probably go up to 20 ppm just before you leave without any problem other than possibly the fumes fading your cover a little, but if you leave it vented it should be fine. (I don't use a cover, but I'm sure someone here who does will pop in and advise you better there.) How confident are you in your in-law's testing abilities? If they could test, and get it back up to shock level, that would be great. If not, then having them pour another gallon in (which would raise your Cl by 12) should be sufficient.

In looking through your thread, I don't see mention of a pH or calcium level, but another option could be to purchase a floater and put a couple of trichlor (if you can withstand a lowered pH and slightly raised CYA level) OR cal-hypo (if you can stand a slight calcium increase) pucks in it, then tie it off somewhere in the pool where it can't float over and make contact with your pool walls. This would at least allow for some continuous chlorination, but honestly I'm not sure how well it would work with your pool covered. Again, maybe somebody here that uses a cover will comment on that. You do need to take a look at your pH level, though, even if you don't use the floater--you don't want a pH lower than 7.0 because it can start causing damage to your liner. Keep in mind that pH at high chlorine levels will read falsely high, so if you test it while the pool is shocked, and only get a 7.2, then I would for sure add some Borax to adjust it upward.

Honestly, don't lose any sleep over this--I'm sure that by shocking the pool before you leave, and having your inlaws add a gallon of bleach mid-week will be fine--the absolute worst thing that could happen is a little green when you come back, but that's easy enough to take care of in a few days.

Janet

[blessedbeingmom]

In looking through your thread, I don't see mention of a pH or calcium level

Our pH is usually around 7.8 (on the higher side) even when the chlorine level isn't high. Our calcium was 140 ppm last week. Our CYA is close to 42.

I thought about either getting a chlorinator or a few pucks (but wasn't sure what to look for) and also thought about getting some polyquat 60. I just haven't had time this week to do much more than think about it.

[aylad]

I just haven't had time this week to do much more than think about it.

I TOTALLY understand this statement....

One thing that is going to make a huge difference in your outcome over vacation is what kind of shape your water is in before you leave. I don't know when you're planning to leave (and it's probably better that you don't post it here), but I'm hoping that you can clear up your current chlorine demand by maintaining a shock level until your chlorine loss is normal BEFORE you go. Having a stable chlorine usage will give you a much better chance at clear water on your return.

Polyquat is a good idea, also, just as an insurance, it certainly won't hurt. Polyquat does create a pretty good chlorine demand, or so I understand from around here, so once you add it and let it circulate, you need to then raise your chlorine back up.

Your pH is high enough that a couple of trichlor pucks in a floating feeder wouldn't hurt (unless it will create issues with the cover, again, you need some input from someone who uses a cover on that issue) because your pH can stand to come down a little bit anyway. If you decide to go that route, though, just make sure to tie it somewhere that it can get circulation but can't float over and sit next to your liner to fade it by dispensing pockets of chlorine and low pH while the pump isn't running.

Janet

[blessedbeingmom]

So last night when DH got home, he added enough bleach to get it up to 19.5 ppm (the 1.42 gallon jug) at 12:30 (just after midnight). This morning the chlorine level tested at 13 ppm at 9 a.m.

Okay, this morning at 9 a.m. after getting the reading of 13 ppm, DH added 2 quarts of bleach, which should have brought it to 19 ppm. He checked it just now (a little over 2 hours later) and it's only 11! Yikes! What is going on???

[blessedbeingmom]

Okay, this morning at 9 a.m. after getting the reading of 13 ppm, DH added 2 quarts of bleach, which should have brought it to 19 ppm. He checked it just now (a little over 2 hours later) and it's only 11! Yikes! What is going on???

Okay, we just did CarlD's chlorine test on our bleach, and it only came to 3.5% bleach. Maybe our bleach is old and that is part of the problem???

http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?t=10167 (CarlD's chlorine test)

How do we make sure we're buying fresh bleach?

[aylad]

When you say "he added enough bleach to get up to x amount"....are you testing it at that level, or just assuming it's there because that's what the bleach calc says? If you're testing it at the higher level and then testing it at the lower level, then you still have a problem with your water. If you're just assuming that it's hitting the high level you think it is, then you probably don't have nearly the chlorine demand that it appears. With the weaker concentration, it's not going as high as you think, and it's probably not going high enough to maintain a shock level for very long. When you make your next addition, give it an hour or so after the addition to circulate, and then test it to see what you get. That result will make the results from the next test meaningful....make sense?

AS far as buying fresh bleach--there's really no way to know--you could ask the manager of the place where you are buying it how long that particular lot has sat around, but even he can't control things like how long it sat in the warehouse, what the temps were, the storage conditions, etc. I buy mine at WalMart, where there's a HUGE turnover--they completely turn over their bleach (generic, anyway) shelves at least every couple of days.

Janet

[blessedbeingmom]

We haven't done much testing afterward, but will start doing that now. I did buy 4 large containers of bleach from Walmart today, thinking they probably move a lot more bleach. (Our last bottles were bought from 2 different Dollar General stores.)

I also bought some polyquat 60%. CarlD, if you are still reading this, how much would you recommend for algae prevention and a week away? Our pool is about 5000 gallons.

[aylad]

It will be interesting to see what your actual overnight chlorine loss is--measure tonight and in the morning, and be sure and let us know...

Janet

[blessedbeingmom]

Okay, numbers for the evening...

Last FC reported on this post was 11 ppm at 11:30 this morning (Thursday). We did not add any chlorine at this point.

At 4 p.m. today DH added 4 quarts of the Dollar General Bleach (tested to only be 3.5%).

Unfortunately we do not know how much the chlorine had dropped before the bleach was added at 4 p.m. since I wasn't home (stuck in line at Walmart with the whole store full of registers with computers down) and DH did not test at this time.

At 8 p.m. our FC level was 9.5 ppm. We added 2 quarts of the new bleach (Walmart brand), which should have brought our FC level to 15.5 ppm.

At 10 p.m. our FC level was 13 ppm. Either the bleach wasn't 6% or something is eating up the bleach.

We will test in the morning and I will post the results. Then I will probably add a maintenance dose of polyquat 60 to the pool.

Oh, I forgot to submit this reply when I wrote it about half an hour ago. Since then, we have done the test and verified that our Walmart bleach we just bought today is indeed 6 percent. However, we think the Dollar General bleach may have gotten a bad rap due to measuring mistakes. We used a pipette we had from a microscope set to measure the 1 mL bleach earlier today. However, we just found out that it wasn't accurate at all. I had ordered a set of scientific graduated cylinders (for our homoschool) and we got them today. Using the 10 mL cylinder, we found that what we though had been 1 mL bleach was actually only a bit over half (maybe 0.6 or 0.7 mL). We are retesting the DG bleach now to see what percent it really is. Well, we retested and still got 3.5% for the DG brand.