Ive read everything about using Bleach and thats fine. I just would like to know if you can use lithium shock or non-chlor shock to switch from Baquacil to chlorine. If so, which of those would be the best way to go. Thanks!

First, welcome to the forum...glad to have you here.

Secondly, my honest answer would be neither. I would shock and clear the pool with chlorine only. It's fairly cheap and predictable and almost all the conversions done with the help of this forum have been chlorine only. I can think of no real advantages to using mps or anything other than chlorine. (sorry to keep saying chlorine,........it simply works!)

Non chlorine shock (MPS) is not effective at oxidizing biguanide so I would not use it. Lithium Shock is Lithium hypochlorite so it is just unstablizied chlorine. However, it is the MOST EXPEN$IVE form of chlorine that there is so I would not understand why you would want to use this because such large amounts of chlorine are needed for the conversion. If the money is no object to you then PLEASE adopt me!

Hi, have you read this article?
http://www.troublefreepool.com/pool-school/baqua_chlorine_conversion

If you have Baq levels in your pool, you can use sodium percarbonate to neutralize the Baq, but this is not necessary. Really you can just use liquid chlorine.

This article...http://www.troublefreepool.com/sodium-percarbonate-question-t11185.html?hilit=sodium%20percarbonate might give you some tips...

Ok so non chlor is a no go. As far as litho, I only thought that because using all that cal hypo would make me worry about the calcium level. How much do you typically need on a average case? 24lbs?

Okay, I'm not recommending Cal-Hypo. Not sure if any of us are for a conversion.

I'm recommending liquid Chlorine, aka bleach which is sodium hypochlorite. You can buy it at Wal-mart in large jugs for $2.54 it is 6% available chlorine. Some pool stores and home improvement stores sell gallon jugs that range in 10% to 12% percent active ingredient, and this will mean less jugs to carry around and lug home. They should all say sodium hypochlorite.

How much you should buy really depends on how much Baq sanitizer is present in your pool water, so you may want to have that tested.

Bleach is also sold under the Clorox label, original scent.

Do not buy any bleach that has additives or scents.

Store brands are okay too, just remember that it should say 6% sodium hypochlorite and nothing else.

I get lost in the whole bleach being cheaper thing. If your typical one pound bag of lithium shock is 35% available chlorine, wouldnt it take over 5 times the amount of bleach to get that same chlorine amount?

Like if in a situation where you might need 20 gallons of bleach to do the job, wouldnt it take less bags of litho to do the same?

I dunno maybe im just confusing it all.

Our Special Contributor, Chem Geek, did a cost analysis on chlorine sources in this article:

http://www.troublefreepool.com/cost-comparison-of-chlorine-sources-t1859.html

This might help:

1 1 lb bag of 35% lithium hypo will raise 10000 gallons 4 ppm FC
1 1lb bag of 48% cal hypo (the most common kind) will raise 10000 gal 5.5 ppm FC
1 1lb bag of 68% cal hypo (the most common super shock strength) will raise 10000 gal 7.5 ppm FC
1 1 lb bag of 73% cal hypo (getting very difficult to find) will raise 10000 gal 9 ppm FC
1 gal of 5.25% bleach will raise 10000 gal 5.25 ppm FC
1 gal of 6% bleach or liquid pool chlorine will raise 10000 gal 6 ppm FC
1 gal of 10% liquid pool chlorine will raise 10000 gal 10 ppm FC
1 gal of 12.5% liquid pool chlorine will raise 10000 gal 12.5 ppm FC

To convert you want to maintain a 15 ppm FC level and this will drop to 0 ppm quickly and might have to be added as often as every hour!


I have rounded these off very slightly but they are close enough that the errors most likely will NOT SHOW ON TESTING WITH THE TEST KITS WE USE!

Lithium hypo and sodium hypo will have the fewest side effects. Both add salt (technically the lithium adds lithium chloride and sodium chloride but it has exactly the same effect in your pool as all sodium chloride--basically nothing negative)

If you compare prices the lithium hypo is much more expensive than 12.5% liquid chlorine in most parts of the country (AT $4/bag and needing 3 bags for a total of $12 to produce the same FC level as 1 gal of 12.5% liquid that sells for about $1.5 to $2.5 a gallon in most areas!

Even if you are using bleach it comes out cheaper. 5.25% Bleach is usually $2-$3 dollars a gallon and you would need just slightly over 2 gallons for 12 ppm FC
The 6% might be up to a dollar more a gallon but it still comes out cheater than the Lithium Hypo

Cal Hypo sells for $3- $5 a bag in most areas and will add calcium but it can and will make the water cloudy at the amounts you wll be using.
You will need 1 1/4 to a bit more than 2 bags (depending on the strength of the cal hypo) to get to 12 ppm FC in 10k gallons so it's still a bit more than the stronger sodium hypo strengths but would possibly end up on par with bleach.

If you start the conversion with the sodium percarbonate (expen$ive) you might not need that much chlorine at all but if you use only chlorine to convert you will need a lot. It really depends on how well you keep on top of keeping up the FC level. Testing FC and adding it hourly to maintain 15 ppm will make the conversion go faster in any case compared to testing and adding chlorine 2-3 times a day.

IMHO, converting with percarbonate or with liquid chlorine ends up costing about the same in the end and how much of either you need depends on several factors, such as your starting biguanide levels, the size of your pool, and how well you keep on top of the conversion. It is going to take a lot fo attention for a few days but once it's done you are truly on your way to a trouble free pool!

thanks for that. Is there a calculator to tell how much bleach you need based on what your baquacil reading is? Pool is 22,000 gal and baqucil level is at 25.

There is a pool calculator that will tell you how much bleach you need to add based on your current FC level to maintain 15 ppm. The total amount of bleach you will need for the conversion really cannot be determined because how often you add the bleach and how well you maintain the 15 ppm FC level plays a big part.

One thing you DO need before you start is a good test kit that uses the FAS-DPD chlorine test. A DPD test will NOT do.
There are only 2 kits that have this test that are reasonable in price. The TF100 from TFTestkits and the Taylor K-2006 (NOT the more commonly found K-2005 which uses the DPD test!)
pool-school/pool_test_kit_comparison

One of these kits is what you need anyway to maintain a chlorine pool. It will save you a LOT of money in the long run and is one of the most essential pieces of pool equipment. It si also one of the easiest test kits to use, even easier to read properly than 'guess strips'! You are not really going to be able to rely on pool store testing for the conversion since you really will need to be testing every hour and also most pool stores use DPD testing which cannot test over 5 or 10 ppm FC! The FAS-DPD test can test up to 50 pp FC with a precision as great as .2 ppm!

Thanks Waterbear for explaining in plain English the cost analysis so that even I could understand!

Mrs.... I've seen conversions on here where folks have gone thru more than 40 gallons (6%). It's really impossible to predict what you'll need...buying the 12.5% if you can find it will certainly cut down on the number of jugs you'll need, so if you can find the higher concentration for a reasonable price, I'd stock up on them, buy maybe 6-8 to start? That's a total guess, sorry .

But probably a VERY good starting point. If you are using bleach I would stockpile about 12 or more gallons (not jugs but gallons--often bleach is sold in 96 oz and 184 oz instead of gallons!) for starters.

Thanks for the help. I was hoping to use the Litho cause its easier then getting all this bleach. That calculator says i would need 7lbs. of Litho shock to raise to 15ppm chlorine. Where as itd take like 5 gallons of the bleach. 7lbs of Litho to reach 15ppm seems high to me. But im not expert.

According to my analysis here, the percarbonate approach is about twice as expensive as using chlorine bleach or chlorinating liquid, though the conversion using percarbonate goes about twice as fast.

You can use the lithium hypo but like I said it will be expensive. You have to raise the free chlorine level to 15 ppm and KEEP IT THERE until all the biguanide is oxidized. This can take a week or more in some cases and it involves adding chlorine several times a day since as it oxidized the biguanide it gets used up so you will be adding a LOT of chlorine. If you can afford the lithiium hypo by all means use it but it wil run into a LOT of money. It's actually one of the least effiicient forms of chlorine since it causes the least rise in FC per lb of the granualar chlorine. However, it the only form of chlorine besides the liquid that does not have any serious side effects on the water chemistry.