Chlorine Smell in Salt Water Pool

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khsjes27

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Jul 22, 2015
19
Greenville, SC
Hello!
I have a very basic, new pool owner question :grin: ... Should there be any chlorine smell at all in a salt water pool? *I know my SWG produces a small amount of chlorine each day. But this is a somewhat strong chlorine smell.* I've taken the pool water to be tested at our local pool store and the owner said this is normal. However, I installed a salt water pool because I didn't want to smell chlorine.

Here are the readings from the pool store yesterday ...

FC 3
TC 3
pH 7.8
TA 75
CH 140
CYA 30
Salt 4000

PLEASE talk in basic terms to me as I am such a newbie!!! PLEASE :grin:
 
your chlorine smell is coming from the presence of CC, I would think you need to SLAM i believe is the term used here to kill whatever your chlorine is trying to kill and then the CC will go back to 0 and the smell will go away


EDIT: and a salt water pool is still a chlorine pool as you mentioned. It just produces chlorine gas from the salt in the water instead of you adding the chlorine manually
 
The chlorine smell is produced by the chlorine doing its job.

If this chlorine smell was noticed after the pool was getting a lot of use that could be expected as it's oxidizing all the bather waste. If it's all the time, you could be battling algae and keeping enough chlorine to keep it from getting out of hand but not enough chlorine to eliminate it.
 
TC (Total Chlorine) = FC (Free Chlorine) + CC (Combined Chloramines)

I see your pool store test results show TC = FC, which would suggest your CC = 0. However, because pool store tests are notoriously unreliable, we can't be sure whether that's actually the case. If you're bored one day, take 2 or 3 different samples at the same time and drop each one off at a different pool store. Or, better yet, take those 2 or 3 samples to one pool store and have them test them all. ;)

This is why the foundation of TFP is testing your own water with one of the recommended test kits; that way we are all speaking the same language and we can all help with recommendations if you have difficulties with the tests.

The TF-100 and Taylor K-2006 are both great test kits -- the TF-100 has more reagents (chemicals used to test the various aspects of water chemistry), so it ends up being a better value, IMO.
 
**the chlorine smell is gone**

I received my TF-100 Test Kit today and have already put it to use!

Here are my results ...

pH 7.5
TA 70
FC 11
CC 0
TC 11
CYA 40
CH 250

My SWG was running at 80%. I just adjusted it down to 68%.

Please advise on what else I should do! :)

Thank you!!!
 

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Isn't it amazing how the pool store got an FC of 3 ppm but you measure 11 ppm? Are you using a 10 ml water sample and it took 22 drops to get the pink/red to turn clear?

In your case, you probably were smelling chlorine because the level was pretty high. Still not at SLAM levels, but over 5 times higher than needed for an SWG with your current CYA level.

You are doing the right thing by turning down your SWG. I'd lower it more probably to around 40% which would probably have the FC drop over time to around half so around 5-6 ppm. Then you can consider raising your CYA level if you want your SWG to last longer.
 
If your pool is in full sunlight most of the day, then you could add stabilizer to get the CYA higher so that you'd be able to turn down your SWG even more, but if you want to wait on doing that later after you've got your FC settled down, that would be fine. You'll at least then be able to see what your normal SWG setting is for a minimum of at least 2 ppm FC with 40 ppm CYA.
 
I'm going to chime in on the smell question because my water sometimes more or less smells like chlorine as well. I noticed my tap water also kind of has the same smell. I can't tell you the exact conditions that the smell is better or worse but I've never had algae and my numbers rock. I haven't smelled any odor lately but in the spring it was kind gross smelling. Take a good strong whiff of your tap water.
 
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