Cloudy Oasis Help!

[JeremySchrader]

Hi everyone,
I've had great success here before and was hoping for a repeat performance.

On Monday night my 27K gallon pool became a tad cloudy, I noticed while swimming. I checked levels:

FC: 1.8
CC: not present
pH: 7.8
TA: 80
CH: 160
CYA: 40

This has essentially been standard all year for me. I'll bump up the FC to 4 every other night (I use a 32 oz. empty Gatorade bottle when 1 bottle equals 1 FC point). I also added 16 oz. muriatic acid.

Tuesday the cloudiness remained, a light went off in my head that I hadn't backwashed my sand filter in quite a few weeks.

Tuesday night I backwashed and retested. All values were the same aside from FC that was now at 4 and pH at 7.6ish. I threw in the vacuum and also 2 gallons of 12.5% (now getting nervous) and went to bed.

Wednesday morning, still cloudy, not worse than Tuesday, FC high. I attributed cloudiness to particles settling still, so j just vacuumed again.

Thursday AM, rained last night:

FC: 4
CC: not present
TA: 80
CH: 160
pH: 7.9
CYA: didn't check, out of reagent

Out of frustration, I added 6 lbs arm and hammer, 30 oz. muriatic acid and 2 gallons 12.5% chlorine.

I've been running my filter 24 hours since Tuesday. Any thoughts on what I've done wrong?

Thanks in advance!

 

[jaduck]

At a CYA of 40 I would be keeping my FC at a minimum of 5 and target 7 ppm. Seeing that your FC has dropped to at least 1.8 I think a short SLAM may solve your issues...

 

[Texas Splash]

I would also encourage your to SLAM at an FC of 16 until you pass all three SLAM criteria. The cloudiness simply confirms that your FC fell low enough previously to allow algae to begin. Simply raising it a little bit right now, or to target level, may not resolve your issue. After you complete a SLAM and the 3 criteria, then allow your FC to drop naturally to the 5-7 range as jaduck recommended.

 

[JeremySchrader]

Thank you so much- do you think this could be a result of just lack of clarifier, or is that a bit of a scam?

Thanks for the insight!

 

[YippeeSkippy]

No clarifier needed, assuming your filter is working well and your FC is kept high enough to kill the cooties. How old is that 12% liquid chlorine? It may not be as strong as you think it is?

What type of filter do you have?

 

[JeremySchrader]

I do see lines of what appears to be algae possibly forming along my lip to the deep end. FC is now up to 18, I'll check later tonight.


Filter is a sand dollar. The pool was installed last summer so all parts are still very new

 

[Texas Splash]

Keep it there until you pass all 3 SLAM criteria and you'll be just fine. Have a good evening.