YABATT - Yet Another Bio-Active Test Thread

[igneramos]

I started a trial of Bio-Active in my pool this morning, and per Divin' Dave's request I'm starting this thread to track progress.

Baseline chemistry at 9pm last night:

FC < .2
CC < .2
pH 7.4
TA 150
CH 340
CYA 140 (1:1 dilution with tap water)

Added 128oz 10% chlorine at 9:30pm last night to get to the target 2-3 ppm range. 10:30pm test showed FC of 2.4

Test at 6am this morning, FC was down to 1 and CC ~ .5, so dropped in another 128oz of 10% chlorine near the return, and dropped in 16oz. of Bio-Active CYA Reducer in the skimmer.

Work and volunteer obligations mean I most likely won't be near the pool until much later, but will test CYA when I do get home.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Hmmm...will be interested to see your results. I know the manufacturer says the 2-3ppm FC is ok for their product but I sincerely have my doubts about that. I know they're trying to not turn people's pools into green swamps, but I wonder if having a little "swampiness" would be a good thing.

Any idea what your phosphate levels are? There is some interesting theories that nutrient deficient pool water (low phosphates) inhibits the products performance. Not enough to make any definitive statements about, but it would be good to see that as another parameter folks post. Perhaps over time a correlation might emerge. So far it seems this product fails much more often than it succeeds and the response from the BioWish people is basically to throw a free bag of product to people that complain it did not work and then just ignore them rather than trying to debug.

Good luck!

 

[Divin Dave]

Thanks for starting this thread igneramous.

Good luck to you.

 

[igneramos]

Hmmm...will be interested to see your results. I know the manufacturer says the 2-3ppm FC is ok for their product but I sincerely have my doubts about that. I know they're trying to not turn people's pools into green swamps, but I wonder if having a little "swampiness" would be a good thing.

Yeah - I've got some green (albeit limited) going on, so I just wanted to not be at zero to start. I'm not planning on doing a ton of maintenance on sanitizer for the next few days unless a) my kid decides to swim (a distinct possibility) or b) the algae levels start increasing.

Any idea what your phosphate levels are? There is some interesting theories that nutrient deficient pool water (low phosphates) inhibits the products performance. Not enough to make any definitive statements about, but it would be good to see that as another parameter folks post. Perhaps over time a correlation might emerge. So far it seems this product fails much more often than it succeeds and the response from the BioWish people is basically to throw a free bag of product to people that complain it did not work and then just ignore them rather than trying to debug.

Good luck!

I assume I've got enough phosphates to start, since I already have a little algae growth. Nothing horrible, but enough to prompt me to look for answers as to why my pool wasn't holding chlorine, which led me here. We'll see what happens.

 

[igneramos]

Did a quick check at 6:30am:

FC < .5
CYA 120-130

Tough to say at this point if there's any real impact. Of note, according to the BioActive literature the pool is safe to use, and it did get use yesterday evening. Not sure that would have any impact on the efficacy.

Added 1 gal 10% chlorine this morning to bring it to ~2.5ppm, as I expect the pool to get some use today.

 

[igneramos]

Sorry for the delay in follow up - was a busy few days.

I did test over the weekend. Both Saturday and Sunday CYA tested out in the 120-140 range at 1:1 dilution, so I'm inclined to say that I'm not really seeing any effects at this point.

I did see the pH creep up to 7.6-7.8, so I added enough muriatic acid to bring the pH back down into the BioActive operating range of 7.4. FC is staying pretty consistently at < 0.5 ppm, with CC in the same basic range. I've been adding a gallon of 12.5% Chlorine a day to try to keep the level of sanitizer above 0, but within the 1-3ppm range indicated by the BioActive documentation.

I'll test again this evening, but inclined to say that I think this BioActive test is going the same way as most others have posted.

 

[Divin Dave]

Thanks for keeping us posted on this.

Wish it had worked out better for you.