New Pool Owner - Above Ground

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Other than a few clumps/lines of rust that I was able to easily vacuum up, water is perfectly clear this morning.

Now if only the deck was done and surrounding the pool instead of a mud pit.

I did order the Taylor K-2006 test kit and will report back with numbers ASAP.
 
kimkats said:
That is awesome news! AND your wife is not mad at us LOL

When is the deck work?

Kim:cat:
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The deck gets built this week. I work at home full-time, so it's gonna be a serious case of a watched pot not boiling. Hopefully the builder doesn't get annoyed with me going out to check on his progress every 10 minutes. :D

Hopefully my friend who is an electrician gets out here this week as well. A hot tub without power is a sad hot tub.
 
Get some water and Gatorade in a cooler for them while they work. Offer to get lunch as well. They will LOVE you and not mind you watching at all. Works for me all of the time! Don't forget to take pics too!

Kim:cat:
 
Finally got my K-2006 test kit.

Here's what I have:

FC - 3.5
CC - .5
pH - 8.0
TA - 400
CH - 240
CYA - 40

Water is still crystal clear, with only the occasional small pile of rust in the middle of the pool.

Any thoughts on anything I should do to adjust...or just leave well enough alone?
 
- Add a little bleach to keep the FC around 5.
- Lower pH to about 7.6
- Your TA is quite high. Any problem with that test? 2 drops of #7, 5 drops of #8 (green), then counted drops until bright pink/red ... times 10?
- If 400 is the number, you will want to stay close to the Pool School - Lower Total Alkalinity page. It will be a long process, but it will help to keep the pH from rising so fast.

Let us know if you have any more questions.
 
Tested the TA again and got 375.

Too late to go grab some muriatic acid, but I did point the return so it breaks the surface and creates some pretty good bubbles.

We were low on bleach, so I dumped in a bag of the super shock I bought when I bought the pool. I'll grab bleach when I get muriatic acid tomorrow.

Funny how the water can look so good but have certain factors so far off from a chemistry perspective.
 
Funny how the water can look so good but have certain factors so far off from a chemistry perspective.
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Very true. And if you went to the pool store they would still sell things you don't need. Now remember that adding pool store products (like super shock) may increase your CYA. You used it in a pinch, but you may want to check CYA in a couple days. At least now you know regular bleach won't effect anything other than FC. :)
 
What should be my first goal? Add recommended quantities of muriatic acid to begin the process of lowering TA (along with pH)?

From all the reading I've done tonight, it seems it will take a few weeks of dosing with muriatic acid (and aerating to naturally increase pH) to begin knocking the TA down from 375.

The people at Ace Hardware are going to wonder why I start buying them out of acid.
 
First, you always want your FC to stay at your recommended target level to avoid algae. After that, you want to keep pH in the mid-7s. Too high causes scaling. Too low (below 7.0) and it can become corrosive. So those two items (FC & pH) you want to watch closely each day. The TA can be annoying in that it can be a slow process, but as long as you keep the pH managed, you are still okay. Work on it overtime, but don't let it overwhelm you. You'll get it slowly but surely. One day when you're ready to work hard at it, lower pH to 7.0 then aerate like crazy & repeat. As for the acid, the store should be happy to make sells. :)
 

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Making progress (I think). After 2 gallons of muriatic acid and about 80oz of bleach, I'm at:

FC - 6.5
CC - 0
pH - 7.2
TA - 325
CH - 375
CYA - 42

I'm aerating the pool via the return pointed high enough to break the surface of the water to (hopefully) get the pH back up high enough for another round of muriatic acid.

The deck should be done this week, so I want to have things as good as possible by the weekend.
 
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