Help identifying this stain or metal?

[Dmack]

I bought a new house and had the pool redone with a Sand colored quartz. Its been 2 months now and everything has been great until rains started happening. My phosphates went up and small yellow stains began to appear all over the pool.

I went to Lesie's Pool Supply and got a test. They said it was Mustard Algae. They told me to raise my PH and Alkalinity and shock with Yellow out. It's been 4 days now with no difference. The spots do not come off with brushing and do not feel any rougher than the rest of the pool.

I have read if you put a puck on the satin itself it will disappear, but that didn't work so I tried rubbing Vit C on it and that didn't work either.
I went back and had them test for Copper. They said I had a little copper, but why wouldn't have the Vit C tab worked?

Ive looked all over these forums with someone similar to mine and I cant find anything.

My questions are:
Do I need to be patient and let the shock work? I was told they would be gone in 48 hours.
Why didn't either of the "tests" (Vit C tab and the Puck) not work if I have copper?

At this point I'm lost and about $200 in. I have not put the metal out and sequester in that I purchased a couple of days ago from Leslie'sin yet because I thought I would ask everyone here. Can someone please help me? Im very new to this and need help.

Attached is what my pool, pool equipment and what the stains look like and my initial test results.

My Pool is Quartz approx 30,000 gal
Hayward DE filter

Thanks in advance everyone!

 

[Swampwoman]

Welcome, Dmack. I see a few problems in trying to diagnose your problem at the moment...your FC is way too low to rule out organics and th pool store also put 0 for copper so we don't know how much you have when they said "a little." Even .3 ppm will stain, as will lower amounts if the ph is higher, which yours is.

So before going too far down the dx road, I'm going to cover off some of the basics first, so read up on the links I've included.

At TFP we don't put a lot of stock in pool store testing. The first step to diagnosing and then managing your water and any incidental stains is to buy a good home test kit that includes your own cya test -- the TFT 100 or Taylor k2006 specifically are available at TFTestkits.net.

The next trick is to be sure you have a firm grasp on the content of ABCs of Pool Water Chemistry and the [fc/cya][/FC/cya] chart. The FC/cya ratio tells you exactly what proportion for a good sanitization rate in everyday conditions and also when you need to shock/slam.

The third piece of the formula to get water handled before diagnosing or treating for possible stains (metal) is to do the TFP variation of "shocking" -- which is SLAM Process.

So before adding any metal sequestrant, in your shoes I'd do a proper slam and get my water sanitized correctly to rule out organics.

After passing te Overnight Chlorine Loss Test I would then try the vit c test again if the staining is still there. If you suspect copper, you could also try dry acid in a sock. THEN consider treatment and metal sequestrant.

Metal sequestrants ( we recommend jacks magic or metal magic, whch are HEDP types) should not be used right before a Slam because the high FC breaks them down and they won't work.

Let us know if you decide to change over to the TFP way and we'll help you through the steps if need be. We'd love to help you keep that nice new plaster job in tip top shape