help,. can't keep fc at frequent levels

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allusion76

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Jul 8, 2008
21
FC = 3.5
CYA = 50
PH = 7.5

I put in 2 bottles of bleach last night at around 9pm. After leaving filter on for half hour, FC = 10. This morning, FC = 3.5 around noon. This has been happening on a daily basis after putting in 2 bottles of bleach. Any help will be appreciated.
 
I'm pretty confident that you have algae. Basically, there are two things that make your free chlorine go away - Sunlight (UV) and organics (in this case, algae). If you lose chlorine at night, when no sun is on your pool, you are losing it to something organic.

With a CYA level of 50, you shouldn't let your FC level drop below 4, and should keep it at 6.
So what's happening is that an early stage algae bloom is consuming your chlorine. The fix is more chlorine.

To get rid of your algae, you need to raise your FC level to 20 using liquid chlorine (bleach) and maintain it there until the FC reading will maintain overnight with no more than 1ppm loss.
 
You mentioned your test was done around noon today. Unless you had complete cloud cover, or your pool was in total shade, the sun could have contributed to some of the loss of your FC level, though I wouldn't think it would have been 6.5ppms since last night. In order to have accurate FC test results, you should do it before the sun hits your pool water. I too, tend to think algae.
 
Here's the indications of how to know when your done shocking.
1) Your overnight chlorine loss is less than 1ppm. And
2) Your CC's are .5 or less. And
3) Your water is clear.

During the shocking process you should add chlorine often enough that your FC level never goes below you target level. This may require testing and adding chlorine several times a day. i.e. Your target is 20 and you test and add chlorine in the morning, you should test again in a few hours to ensure you're still at target level.
 
Thank you everyone for your help.

ok, so I have been testing and adding chorline for the last 4 hours. The FC has been dropping consistently every hour.

Shocked pool at 5:45 w/ 4 gallons of bleach and CYA is 50, very close to 40 though.

tested about every hour after that, here are the results:

6:50: FC 18 - added 1 gallon
7:50: FC 19 - added 1/2 gallon
8:50: FC 16 - added 1 gallon

I def agree I have an algae problem.

On average, how long does it take to clean up a problem like this?

I am going to keep plugging away through out the night to see if I can have it solved by the morning.

FWIW, My pool has also been clear the whole time I have had rgis problem.
 
Continuation of results:

10:10 - 17, added 1 1/2 bottles of bleach.
11:20 - 20, added half bottle of bleach.
12:20 - 16, added bottle of bleach.
1:20 - 19.5, CC = 1, added no bottle of bleach.

In addition, I have a cartridge filter that I am going to clean out tomorrow as well.

Thank you again for everyones input.
 
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