Hard water and Scale

[mlaspina]

Hello all. We're about to have our new pool ans spa completed. This is not my first one, and I have used the BBB method in the past for maintenance - although I didn't know it had a name - I just thought it was me being ultra cheap :-D .

Anyway, our fill water is very hard and I was wondering if there's anything else aside from good maintenance that I can do to help reduce scale buildup. We will have a water sheer and a bubbler in the pool, but I opted for no rock water fall as they always scale up a lot here. In addition, I've added a salt cell to the pool and and interested in protecting that as much as possible too.

Is there anything I can do now, or after the pool is complete to reduce scale? Do magnets on the line actually do anything, or are they just a way to extract money from wallets?

Forgot to add my specs:
12k gallon in ground pool w/spa.
1.5 hp pump, cartridge filter
Salt cell
Pebble Sheen interior

 

[svenpup]

1. You could try to get water trucked in that has low CH[/*:m:3e9yuxp7]
2. You could get Reverse Osmosis service done to lower CH.[/*:m:3e9yuxp7]
3. Scaling is caused by having a high Calcite Saturation Index (CSI).
   This measurement is a combination of CH, TA, pH, CYA, and temperature.
   Obviously you can't control temp, and CH is more difficult, but you can purposely maintain low TA and keep pH on the low end of the range.[/*:m:3e9yuxp7]

You can determine your CSI with Jason's pool calculator.

 

[frustratedpoolmom]

Read the Start Up new Plaster article in Pool School - the key to your situation is to keep your PH under control with Muratic Acid. Annd if the CH is truly an issue, consider alternative source for fill water or R/O.
Where are you located, and have you tested the fill/tap water yet?

 

[mlaspina]

Great advice - I had forgotten about Saturation. It's been 5 years since I've had a pool, so I'm a little rusty. I do remember adding a good amount of acid to get the PH down to around 7 or less and aerating to bleed of some of the calcium off as CO2. It seemed to help lower the TA. Do you guys still use this technique?

 

[svenpup]

Great advice - I had forgotten about Saturation. It's been 5 years since I've had a pool, so I'm a little rusty. I do remember adding a good amount of acid to get the PH down to around 7 or less and aerating to bleed of some of the calcium off as CO2. It seemed to help lower the TA. Do you guys still use this technique?

The technique you describe is exactly how we lower TA. This will not lower calcium. CO2 is Carbon Dioxide...no calcium.