Adjusting pH without TA

[officerdoofy]

Hi all,

Just started browsing the board the other day when we decided to purchase a 15' Intex pool. I have a pretty good idea of how basic pool chemistry works at this point and started my pool off following the instructions in the beginner's guide for temporary pools (pool-school/temporary_pool_guide) . My issue is that I'm trying to spend as little as possible on maintaining this pool (only keep it up for the next month), so I purchased a 3-way HTH test kit from walmart. I measured the pH today and it looks to be in 7.3 range, which should be fine, but it got me thinking about when I do go to adjust the pH. Messing with the calculator showed me that TA has a HUGE effect on how much acid or base you need to add to achieve a desired result.

So how do you go about making these adjustments when you don't know your TA. It looks to me that a pretty usual TA is 70-100 to start off, so possibly assume this, but make small adjustments?

Thanks for the help.

 

[257WbyMag]

Welcome to TFP!

It's good to know your TA to start because that is a sort of predictor as to how often you are going to need to add acid to lower your pH. My pH stays at 70. I adjust pH as needed which usually means once a week. The TA seems to stay at 70 pretty much all of the time.

 

[JasonLion]

Welcome to TFP!

By far the best thing to do is to go to a pool store and get them to test the water for you.

The other option is to start with very small amounts of chemical and work up to larger quantities until you get a sense of how much you actually need to make the desired adjustment.