Cloudy pool after near-monsoon?

[Tyrone Shuz]

19k vinyl pool pentair filter sta-rite 3/4 HP pump

Pool was fine yesterday (Monday) pre-deluge. Today it's cloudy. The CL was about 0, I went to do a test and a scoop didn't even turn the 10ml water pink. I've done enough of these tests to know there was max .5ppm. I do a container of bleach every three days like clockwork, and today was the day to add it. I usually wait till after sunset but at this level it had to go in.

The only thing that changed was, I put a couple of products in on Saturday for staining on my stairs that had happened over the winter and never went away, even though the water has been perfect shortly after opening. Tried scrubbing with very limited success. The products worked, they were Ascorb-X (ascorbic acid) followed by Keetrol Plus (no info on what it is). The pool guy at the convenient clip-joint said check TA and pH levels the next day, you may have to raise 'em back up. Well they didn't seem to affect 'em much, so I didn't think anything of it. My TA has been around 100, but after the monsoon it seems to read 120 now, which is not alarmingly high, and pH is around 7.6.

My natural culprit would be these products, but we had guests Sunday, pool was perfect, yesterday before the storm I enjoyed it for a little bit and again, perfectly clear.

Do I need to lower the pH to 7.2 then aerate? I don't seem to recall that high TA causes cloudy water.

I did notice the pressure was up a little on the filter, but not to "backwash now" levels, just a few pounds high, and the baskets are clear. I'm stumped.

 

[Bama Rambler]

If your FC went to zero you're most likely going to have to shock the pool. I'd run the OCLT to see if anything is in there.

 

[JasonLion]

Ascorbic acid and chlorine wipe each other out. Depending on how much you added, you could very easily have used up all of your chlorine. In fact, it is not that difficult to have added enough ascorbic acid to continue to use up any additional chlorine you add for a little while yet. It is also very common for the ascorbic acid treatment to cause the pool to get cloudy for a couple of days starting a day or two after the application. That is not to say that you don't have algae, you could very easily also have algae.

You need chlorine in the water, but you don't want to add it too quickly or you might cause the metal stains to reappear. Add chlorine a couple of ppm at a time and see if you can get the pool to maintain an FC level.

Do lower the PH to 7.2, but don't worry about aerating right now. Just lower the PH to 7.2 and time it gets up to 7.8 until the TA is more reasonable.

 

[Tyrone Shuz]

Are you certain they were metal stains? I thought they might have been stains from leaves? I don't put any metal product in my pool that I know of. I think the winterizing company doesn't use metal algaecide. I've talked to them about that in the past. I use bleach for everything.

 

[Tyrone Shuz]

And the obvious questions:

How do I uncloud my pool?

And how long will the process take?

And is the water unsafe to be in (I doubt this, but one never knows)

I added the large bleach container, which /should/ bring it to about 4ppm, perhaps 3.5. I'll take readings in the morning.

I also added about 8 oz of ph- (sodium bisulfate)

 

[zea3]

Run the overnight test to see if you need to shock. If you do need to shock, that will clear the cloudy water. If you do not need to shock according to the overnight test, add chlorine slowly (every couple of hours) until it starts to hold. Once you can hold chlorine levels in the recommended range for your pool it is safe to swim in. Every pool reacts differently, but it should clear up in a day or two.