[UPD 3/22/2008] Pool Neglected - For a long time...

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I'm probably beginning to sound like a broken record, but after adding tons and tons of trichlor (I have trichlor, not dichlor like I thought) still can't seem to get my FC up past 1. I do smell chlorine so it must be doing something. The first numbers are at the top of this thread. This was on a stagnant pool that hasn't been circulated. Now that I got circuletion going I took a new full set of numbers. They turned out rather surprising. I was looking for some guidance on how to handle it or if perhaps I tested wrong. I have a taylor 2005 kit

FC .5
CC 0-.5
PH 8 (or more) - Acid demand to 7.5 was 6 drops for about 5 pounds of dry acid
TA 340!!!
CH 470!!!
CYA 0

I've been using trichlor for shocking which has CYA in it but my assumption is that it's not dissolving yet. Tonight I am thinking about just getting a ton of 6% bleach (4 gal or so) and dumping it in. The pool was clearing due to filtration but is not turning blue or even turquoise. I have what I believe may be a serious mustard algae infestiation (brown spots on the steps that don't scrub off easily at all). I retested PH and it was right but I didn't add acid yet because the dry acid container said to correct TA first. I've read to correct TA by reducing PH with acid than aerating to raise PH while keeping TA lower. I don't have a fountain or anything to aerate with so I'll have to find suitable eyeballs perhaps (to direct at surface).

Tonight I'll actually get a proper vacuum hose (1.5" rather than 1.25") so I'll be able to start vacuuming the silt out. My thought is that the chlorine is not working due to the high PH so I must get it down now. I'll get a 5gal bucket tonight for pool use so I can start with that.

Any and all advice about how to proceed is most appreciated. My plan is to backwash (since I royally broke the filter with bad orings), vacuum, dose with 2 cups acid, dose with 4 gal 6% bleach and brush.

It'll be nice tonight when my darling wife gets back from anthony sylvan with all new orings, spider gasket, etc and the plumbing doesn't leak everywhere.
 
It isn't so good to use trichlor for shocking. It tends not to dissolve completely and particles that settle can cause some damage over time.

You need to get the PH down or the chlorine isn't going to be effective, get the PH to between 7.0 and 7.4 before bothering with more chlorine. You also need to get some CYA into the water or you will lose most of your chlorine to sunlight, try adding enough for 20 ppm to start and then adjust CYA more later if needed.

It is going to take a large amount of acid to lower TA. I would start out with 1 1/2 gallons of muriatic acid (pour slowly in front of a return with the pump running). That should get you to around PH 7.0 and TA 300. You can use dry acid but it will cost noticeably more in the quantities that will be involved and adds things that could cause problems in the long run. It is worth stocking up on muriatic, probably at least 4 gallons to start.

The PH will come up again on its own. If you keep lowering the PH as it comes up you will eventually get the TA down. I don't see any need to rush that process. Just remember that the PH test doesn't work reliably when the FC level is over 10 or 15 (which will hopefully be important soon).

Once you start with chlorine you want to hit it hard and frequently or the algae bounces back and everything up to that point is wasted. Make sure you have lots of bleach available. I would start out with 3 gallons of 6% bleach, test after 30 minutes or an hour and bring the FC level back up to 10 (aim for 15 if it is 24 hours or more after adding CYA) and repeat as many times as you can find time for. Then keep at it at least twice a day till the water clears. If you can't get to it at least twice a day you should wait till you have some concentrated time to really take it on.
 
Piku, sorry that the saga continues poorly :( However, you're on the right track :-D I know you had low water level when 'firing up' the system - do you have fill water problems (ie, high calcium, alkalinity, metals)? - If not, you probably want to do your vacuuming to 'waste' ( :oops: ) to save clogging up the filter too quickly. Also, you might want to consider breaking the filter apart and cleaning the grids with a garden hose (you know how to put the unit back together & said it was easy) so that you don't end up with a bunch of algae/ debris on the inside of the grids (backwashing reverses the flow of the water through the grids, so if the water isn't clean you can clog up the grids from the inside!) - also, if your water is green/ brown, a lot of stuff will get onto the membranes before you have a chance to recoat them with fresh DE.

Please test your fill water w/ the 2005 kit for calcium and alk! Those #s are high (!) in the pool, make sure that you're not making them worse with the fill water. For airating, you can get a screw in adapter (SP 1091-Z-7) that would go into one of your returns (you'd have to remove the directional 'eyeball' first) that would accept the 1 1/4" hose you are replacing, attach the old hose to it (depending on the pressure, you may have to use a clamp to keep the hose from blowing off) and just have the end of the hose 'fountaining' off the deck into the pool to provide lots of airation.

If you can smell the chlorine, it's most probably the combined form (though you say that your cc = 0 - .5) - I don't think 4 gal will be close to the amount you'll need over the course of the next ~ week. Also, if it's in your 'comfort zone' I would recommend muriatic acid (31.45%) over the dry stuff - it's cheaper and the dry adds sulfides to the water, which can sometimes lead to other problems (* just make sure you know the % of the acid - some places like to sell 'muriatic' acid that is only ~16%, so you'd have to use 2X as much to get the same result). You can keep using the trichlor pucks to help maintain some cl residual when you can't add the bleach while at work or sleeping, but bleach is going to be what clears up your pool as quickly as possible.

You've got a lot going on with your pool and issues that will require time, chems, effort, diligence and PATIENCE to fix, but we'll be here to help you through this process :thumleft: With the help you'll recieve here, we'll get you set to swim by the time the weather makes the pool usable :-D

Keep the updates and questions coming :!:

Well, of course someone had to post while I was 'hunting and pecking' my way through this :? Jason and I are on the 'same page' I just wandered off onto a few tangents .. hope that some of what I said is also helpful :)
 
I see that muriatic acid is available at the hardware stores from the BBB guide. That's good because my pool stores close at 4pm for winter schedule. I was going to use up my current chems but they are almost all dry and honestly I don't like these dry chems. I've always been more comfortable with liquids which for one don't blow in the wind (and up my nose). The dry acid requires mixing in a special bucket for the pool of which I couldn't dedicate one to yet. The muriatic acid I can just pour in as is.. easier. So that means my wife's run to the pool store (right now) for skimmer baskets, eyeballs, o rings, drain plug, spider gasket and 1.5" vacuum hose is still good enough. Tonight I'll go to walmart and buy 20 gal bleach I guess to start. I have time in the morning (about an hour) and time in the evening (about 1.5 hour) to maintain the pool so now is the time. Though it sounds like I haven't been paying attention to it, it's been my focus for the last 2 days straight.
 
Okay, added 1.5 gal muriatic acid (wow, nasty stuff! I accidentally inhaled a tiny bit of the gas and my nose bled a little!) added 2 giant jugs of walmart ultra bleach. I bought 7 jugs but when I got home I realized I probably need a heck of a lot more than that. The wife needs to go back to the pool store to get the right eyeballs since those were wrong and I'll have her pick up some CYA for me. Looks like I need just under 3 pounds. I could probably deal with 3 pounds. Hopefully tomorrow morning I'll have some nice turquoise pics.
 
Of course I stored it right beside the bleach. Why wouldn't I.

Okay okay okay... No pics yet (mainly because there's no change :( ) but I've got numbers and info. I replaced the drain plug in the DE filter as well as the spider gasket in the multiport valve and I now only have a slow (1 drip per 10-15 sec) leak at the pump housing pressure side. I'll just deal with that for now now that the system isn't oozing water. Last night I dumped in 2 of those 178ish oz jugs of 6% bleach after I got the ph down to 7.4. I was happily disappointed this morning to see the water look exactly the same. It's strange that my particular pool condition is unlike others. The water is green tinted like a lake but otherwise not cloudy. I can clearly see the bottom of the shallow end and I can just make out the main drain covers (looks like there's 2?). The entire floor and walls are covered in a brown silt that I have yet to vacuum up since I ran out of time. Despite the chlorine addition the filter needed backwashed once and has since run at 11psi which is well under backwash territory. In fact, if I open one of my skimmer valves all the way, it will happily empty the contents and suck air despite a waterline slightly above halfway up the tile. I also notice that despite adding 2 jugs last night and 2 jugs this morning all of the organic material in the pool and skimmer (any dead worms, a leaf or there etc) is not turning white. I'm not sure if I should keep hitting it or give up until I get my CYA to around 20ppm. I mean the bleach isn't expensive but walmart only has limited quantities and it's fairly heavy. I added 2 jugs this morning but I wonder if it's all for nothing due to sun.

This morning my FC was 1.5 and my TA is down to 270-280 (yay) ph is 7.2

I tested my fill water last night which I'll be using a lot of after I vacuum the gunk to waste tonight. It's:

FC 0
CC 0
PH 7.8-8.0
TA 50
CH 80

so it doesn't look that bad for pool use other than ph. So yeah, I saw an article on poolforum by a guy recovering a pool in similar shape to mine. He had turquoise milk in 30 minutes! So why do I have to be patient :p
 
It sounds like you are making great progress! Still having some FC in the morning is a great sign. There is probably a fair bit of organic matter in the silt. The algae will be able to hide out in the silt, so it can come right back if you stop the chlorine. It would go more quickly if the silt was all vacuumed up. Still, it sounds like you are fairly close to turning the corner. I would keep adding bleach twice a day and see how it goes. You should be seeing higher FC levels in the morning each day. You will lose much of the morning chlorine addition to sunlight, but the evening chlorine will still be very effective.
 
it prob wont hurt to stir up a little of the silt to get the algae that is hiding out. also try to scoop up most of the silt to help along and make the bleach and cleanup a little easier. that is what i would do, if i had time to do it.
 
Got home from work today and vacuumed to waste. Apparently my driveway isn't perfectly level and I flooded mine and my neighbor's front yard. Hopefully he's alright with that :p I got probably 75% of the Crud out but unfortunately the skimmer adapter sylvan sold my wife doesn't fit into our skimmer despite the fact that she bought the baskets for our skimmer at the same time. I'm beginning to think those folks might have a learning disability. So I just stuck the hose into the bottom of the skimmer and it functioned more or less. I'm not too worried about clogging since there are almost no leaves. However when I was working on the deep end the pump basket clogged repeatedly. I checked the basket and it was filled with these white rice shaped calcium like things. I can't even imagine what they are but I think I got the vast majority of them out without screwing up my pump and plumbing. No pics since it got too dark but I'll grab the camera and snap some in the morning. With the vacuuming, I think I'll vacuum one more time to waste and get all the rest of the silt off the floor and then do teh walls better to filter. Then finally I'll backwash for the final algae killing push.

When I got home I noticed that I could see the bottom of hte deep end perfectly and there was a bit of a turquoise hue down there. I'd venture to say it's progress. The numbers were:

FC .5
TC 3
ph 7.2 (same)
TA 270 (same)
CH 420 (same)
CYA maybe 5... It had a slight tinge of cloudiness when the column was full of the water. (checked after the water warmed up a bit)

(I guess TA and CH especially only need to be measured once a week or so? or perhaps more often if you're trying to lower them. My CSI looks fine so I see no reason to reduce my TA quickly).

So tonight I added 4 cups of dichlor in order to get the CYA out of it. It seemed like it wanted to dissolve far more quickly than the trichlor granules. I also dumped in 180 (or whatever it is) oz of bleach which should bring me up to 15PPM FC again.

I'm excited because I finally expect to see some results tomorrow morning. I noticed as the vacuum lay in there even in the dark after I chlorinated I could see all the colors of the vac vibrantly (in the shallow end).
 

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I just read the rescuing green swamp thread. I didn't realize a green pool will eat the chlorine in just hours. I definitely could have devoted more time to slamming it rather than twice a day. Just as well, it doesn't appear I've wasted too much as it does seem to be coming along.
 
Numbers were
FC 1
CC 2
PH 7.2

this morning so it looks like it's both holding FC and the chlorine is being used to eat the organics. I'm out of bleach now but according to my calculations I can do another shock with dichlor before I reach my 20ppm CYA target.

So I was hoping someone could identify this rice like stuff. My best guess is some kind of insect skeleton but it's pretty heavy and crunchy. Definitely calcium like.

strange_rice.JPG


Some other pics too are uploaded to the original picasaweb link. I vacuumed last night to waste but this is before I brushed this morning. It's now a nice swamp again :p

shallow.JPG


middle.JPG


deep.JPG


shallow_new_eyeballs.JPG


Looks a little turquoiseish.... I'm amazed at just how much work this has been. The cover is still laying in my lawn uncleaned.
 
*sigh* Almost $50 in with chlorine and it's still green (about $300 total parts and chemicals). But more of a bluegreen now and it clouded up really badly last night. It still consumes all of the chlorine and fast. I put in 12 last night at 11pm and by 12:30pm I was down to 2. I brought it back up last night before bed and this morning and also dosed it with some trichlor for residual. Since I'm brushing it, though it's cloudier the water quality seems better overall and almost all of the silt is off of the floor. My neighbor gave me the evil eye when I was vacuuming to waste but what else can I do? I aimed for the street as best I could but I still made a short lived pond in my front lawn close to the street. Saturday I am buying another 50' discharge hose (leslies is shockingly cheap for these) and a union so I can be sure it goes straight to the sewer. This morning after dosing it last night FC was at 2 so I'd call that very real progress. Pool calc says shock level of 12 for mustard algae so I'm doing that instead of 15. I can't afford to waste any chlorine... I know some of the folks who actually paid to have their pool installed rather than buying it with the house would laugh at me fretting over $300 :p
 
piku said:
*sigh* Almost $50 in with chlorine and it's still green (about $300 total parts and chemicals). But more of a bluegreen now and it clouded up really badly last night. It still consumes all of the chlorine and fast. I put in 12 last night at 11pm and by 12:30pm I was down to 2. I brought it back up last night before bed and this morning and also dosed it with some trichlor for residual. Since I'm brushing it, though it's cloudier the water quality seems better overall and almost all of the silt is off of the floor. My neighbor gave me the evil eye when I was vacuuming to waste but what else can I do? I aimed for the street as best I could but I still made a short lived pond in my front lawn close to the street. Saturday I am buying another 50' discharge hose (leslies is shockingly cheap for these) and a union so I can be sure it goes straight to the sewer. This morning after dosing it last night FC was at 2 so I'd call that very real progress. Pool calc says shock level of 12 for mustard algae so I'm doing that instead of 15. I can't afford to waste any chlorine... I know some of the folks who actually paid to have their pool installed rather than buying it with the house would laugh at me fretting over $300 :p
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I'm no expert, but it seems like your shock levels aren't high enough.
 
It's what poolcalc recommends considering I have *extremely* little CYA.

Part of me wonders if my uber high TA (down to 400) is to blame. My CSI is almost dead on at 0 though so I wonder if I'm supposed to worry about the high TA or not. The water will clear and cloudiness was the only problem I read about.,
 
piku said:
It's what poolcalc recommends considering I have *extremely* little CYA.
Click to expand...

how long have you been working on this? Is it possible that some of the known factors may be off a little? Your Chlorine dropped from 12 at 11PM to 2 at 12:30 PM the next day. Is there anyway to get a Chlorine reading at sunrise? It's hard to tell how much Chlorine was lost due to sunlight vs Algae. I usually kick the Chlorine dosage up a little over where it's recommended just to make sure it's high enough. Certainly, you don't want to be wasteful with the Chlorine, but if this continues, your wasting Chlorine by not hitting the algae a little harder.
 
JasonLion said:
tagprod said:
I'm no expert, but it seems like your shock levels aren't high enough.
Click to expand...

His CYA level is very very low. It can't be zero, since there has been some trichlor put in, but it is presumably well under 20. Because of that the shock levels mentioned are reasonable.
Click to expand...

yea it looks right, calculation wise, but that pool should be cleaned up by now - that's why I'm curious if some of the known variables are off or the testing or something else.
 
tagprod said:
yea it looks right, calculation wise, but that pool should be cleaned up by now - that's why I'm curious if some of the known variables are off or the testing or something else.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't expect the pool to be cleaned up by now at all. In fact I am rather impressed with how quickly everything has been moving along. This pool has been closed for a long time and the silt on the bottom provided a safe haven for algae through at least Tuesday evening. A major cleanup like this one can easily run to two or three weeks. Clearing the water after killing the algae alone can easily run five to seven days. Yet there are pictures posted where the bottom is clearly visible and chlorine levels are no longer going to zero overnight. Even if the water has clouded up again since the pictures there has been major progress, well ahead of what I would expect.
 

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