I found the forums yesterday after the umpteenth trip to the store this year to fight a pool that will not clear. I've been balancing and testing my water successfully for the past 3 years with the occasional expertise of the pool lady who has always treated me - and my pool - fairly. I do use 3" tabs in an inline feeder, as well as a low dose copper "pill" once each season to avoid algaecide. (right after we built, before i found her, we had pink slime and I never want to go through that again!)
This year we had an unseasonably warm winter combined with a hot early spring, then unusually cool late spring. Opened late and was greeted with milky water. Didn't clear even though I took the unusual step of using clarifier. We changed our filter sand and have continued with shocking/ clarifying. I've alternated between Potassium shock and dichlor after the initial 8 gal 12%. I've been running trichlor far heavier than i ever have...wide open and have been through 6 tabs since Saturday morning. Was retrying to raise CYA, as reading at open was 0. Cant maintain FC residual. Yup... You guessed it... Ammonia! We just tested it for the first time yesterday and were at 1.0.
Found you all, hoping you can help!
Shocked w/4 bags potassium Sunday evening.
Yesterday's readings:
FC:1.0
CC: 5.0
Ph: 7.3
Alk: 80
Cya:30
Ammonia: 1.0
Turned off feeder, left pool open 24 hrs.
Today's readings:
FC: .4
CC: 4.0
Ph: 7.1
Alk: 75
Cya: 30
Ammonia:0.75
I brought home 150 in potassium shock yesterday but couldn't bring myself to add it once I found your forum. Hoping you can give me some guidance on how much bleach I'll need to add and for how long (how do you plug the 10x ammonia into the calculator??)
Or- should I go with the non- chlorine ( I think I know the answer to that!) Or should I go with her second suggestion and do a partial drain / fill (1foot) and start over? She did not advocate the liquid shock b/c of ph issues.
Thanks in advance for your advice, and for the wealth of info you have elsewhere!
This year we had an unseasonably warm winter combined with a hot early spring, then unusually cool late spring. Opened late and was greeted with milky water. Didn't clear even though I took the unusual step of using clarifier. We changed our filter sand and have continued with shocking/ clarifying. I've alternated between Potassium shock and dichlor after the initial 8 gal 12%. I've been running trichlor far heavier than i ever have...wide open and have been through 6 tabs since Saturday morning. Was retrying to raise CYA, as reading at open was 0. Cant maintain FC residual. Yup... You guessed it... Ammonia! We just tested it for the first time yesterday and were at 1.0.
Found you all, hoping you can help!
Shocked w/4 bags potassium Sunday evening.
Yesterday's readings:
FC:1.0
CC: 5.0
Ph: 7.3
Alk: 80
Cya:30
Ammonia: 1.0
Turned off feeder, left pool open 24 hrs.
Today's readings:
FC: .4
CC: 4.0
Ph: 7.1
Alk: 75
Cya: 30
Ammonia:0.75
I brought home 150 in potassium shock yesterday but couldn't bring myself to add it once I found your forum. Hoping you can give me some guidance on how much bleach I'll need to add and for how long (how do you plug the 10x ammonia into the calculator??)
Or- should I go with the non- chlorine ( I think I know the answer to that!) Or should I go with her second suggestion and do a partial drain / fill (1foot) and start over? She did not advocate the liquid shock b/c of ph issues.
Thanks in advance for your advice, and for the wealth of info you have elsewhere!