New pool owner, pool is sucking down chlorine and money!

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Typing on the computer this time, so hopefully no more ridiculous typos!

I do still need a little advice. As I mentioned I did a thorough clean on Sat. brushing all the nooks in the ladder, light, stairs, skimmer, returns. This included removing the light and it was pretty nasty in the housing. I then vacuumed to waste on Sunday and backwashed and rinsed the filter. I kept the pool at shock levels (between 18-20) on Sunday and left it at FC=19 before bed. I measured this morning and got a 4.5 ppm drop to 14.5 ppm. This was at 7AM, so not much sun yet. This is still clearly excessive relative to the guidance to "Shock the pool until CC is 0.5 and overnight ppm drop is less than 1".

The only things that I can think of are the following:
1) Take off the floor drain cover and clean/brush thoroughly
2) Replace sand in sand filter and clean sand filter housing. I bought the house this winter and I have no idea how long ago this was last done.
3) Look for mold growth in the heater.

This is all I can come up with to find/eliminate other sources of whatever is eating my FC.

Would you suggest any of these steps or something completely different?
 
You're just one of the lucky ones who have a tough strain of algae, I guess. We've had folks battle the shock process for 3 or 4 weeks, doing it correctly the whole time. So it's a bit early to panic.

Scrubbing inside the drain might not be a bad idea. Otherwise, just stay the course. Keep the FC level elevated. You're probably getting close. Cleaning the sand might be helpful - there could be organic debris that slipped through the strainer and the bleach is trying to oxidize it. Sand doesn't wear out, so a change isn't necessary. Personally, I'd give it another day at shock level before I started tearing into things.
 
If I am reading right, you started on Saturday, and today is Monday. 2 days. 2-4 weeks, as Richard said, is not uncommon. It took me 3, and a friend 4. In fact we were talking about my friend's pool this weekend, it's 8,000 gallons and took 90 bottles of bleach to get through the shock process. He's an unusual case, but it happens.
 
RobbieH said:
If I am reading right, you started on Saturday, and today is Monday. 2 days. 2-4 weeks, as Richard said, is not uncommon. It took me 3, and a friend 4. In fact we were talking about my friend's pool this weekend, it's 8,000 gallons and took 90 bottles of bleach to get through the shock process. He's an unusual case, but it happens.
Click to expand...


Jeez, 8000 gallon pool and 90 Bottles?!! Any chance there was ammonia involved? Just curious...


Yea I wouldn't start tearing into anything just yet. Keep Slamming it with bleach and lets see where it goes.
 
Since I was assisting remotely, I don't know for sure. I was also thinking he might have had a problem behind his light. He said for years their pool has been trouble all year long, and he said this year he hasn't had to mess with it at all. I gave him my Liquidator, and he has it tuned and keeping the pool chlorinated, and hasn't had to do anything out of the normal routine of keeping FC and pH in line.
 
Just to clarify. I started the shock process on Wednesday of last week and let the levels drop to high/normal (8 ppm) for a party on Friday and then restarted on Saturday. I'm still well short of 2-3 weeks you guys are mentioning. Not too excited about the possibility of it taking that long and loosing that much swim time, but I think the benefits out way the lost time.
 
Anytime you let it fall below shock level, you might as well consider that where you stopped, and now you need to start over again (as you have). You have to come up to shock level and hold shock level to be effective. The more you drop below shock level, the longer it's going to take.

I know my above posts were slightly off topic, but the point is that my friend's 4 weeks of time have cleared a problem he has had for years. You are right, the benefits will outweigh the time. And with any luck, getting to where you pass the OCLT won't take that long and it will just be the clearing of the water that will take time.
 
Thanks and not a problem with the off topic posts. They give me a frame a reference for what I'm in for.

One more thing that would be helpful for me to know. I'm currently bringing my pool to between 19-20 FC when I add chlorine (my CYA is 50), but with overnight drops and being at work all day it is tough to keep it at that level all the time. Is there a minimum value that I should try to stay above in order to not set myself back in the process, or maybe I should go to 23-24 in anticipation for the drop.

For instance. I brought the levels up to 19 this morning (7:00AM) the pool is uncovered and exposed to the sun. My wife just now measured 11 ppm FC and 0.5 CC. Is this low to the point that it will set me back?

Thanks for all the help
Jeff
 

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The shock level calculated on poolcalculator.com is your shock level. You must stay at or above it during the process. Just don't go crazy high, especially since you have a vinyl liner. 19-20 seems like a good start point to me, since I calculate the shock FC to be 16.

During the first part of the process, you might have to make hourly additions. This is part of why I recommend it being a weekend process if you have a normal 9-5 M-F job. Nighttime is a little easier too, as you don't have the sun helping lower the FC.
 
We have been shocking the pool for the last five days now and still getting a 3 ppm nighttime hours drop in FC. The pool looks beautiful. The water is crystal clear and sparkling in the sunlight! I measured the CYA for the first time in about a week today and I measured it at 30 ppm which is down from the 50 ppm that I measured right after I did the 1/2 drain and refill. Guess maybe the water was still a little cloudy at that point and it was effecting the test? So at 30 ppm the chock level should be 13, so we have actually been overshocking the pool for the last week getting as high as 20 ppm FC. Any new advice or just stay the course and keep shocking to the new 13 ppm calculated value?

FYI..TA is high at 140 if that is a concern.
 
Yeah I saw that the site is calling this SLAMing the pool now. I like it. I will stay the coarse, but I was reading through Pool School a little further earlier and noticed two things that seem relevant to my situation.

1) I did not adjust my PH to 7.2 - 7.4 prior to starting the SLAM process. I measuring at 7.6 as of today but saw that PH readings when FC is elevated are not reliable. Is this important enough to let the FC drop to normal levels and adjust PH and start again?

2) I also saw DE particles discussed as something that can really speed up this process for a sand filter systems. Do you see value in me adding some DE after my next backwash?

Thanks,
Jeff
 
Leave your pH alone. It is fine.

DE is for another use. ignore it for now.

Your focus needs to be on maintaining adequate chlorine in your pool to stop that overnight loss. What is your current FC?
 
We are out of town for the weekend so I'm worried about loosing ground in this process. I brought the pool to 16 FC before I left and added 5 trichlor pucks to the chlorinater. I hate to use the trichlor, but figure with CYA at 30 a couple of days won't hurt too much. Thoughts.

I may be able to get a neighbor to help in the future, but we don't know any of them all that well yet. Any other thoughts on how to handle this.

I left the space age solar cover on to reduce UV consumption. I lost 2.5 ppm from 6:20AM to 4:30PM yesterday with the cover on.
 
I think you are in good shape. You will very likely return to a pool with plenty of FC. Remove the cover as soon as you return so your pool can "breathe" a bit, test your FC, and bring it right back to 16 ppm.

Using the pucks in the way you did was fine.
 
Thanks for all the help Dave! This site is great!

I did want to make sure I understood you on the shock level. I'm now measuring CYA at 30 rather than 50 as I stated at the very beginning of this thread, so I have ajusted to keeping FC above the calculated shock of 13 and I will go as high as 16 when I add. Do you agree with this?

I'm assuming that the higher CYA measurements of a week ago were due to cloudy water not an actual higher level of CYA.
 
Yeah, going to 16 will not cause harm. We want folks to stay pretty close to the guidelines but that difference is fine.

On a side note, cloudy water VERY seldom has any appreciable effect on the CYA test. I have not read your whole thread (to look for other causes) but cloudy pool water normally just doesn't make enough difference to matter.
 

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