Newbie to SWG and need help on Chemical

Jump to latest Follow Reply
F

frang

0
Jul 11, 2013
2
Hi all,

I very very new to SWG's and unfamiliar with the chemicals. I have a 21 round pool. I check the SWG and it said the salt was 2600. I go to pool store (not the usual place, the place I use was on vacation) and they sell me:

2 bags of salt
Alkalinity Up 10 lbs.
a small bag of PH increase (threw bag out so don't know how much)

I do this, and I test again after 24 hours and now the PH is too high, salt is 3500, and free chlorine is testing "0". I now go back to my usual pool store and they give:

Add 4 lbs of Calcium to skimmer
add 3 lbs of PH decreaserto pool
wait four hours
add another 4 lbs of calcium to skimmer
wait 2 hours
add 1 lb of shock to skimmer
filter continuous

I did everything except the shock. I keep filter on with salt generator and after a few hours the salt generator Read "HIGH" and shut down.

At this point I keep filter with SWG shut off, and I now have this:

SWG reads 4500
PH: 8.4
Free Chlorine: O (not sure why this is 0 when salt is so high)
Alkalinity: 80
PPM Stabilizer 30-60 (I don't know what this is)

I got the readings from test strips.

What should I do? Should I empty some water and add fresh? Add more chemical? Shock pool.

By the way the pool is crystal clear and not slimy.
 
First use muriatic acid to drop the pH down to 7.5. The next thing you should do is buy a high quality test kit such as the Taylor k2006 or the TF 100. As you can see from your experience pool store testing is notoriously inconsistent and usually inaccurate. Test strips are also highly inaccurate and the range is too broad for accurately dosing the pool.

If your salt is too high you will need to drain and replace some of the water. The pool calculator can help you determine how much water you need to drain.

Please post a current set of test results and we can tell you if anything else needs adjusting.
 
Welcome to TFP frang!

You need to read in Pool School and learn the basics of the chemistry. It is not too difficult and you will learn much more from reading this information than the pool stores ever will help you out. The Pool School button on the top right of each page will direct you to the information you need. Needless to say, you are being pool stored and spending time and money that lead to headaches.

What you need to do is to add chlorine to the pool. Use liquid chlorine, either bleach or liquid from the pool store. They are the same thing but different concentrations. SWG's are not meant to bring the chlorine up from 0 to the proper level. They need they proper amount of chlorine in the water and then they maintain that level. See our recommended chlorine levels in this chart, pool-school/chlorine_cya_chart_shock.

You also need to drop the pH into the 7's. The cheapest way to do this is use muriatic acid or continue using the dry acid. You can measure the pH after 30 minutes and add more muriatic acid if needed. Pour the acid over a return so it gets mixed in with the water to prevent it from pooling up.

To avoid bad advice from the pool store you need your own test kit that gives accurate test results. Sorry, test strips are not what we recommend, see this link for the test kits we suggest, pool-school/pool_test_kit_comparison. Most of the members here use the TF-100 test kit as it has the most chemicals that are used most often.

Another great aid is the Pool Calculator found here, http://www.poolcalculator.com/. Insert your pool size and your measured test results and what you want your targets to be and it will calculate how much of each chemical you need.

You will need to drain some water to get the salt reading in the correct range. Use the pool calculator to estimate how much water to drain. It also has a calculator at the bottom of the page to figure out how many gallons your pool holds.

Here are the recommended levels we suggest, pool-school/recommended_levels.
 
Thank you all. I called the pool store and the don't have the type of test kit recommended. I will order it online. I will read here and ask questions. In the meantime I called the swg manufacture and he. Reset my swg and it reads 3400. I am hoping that is accurate. The test strip was higher hough. Also by adding chlorine the ph is now in range as is the other values. Right now power is out from a storm so nothing can be done.

Thanks for the heads up about putting the chlorine in skimmer. I did do that anymore.

How do you pout granular chlorine in pool.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Thread Status
Hello , This thread has been inactive for over 60 days. New postings here are unlikely to be seen or responded to by other members. For better visibility, consider Starting A New Thread.
Top Bottom
Back
Jump to latest Follow Reply