winter cover blew off, green and doesn't seem to be clearing

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R

ryxore

0
May 31, 2007
5
So the winter cover blew off the pool and since we do not have many trees I didn't mess with putting it back on. Big mistake on my part I think.

I hooked everything up a couple of weeks ago, except the solar panels because I would rather the water was clean. I put new sand in the filter and ran it over night and shocked the water with 2 bags of supershock from Wal-mart that was left over from last year. Of course it did nothing to the water.

I took out the old test kit and everything was ok for opening numbers, alkalinity was low, ph was high and chlorine was low.

A week or so ago I put 5 bags of shock, 4 lbs of alkalinity up, half a bottle of clarifier and half a bottle of algaecide in and the water turned grayish, then it rained for a few days and it went back to green.

Three nights ago I put 5 bags of shock in with the pump turned off (someone said to do that), in the morning it was still green. I let the pump run for the day and backwashed that night. I put 5 more bags of shock in last night, tried to vacuum it but the basket fills up faster than I can empty it, oh and I left the pump running. This morning I put 8 oz of black, green and some other color algaecide in the pool. This evening I vacuumed by leaving the pump on rinse and just let the nasty green water run right through the filter and out of the pool.

I added water and went to Wal-Mart to buy more supershock. I added 5 bags tonight and again just kept the pump running. I have been backwashing several times a day but the pool doesn't seem to be getting any clearer.

After adding the shock I thought about getting some numbers for you, so here goes.

27 foot round pool, about 18-19K gallons.

Cl 5
Br 10
Alk 190
Ph 7.7-7.8
Hard 0
30 and I could still see the black dot

Any pointers would be much appreciated.

This is only my third season, second season opening the pool. Last year went great but I had the winter cover on the entire year.

Thanks,
 
Welcome to the forum!

You want to get some stabilizer in there to keep the chlorine from burning off each day. You could do that by using dichlor to chlorinate for a while till your levels come up, or you could add stabilizer directly.

Second, you need to bring your chlorine levels up to shock level as frequently as possible. Test the water and add enough chlorine to bring it back to shock level at least once a day and preferably several times a day. Once the chlorine level starts holding overnight for a few nights you can let the chlorine level start dropping back to normal levels.

Brushing the pool reguarly will help the chlorine get to all of the algae. If there are significant amounts of algae or debris on the bottom try vacuming it to waste.

After you have killed all the algae it will still take several days for the filter to clear everything out of the water. To speed this up run the pump 24/7 starting right away and keep an eye on the filter pressure. Backwash any time the pressure goes up 10 lbs.

Good Luck!
 
Ok, , first off, you're throwing way too much stuff into your pool to start.
let's concentrate on your algae issue first, your stabilizer will take at least a week to be brought up anyway, so that's something you can start on while cleaning up algae, but don't worry about the rest of the numbers so much and keep the algacide out of your pool, it helps prevent algae in a CLEAN pool, NOT kill it in a dirty pool. If your cl is allowed to drop to 5, you likely won't be getting rid of the green in any hurry.
Go to walmart, stop buying the bags of shock, head to the laundry section, buy about 10 bottles of their cheap bleach (6%) , get 1 can of stabilizer and 1 can of floculant (clarifier) in the pool section and leave with a happier wallet.
Once you get home, dump 4 of those bleach bottles into your pool, add half of the stabilizer into a sport sock and tie it off the stairs.
This should bring your cl up to about 15-20 ppm, a much better place to be.
If you have a kreepy krawley, I suggest running it for a day to get the algae off the bottom and mixed with the cl.
Check your baskets frequently, leaves etc may colllect and slow the flow.
Don't backwash, it'll hinder filtration.
Backwash only when the pressure goes up about 6+ lbs and/or your flow is very minimal at the return.
Your pool should turn a milky blue within about 6 hours of adding the bleach, keep the cl level at 15-20 for a couple of days with the filter running continually - don't know who told you to turn off your filter after adding shock, but that's just stupid since you need to continually mix the cl and algae up to keep it fully exposed to the cl.
Once you're able to just see the bottom of the pool through your thinning milk (about 2 days), add the floculant and do as the bottle instructs you to.
You should get dust bunnies collecting on the bottom and your water will get significantly clearer, these can be vacuumed to waste if you can replenish the water easily, or another solution if you're on a water budget (well system) is to vac them up SLOWLY with your manual vac into a DIRTY filter - dirty filters work much better.

Don't replace your sand again, sand has an indefinite life span, 3 years is nothing.

You HAVE to stay on top of this until it's taken care of.
 
You might want to read my "Algae Diary" post for an idea about how an algae battle goes: Algae Diary

The big key is checking your chlorine level very often. A pool leaf rake, which is a net that can get stuff off the bottom is good for clearing the leaves and crud off the bottom.
 
Yes, do as Matt says, and I just want to say BLEACH, BLEACH,BLEACH! I just can't specify how important it is to stay consistant with your chorine. Everything else comes later. As soon as you see the chlorine come down from 20, add more bleach. If you have any trichlor tablets, add one to your skimmer basket. Just don't let the chlorine drop and you will kill the algae fast, if you let it drop, you are adding more time to having a green pool :oops:. Kep the filter running 24/7 - If you keep up with the chlorine, you will be surprised how fast the water changes color :-D
 
OK, I have three boxes of supershock-it from Wal-mart to take back after reading about BBB. I figure at $20 or so each that will buy a lot of bleach.

It was milky blue with a green tint this morning. So we will have to see how the bleach goes over the next couple days.

I know it may sound silly but, I am glad it is going to be overcast the next few days, the sun seems to really eat up the chemicals.

I will update my progress.
 
Until your CYA comes up, your Chlorine will get eaten up relatively fast by the sun, once you get your CYA (stabilizer) to 40-60 ppm, your chlorine will stick around longer.
Do not go over 60ppm, your Chlorine will start to become ineffective with too much CYA, and at 80 you'll start to really run into problems.
 
Well, It has been a couple of days and the green is out but the water is now a gray cloudy mix. I have vac'ed everything from the bottom of the pool that I can see and when I vac now I do not get much waste in the basket.

I haven't had to backwash but twice in the last few days because it seems to stay right around 20 on the gauge.

Not sure what to try to get the cloudy water clear again.
 
A week later and it is still cloudy.

I am keeping all the levels where they are suppose to be, I don't backwash until it is higher. I am vac'ing it and keeping the simmer basket cleared of anything and scooping any leaves out.

My son got into the pool a couple days ago and stired it up a bit. It went from grayish blue cloudy to a greenish tint gray blue that is cloudy. I am sort of lost as far as what to do next.

Thanks a ton for the help guys. I am not real sure how long it should take for the pool to clear up.
 

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Are you filtering 24/7? Sounds like with the greenish tint you have not killed off all the algae, and add to that the fact that you are still scooping leaves, you need to get back up to shock and keep it there until the FC level holds overnight. Get the leaves out, as they are eating up your Cl, that needs to be busy killing other things. Keep filtering and backwashing as needed. You will get there!
Another ingredient in getting your pool clear is POPP - Pool Owner Patience and Persistence!!
 
OK four days with no more green, I scrubbed the walls and bottom, even took out the steps and scrubbed them.

the cheap blue test kit at walmart gives me these numbers.

cl/br is at the highest, 5/10

alk is very high 220 (I have no idea how to bring it down, I have been trying ph minus and alk minus, both say they drop alk but neither is working)

ph is only ay 6.6 or 6.8 because of trying to get the alk down

The pool has no hardness, the drops do not even change the water color.

The pool is finally stabilized, of so it says.

Thanks a ton for the help everyone.
 
Don't believe your pH numbers while your chlorine is high. The test isn't accurate at high chlorine. Adding acid or pH minus won't lower your alkalinity unless you aerate the pool with a fountain or point the returns to the surface while the pH is low.
 
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