SLAM taking forever

[MCan56]

I started SLAM'ing about 2 weeks ago. Starting out, the pool was a pond- don't ask. (broken pump at closing time and no cover- boy was this a learning experience) It has/had tons of debris in the bottom, including Pecan flowers, leaves, tadpoles etc.

I made sure my CYA was good (30), got Chlorine up to 16 and have been brushing, sweeping etc. It rapidly went from green to grey, but there it still sits. Very cloudy. Sweeping the bottom (blindly) yields nothing, but the Polaris will fill a bag within a few hours. My sand filter is running 24x7, and I backwash it when it gets to about 22-23 from it's normal 18. I've now gone through about 50 jugs of 8.25% bleach.

I'm at a loss as to how to get the rest of the muck out, since I'm sure that's why I'm still not clean. I've tried a vacuum, but it seems to lose prime easily and doesn't pull very hard. Where do I go from here? My local pool store has said they rent their portable vacuum, and I'm very tempted to floc and vacuum with that. Is it a horrible idea?

btw- I'm using pool math with 30000 gallons as my size to be sure I "overkill"- I don't really have an accurate volume. It's 20x40, with 45 degree corners, 3 step walk-in on one short side and 3 step walk-in on one corner. It's a play-pool or volleyball pool, and is about 4.5' at the sides and slopes to about 6' at the bottom. Very hard to calculate. I'm attaching a picture.

 

[Azgirl71]

Sounds like you are doing what you need to do. What test kit do you have? I don't know that I would do Floc since it has mixed results. Have you considered addin DE to your sand filter? It really helped to clear my pool. You have to be home to watch the pressure rise though as in the beginning it raises pretty quick. By my 4th time adding DE I was able to let it go for 2 days without backwashing and my pool sparkles now.

Lots of brushing helps too.

It may help to rent the portable vacuume. I love my rechargeable vacuum.

 

[JasonLion]

The key is getting all of the debris off the bottom you possibly can. If the Polaris is catching stuff, then that is a good approach. Usually using a leaf rake gets good results. Vacuuming to waste is a possibility, though the pump may clog too quickly for that to be useful. The pool store portable vacuum is likely to have the same problem. Sometimes you can vacuum to waste with a syphon going and no pump, though you have to watch out for draining too much water when you do that.

 

[Texas Splash]

50 jugs! Holy smokes! I'll remember you next time I'm complaining about carrying a couple boxes of liquid chock to my pool. Well, stay with it. Perseverance will pay off. Make sure you are using one of TFP's recommended test kits, and take full advantage of the tools on this site (i.e. Pool Calculator) and you'll get it where it needs to be.

 

[MCan56]

If I sweep, I do stir up some stuff, but can't seem to rake it, since I can't really see what is happening. Does that make sense? I didn't make that very clear.

The Polaris is doing ok, but it's sick. I replaced the feeder tubes and did the body rebuild, but now the belt is slipping bad. It'll be back at work tomorrow, since my rebuild kit came in today!

I guess I'll keep at it. Adding the DE is interesting, I hadn't heard of doing that. The sand is 3 years old, that may help it out.

edited to add that I am using the TF-100 I think I ordered a refill kit a few months back, and I'm already almost out of the 2oz R-0871 for the DPD test

 

[JasonLion]

It should always be possible to use a leaf rake, even if you can't see what you are doing. You won't be able to see where you have been and where you haven't been, but you should still be able to pick up a fair amount of material regardless.

 

[MCan56]

I just wanted to update...my pool is back to it's sparkly self! The SLAM did, indeed, take forever. I did ultimately floc it, shortly after my last post. I got scared when it hadn't even begun to settle by morning. I left it as is for an extra DAY (so about 32 hours of settling) and sure enough, there was a layer of red muck along the entire bottom. It was very fun to vacuum it up, as it was quite easy to see it being pulled away. Turns our most of the organic material WAS gone, hence the leaf rake not working while I was "blind" from murkiness. The only problem...my pool was still cloudy and grey.

My next step was to deep clean the sand. I purchased a strap wrench, and planned for a couple of hours of work. The unions were very tough to break, but I did so, and pulled some muck off top layer of sand and then got to hosing. I did goof and opened the drain first and lost a good 3-5 pounds of sand, but there is easily sand to the halfway part so I figure I'm good. You should have seen how much grey muck (dead algae) came bubbling out. I did this for about 20-30 minutes, and also reached in and pulled out when I believe is cottonwood fluff and broke up chunks with my hand. Once this was done, I capped it off and tested...one of the unions leaked bad! A few winds of Teflon tape solved that problem, and I was back to filtering. (well, after backwash and rinse that is!)

I went back to 24 hours of filtering, and double checking that I was holding FC, which I was, and let it keep going for a few weeks. I purchased some DE as well, and added a cup to my skimmer between backwashes. While it was improving, it was slow. I went back to twice-daily filter runs of 4-5 hours, and have been using it like normal. Then, lo and behold...I got home yesterday and it is sparkling! It feels like it was overnight, but really it just took time for the sand filter to keep doing it's thing.

So all told, this year has been a lot of work to fix my laziness at the end of last year, and I don't see myself repeating that. I have:
Replaced shell on Polaris 380
Subsequently replaced the belts and one wheel bearing that had broken
Replaced the Polaris tail and feeder hose and backup valve
Rinsed sand filter media (deep clean)
Paid someone to repair a PVC break where booster bump attaches to pool return line (I'm going to start playing with PVC now so I can do this myself)
replaced booster pump and fittings
replaced Aqualumin II with a new Aqualumin III (the II had leaked before I bought the house and never worked...and now I know I have a nicheless light- booo!)
Cleaned liquidator, leveled ground underneath and put pavers under it (dogs dug under it and got it decidedly unlevel!)
non-pool, but related to pool experience-
added solar LED lights to fence around pool and on the house
bought electric power washer and got rid of weeds between pavers on my patio

We're ready for the pool parties! I'll post some pics later. I have before and afters of the pool water, and the pavers. Whew!

 

[Patrick_B]

Glad you got it done, but you have to remember how long it took to get that bad. How bad it was to start is a huge factor, but how well you do on the MAINTAIN part of SLAM is key. Glad you are done.