Crazy ph

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christianday

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May 31, 2015
138
New Orleans, LA
So I'm starting a new thread to try to get as many people to help figure this out as possible. I have a 10k gallon plaster gunite pool with four swim jets that's about five months old. No matter what I do, even after adding about (still waiting for test strips for exact) 50ppm borates now, and the pH absolutely rises much faster with the borates than even it did without them. I managed to get the TA down to 60 and the pH to a nice 7.6 when the borates first went in and then, boom, eight days later, the pH was so much more magenta on the TF100 measuring kit that it must have been up around 9 or higher.

So here were the readings from two days ago to now:

Date6/30/15
Time3:09 PM
pH:>>>8.2
FC:5.5
CC:0
TC:5.5
TA:150
CH:450
CYA:65

I added a half gallon of muriatic acid two days ago and a gallon yesterday, got down to 7.4 or so and now, two days later, I retested TA and pH at:

Date7/2/15
Time11:34 PM
pH:8.2
FC:-
CC:-
TC:-
TA:90
CH:-
CYA:-

So let me try to understand this. Basically, I can't even hire a pool person weekly because we wouldn't be able to swim five days out of the week because the pH would spike to ungodly levels in the time between they got here. At this point I should just get rid of the pool. I simply do to want to be working with muriatic acid every single day of my life. What gives here? Are there people out there that specialize in figuring this stuff out because I'm lost. I don't like working with MA. I don't mind doing it here and there, but every day??? The calcium runs up and down between 450 to 350 and back again. The TA won't stay down even with borates. I read that borates are supposed to hold the TA in the face of water features but in another thread I'm reading that the CO2 outgassing from the jets interact with the borates to make the TA and pH rise even faster so why did I even add the borates? I can't even get the same answer twice on this stuff but I'm ready to just have the thing filled with distilled water and call it a day.

What if I put about five gallons of MA in at once? Will that lower the TA enough to freeze it?

These swim jets are so powerful that if anyone in the house forgets to turn them off, in two hours, the pH goes up at least .2 per hour where it used to go up .1 before the borates.

So what is the point of adding borates? I wish I never did because now it's even worse.

I am begging for any insight that might help get this pool under control because ten gallons of MA later in the past month, and I'm just burnt out on it. There simply HAS to be a solution. Does anyone know someone who is a serious expert in New Orleans area that can get this under control because I'm just beyond frustrated that no matter what I do, the pH just gets even worse and our pool is completely un-swimmable most of the time. The chlorine is stable. the CYA is stable. The calcium is generally at 350 though occasionally at 450 (new plaster?). I always check 18" out and 18" down and never let top water seep in as I'm bringing up the container.

Is there even a solution here? Will distilled water help? I'm afraid of one of those acid dispensers but I'm ready to try anything. I may get the Sense and Dispense and just use the pH part.
 
My pool builder custom engineered these swim jets from standard aerated pumps and it was a first time for them. They work probably better than anything out there, probably even Endless Pools, but their affect on the pool is clearly something we never anticipated. They not only change the surface of the water, the entire pool looks like a flowing river with all four of these jets on. So no, the pool builder doesn't know. I am asking him to look into the Sense and Dispense though. I'm terrified of anything adding the wrong amount of pH to the water and don't want to have to check the pH every day but if I can set a max on how much it can add in a day, it should be fine. Not even sure if Sense and Dispense works with the OmniLogic panel but I guess we'll see.
 
What did you use for borates? Whatever it was was basic as the TA went up. You should have used straight boric acid. In any case, just lower the TA by lowering the pH until the pH holds.

What's the water temperature?

Here's what I suggest:
Test ph and ta daily and adjust as follows:
If the ta is above 60, lower the ph to 7.2. When it gets to 60, lower the ph to 7.4. When it gets to 50 maintain the ph at 7.8
Keep a chart of the daily readings and how much acid was added each day.
 
JamesW: it was 99.9% pure boric acid from Duda energy.

I very briefly had the TA at 50 and that is exactly when I added the boric acid but then it went up to 60 in a day and stayed there for about three days and then spiked up to 150 in another eight days so 50 doesn't seem to be the sweet spot.

Another thought is, the SWG is not running anymore than it already was because I dropped the percentage as I increased the filter time but the FILTER is running 20 hours a day where it used to run around 12 hours per day. Could that make a difference? I know they say SWG can increase pH but that's not running anymore than usual. Only the filter is.



The other option is to get one of those sense and dispense. I would imagine that something keeping the pH lower is also going to be keeping the pH lower as well, especially if you use the MA ones and not the CO2 ones that are discontinued, but there's not a lot of reviews about them.

I did a lot of those daily readings in Microsoft Excel but there's no rhyme nor reason to it. I know that before I added borates (99.9% pure boric acid), the pH rose from those jets at .1 per day. Now it's rising at .3 per day which is just insane, and that's with the swim jets maybe running for five hours or so in the past two days. Those swim jets are so powerful though that the whole 10k gallon pool looks like a flowing river.

Anytime the Pool Calculator tells me what to add, what I add works, but the pH just goes right back up again. I need to find a sweet spot on the TA and 50 just doesn't seem to be it. Maybe 40?

- - - Updated - - -

I definitely want to look into sense and dispense. Even if I hire a pool person to come once per week, the pool would only be swimmable for two days after the person was there, since it rises at .3 per day and the TA is rising from 50 to 150 in 11 days. I need something that keeps it balanced more daily and I refuse to be handling muriatic acid every day of my life. It's just ridiculous. There is definitely something wrong with this pool. Even though the chlorine is always perfect, the TA and pH are a nightmare. I'm calling the pool service tomorrow to see if they have ideas that will freeze it, even if it means taking out all the borates by reverse osmosis or even emptying the pool and filling with distilled water and adjusting CH and everything manually from absolute zero. I've been at this for weeks and it's just not fun.
 
here is a scene capture on my site of an excel sheet. You can see the patterns developing here.

http://christianday.com/pool/pool-july-3-2015.png

It's just bizarre. The spikes seem to be worse after borates but there could be something else going on. The plaster is still in the first five months of curing. Maybe after it cures, I replace all the water but it is annoying to have added all those borates. I'd like to give the pool specialists a chance to see if they can freeze the pH and, short of that, I'm going to get a sense and dispense. If MA was something I could leisurely add once a week, I'll suffer the ritual, but I'm definitely not doing it daily.
 
I am using the TF100 test kit. I am wiping the tip of the bottle with the damp cloth. I am taking the water from 18" out and 18" down. The TA absolutely is spiking that much in eight days. I managed to get it down to 90 after a gallon and a half of muriatic acid the other day, but I'm sure it's probably higher now. The four swim jets we're using literally churn the water. Since the calcium has gone up from 350 to 450, it may be the curing plaster. Would that also raise the pH?

Nothing basic is being added my me, not even fill water since any evaporation has been handled by the rain. I am thinking these swim jets have something to do with it because it doesn't spike much when I don't turn them on. Mind you, I always test the water when the jets are off so it isn't the turbulence of the water.

I have also used test strips and both the TA and pH are spiking there too. Yes, I realize nobody likes them but they are consistent with the TF100 drop tests. two drops, swirl, 5 drops swirl, and a drop then wipe then drop then wipe till you get to the number. I'm not doing this test incorrectly. People on the other thread where I was posting realized this.

- - - Updated - - -

The TA went up from 50 to 150 in 11 days and god knows how many spikes in pH, and that's with borates at 50ppm, but as Chem Geek stated on the other thread I was on, these swim jets are not something most people on here have and they aerate the water at a level that nothing else I've seen mention for "water features" would do since the entire surface of the pool is being aerated by them.

- - - Updated - - -

And if the TA had not spiked to 150 in 11 days, how would it still be at 90 after a gallon and a half of muriatic acid? It definitely spiked. I do not know why, but it definitely spiked. I have a pool professional coming this week coming to see if they have any insight, but unless the TF100 simply doesn't work, these readings are not incorrect. It doesn't take a chemist to pour five drops of something and swirl. I could see if I were taking the water from the top but I am not and I do not even allow top water into the tube when I bring it down because it's covered with my hand until I get it down into the water.

So rather than just toss it off as, "this can't happen," I'd be more impressed with, "here's how it's happening."
 

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The only thing that has been added besides muriatic acid is the 400oz of borates, after which the TA and pH blasted up even worse. The pH went from an average rise of .1 per day to .3 per day. God knows what it's at now. I'm out of muriatic acid so the pH is probably up around 9. The only other thing that it could be is whatever was in the fill water to begin with, and I tested that and the TA of the fill water is 140 and the pH is greater than 8.2 but I haven't had to fill water in weeks because of rain. Could it be the plaster curing? That is the only other thing that has been added.

It is pretty hard to screw up the TA test and it's nigh impossible to screw up the pH test. It. Is. Spiking. The TA took eight days to get from 60 to 150 and then two days (and a gallon and a half of muriatic acid) to get down to 90.

PoolDV, Chem Geek, and others have been following this in another thread. I am unsure as to why the spike, but I am definitely sure that it is spiking and we haven't added anything other than rain water, muriatic acid, and 99.9% pure boric acid from duda energy.

- - - Updated - - -

It's clear I need a professional here, but I will be sure to let folks know when the professional notes the spike in TA that there actually is one.
 
James, see this post and others in the original thread. If the plaster is curing or otherwise releasing calcium hydroxide, it can have the CH, TA, and pH rise and acid would bring the pH and TA back down. The same is true for undissolved chlorine gas or hypochlorous acid outgassing though with that one would see more of a chlorine loss. The plaster curing would explain why this even happens (though not as quickly) with the swim jets off overnight. What is not explained is how the TA is going up as much as it is unless the pH is truly off the charts high, but then I'd expect to see some scaling and that hasn't been seen. If this is from calcium hydroxide, then the CH would rise as much as the TA but the TA has been seen to rise even more.e

I'll ask in the other thread what model of AquaRite is being used, it's % ontime, and how long it is on (i.e. circulation pump active) to figure out the chlorine output to see how much its outgassing might be contributing to the problem.
 
chem geek: I am waiting for my pool builder to tell me what the equipment models is and he's taking his own sweet time. When he replaced the ProLogic panel with the OmniLogic, he took all the other equipment manuals with him. I'd have no idea how to even change the filter. It's ticking me off.

The plaster is still in the curing phase so that makes sense. So basically once it's cured, I just need to replace all the water. I may even spring the cost for distilled, since I can adjust the chemicals of that to exactly what I need.
 
Chem Geek: probably good to keep it in this thread. But either way, the filter runs 20 hours per day at 20% which is about 4 hours per day of chlorination time, keeping it at a steady 5.5 FC with 0CC (and sometimes .5 or .1 but only rarely).

Since the CH spiked over eight days, all I can think of is that the pool curing is bad. Plus when the pool was first filled, they were brushing it twice per day to push all the plaster dust into the filter. I'm SURE that didn't help once it dissolved. I may do the reverse osmosis thing. If it's not that expensive, I'll do it every couple years or so if it means getting this thing under control.

- - - Updated - - -

n240sxguy: I also have all the return jets and, after reading how just those can aerate pH up when pointed up at the surface, I can't imagine what the swim jets are doing. I will have to do a public Facebook video of the jets at some point. However I'm explaining them, they are far more powerful than I think anyone here is visualizing. I don't think an Olympian swimmer could reach the edge of the pool when they're on full blast. Plus I always put them on when I'm in the pool because I like the effect ... on the feel of the pool if not the chemicals. LOL
 
You probably have the Hayward AquaRite T-CELL-9 that outputs 0.7 pounds of chlorine over 24 hours so over 4 hours in 10,000 gallons that would be 1.4 ppm FC so not very high. So perhaps instead it's a Hayward AquaRite T-CELL-15 that outputs 1.45 pounds per 24 hours so that would be 2.9 ppm FC where if 1 ppm FC of this is outgassed, then that would contribute to TA and pH rise, but only 0.1 pH units and 1.4 ppm TA.

Is your pool fully exposed to sunlight all day?

So it seems like plaster curing (calcium hydroxide) is the only explanation but it still doesn't fully explain everything because if that were the primary source then the CH and TA rise would be the same ppm (before adding acid, of course). As for the borates, their effect on lowering water surface tension may exacerbate carbon dioxide outgassing more than their pH buffering effect helps, at least with massive water movement as caused by the swim jets. That's my best guess at this point, though that would only have the pH rise more and shouldn't have the TA rise more (unless chlorine outgassed more, but we just calculated that this effect is too small). Unless perhaps the borates in some way are exacerbating the plaster curing effect in some way (maybe by pH buffering near the surface so that it's not getting "sealed" by the calcium carbonate that forms and maybe the swim jets have so much force they are preventing calcium carbonate formation???) So still some mysteries here.
 
Five month old plaster should be mostly cured unless there's something wrong with it. Also, why would it get worse suddenly? It the plaster hard or soft? Is it easy to scratch? What plaster did you get?

Undissolved chlorine gas seems unlikely unless the returns are very short

Maybe the boric acid wasn't pure boric acid. Can you double check the label?

Are you 100 % sure that no one is adding anything like baking soda?

Have you tested the borate level?
 
in one week (8 days) to go from ta 60 to ta 150 would require nearly 16lbs of baking soda or similar
in two weeks ch from 350 to 450 would require 11lbs of calcium chloride
if all this is coming out of your plaster i would be surprised, you would almost be able to see the walls disolving
might be worth collecting some rain water and testing it
how much rain would you guess you have had
do you have any photos of your pool equipment
wondering if there might be an automated ph control that is malfunctioning hidden in there somewhere
i assume you have cleaned your cartridge filter
when you do the ph test do you hold a white card or similar behind the vial
could you have someone else verify your ph reading in case you have some color vision problem
i know it sounds stupid but obviously there is something extremely unusual going on
and by now you must be so frustrated
not trying to wind you up but looking for something we haven't thought of
 
My pool builder custom engineered these swim jets from standard aerated pumps and it was a first time for them. They work probably better than anything out there, probably even Endless Pools, but their affect on the pool is clearly something we never anticipated.
Click to expand...

If air is coming out the jets, stop that from happening to reduce pH rise.
 

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