- Mar 30, 2010
- 3
Ok i'm new to the Spa Chemistry world but I have been reading up quite a bit and have been trying to balance my Spa but i'm having some issues. I'm trying to follow waterbear's step by step on using bromide.
I got the spa balanced and bromde levels around 4 ppm, put the floater in then about a week later I decided to shock it. I think I misread the instructions and didn't increase my my bromide levels up to 30 before I added the bleach ( about a cup ) to sanitize.
After about a week I retested the water. Everything was all out of whack. Water was cloudy, TA was low, PH was high, and BR was almost non existent.
QUestion #1 Did I screw up by adding chlorine without having the BR levels at 30 before doing so?
To try and remedy the situation, I brought the TA to 80 with baking soda, then I used the Pool calculator to determine how much Muratic acid and Borax to add to the tub (including extra acid to make up for the increase in PH from Borax)
I added the correct dosage ( somewhere around 1oz of each for a 400g tub ), waited and retested. NO change. I waited 24 hours and retested, no change.
I added the chemicals again, repeated the above tesiting/waiting. PH levels creeping down very very slightly and BR levels going up very very slightly.
I added the correct dosage again ( with a little extra of each ) and again only very slight changes.
As of right now the PH is around 7.8 (down from 8+), i'd like it to be slightly lower, and the BR is registering maybe around .5 ppm ( up from 0 ), and as I understand it I want this to be closer to 3ppm ( i'm using the 3 step system with a floater ) normally.
Question #2 Given what I did with the shocking, does that make it harder to get the PH/bromide levels correct?
Question #3 Is borax even the right thing to add to get it to 30ppm prior to shocking? Maybe I have my chemicals mixed up completely here....I'm kind of confused as to the difference between 'borates' and 'bromides'.
Please Help
I got the spa balanced and bromde levels around 4 ppm, put the floater in then about a week later I decided to shock it. I think I misread the instructions and didn't increase my my bromide levels up to 30 before I added the bleach ( about a cup ) to sanitize.
After about a week I retested the water. Everything was all out of whack. Water was cloudy, TA was low, PH was high, and BR was almost non existent.
QUestion #1 Did I screw up by adding chlorine without having the BR levels at 30 before doing so?
To try and remedy the situation, I brought the TA to 80 with baking soda, then I used the Pool calculator to determine how much Muratic acid and Borax to add to the tub (including extra acid to make up for the increase in PH from Borax)
I added the correct dosage ( somewhere around 1oz of each for a 400g tub ), waited and retested. NO change. I waited 24 hours and retested, no change.
I added the chemicals again, repeated the above tesiting/waiting. PH levels creeping down very very slightly and BR levels going up very very slightly.
I added the correct dosage again ( with a little extra of each ) and again only very slight changes.
As of right now the PH is around 7.8 (down from 8+), i'd like it to be slightly lower, and the BR is registering maybe around .5 ppm ( up from 0 ), and as I understand it I want this to be closer to 3ppm ( i'm using the 3 step system with a floater ) normally.
Question #2 Given what I did with the shocking, does that make it harder to get the PH/bromide levels correct?
Question #3 Is borax even the right thing to add to get it to 30ppm prior to shocking? Maybe I have my chemicals mixed up completely here....I'm kind of confused as to the difference between 'borates' and 'bromides'.
Please Help