TM- FWIW = For What It's Worth
Thanks! Lol
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TM- FWIW = For What It's Worth
Brushing is kinda like a once over. Just brush in straight pushes away from you. Follow a pattern that covers all surfaces once. Change the pattern for next time, but still covering everything once over. Kinda like vacuuming a carpet or mowing the lawn as far as coverage and varying it. My brush does little on the way back toward me, but the resistance with the water when pushing away helps press the brush toward the surface I'm brushing. For vertical surfaces, I reach out a bit to help the brush press toward the pool wall, then push down and the water resistance takes over. Takes me around 20/25 minutes.
Your pool looks great! I'm sure you will get the technique and water chemistry under control pretty quickly with the help of everyone here.
Pool looks awesome! I'll be curious to see how your pH does since you are curing out a new pebble finish also. We have really hard water here, and I've been battling pH the whole time. Seems to have settled down somewhat now, but I had some big spikes overnight, going from like 7.5 to close to 8 by the morning. I started added some acid before bedtime, just to get ahead of it.
The pool guy told me that they sometimes do an "acid" start where they run the pH down to 6.8 for a couple days I think, to encourage evening of the plaster. You might check that pH, maybe it's why your water is so cloudy? Mine never really was, but we didn't drop the pH very low.
The brushing is a chore... I bought one of those wall whale brushes, and really like it. That also meant i now had a spare brush, which I gave to the kids to hop in the spa and brush it down down real good. I also bought a little corner brush, but haven't found it that useful. At least in our case, I do think it's got a lot smoother over the last couple of weeks of brushing.
We got our polaris 280 in the pool for first time yesterday, and it vacuumed up a pretty respectable pile of pebbles. I felt like you, in that I pretty much just felt like I was pushing stuff around on the bottom. I decided to think of it as "wet" sanding the rough patches...
Also in that first week, the DE pressure went from 20 to 30, which is the dirty mark. They backwashed it then. It didn't really rise at all the next week, but we backwashed yesterday so they could show me how it all worked. So keep an eye on that.
I don't know how your PB is(well I kinda do from reading your thread...) But you really want to keep an eye on your chemistry. They told me they were going to take care of all the start up. Yeah...right. I'm not saying they never came out, but if I relied on their efforts alone, I'd have some messed up water right now.
Congrats on getting through it! Your pool looks great!
Thanks for the tips, Kim! Brushing was better this morning. I have zero instructions from PB or plaster people regarding brushing.The brushing may not seem as if it is doing anything but it is. It is getting the plaster dust off the side/bottom and out into the water to be filtered out. It is MUCH easier to brush in the pool. Like said above it is like mowing the lawn or vacuuming the house. Go this way and that.
If you want to vacuum now you can get this kind of vacuum head:
11.25 Swimming Pool Weighted Liner Butterfly Vacuum Head with Bumper - Walmart.com
It has brushes on the bottom so is safe to use on new plaster. Two things at a time-brush and vacuum.
It was SO nice to hear you were able to get in the water and enjoy it. I can see how it will be a wonderful thing for you to do every night when you get off work-come home and just relax in the pool as you recover from your day of saving lives:angel:
I have read about those! Good to know they work well...maybe I can get one...A Wall Whale brush is what I use. It has a flap that the water will apply downward pressure to help with the brushing.
Thanks, Goober!Congratulations! Your pool looks great! Enjoy!!
G
Looks great!
They will run the pump(s) flat out for a couple of days and then should dial them back "if the are VS pumps. Once you have control of the pool you can figure how long and that rpm to run the pump to get you a complete turn over or two per day. Save a lot of $$$ and not run pump needlessly. For example my pool is 11,600 gallons. I run the pump for 8AM to 4PM at 1400rpm which gets me a flow of 50 gallons per minute (GPM). I have a flow meter but you can figure it out without one.
So 50GPM X 60 minutes = 3000 gallons per hour of flow. 8hrs run time = 24,000 gallons per day. Therefore I turn the pool water a little over twice a day. Running my pump at 1200rpm uses right a 238 watts of electricity, which is very little. Think of two 100w light bulbs. Cheers and enjoy.
Pool looks fantastic with water and glad you were able to "swim". I was in heaven too that first time I went in. Hard to believe it will be 2 weeks tomorrow since my start-up. How long did PB tell you to brush? I've been brushing twice a day and running the pump 24 hrs. I cut that back to 8 hrs on lowest speed and think I can brush every few days now. I don't see any cloudiness anymore when I brush.
Aww, thanks!Your pool is just beautiful -- especially the gorgeous water color!!
FWIW, Greg used a tile sanding and rubbing stone to smooth a few areas of the pool plaster that were a wee bit rough to the touch.
Denise, that water color looks so gorgeous! Congrats on your pool! Isn't it hard to believe that you actually have a pool??
The water will be cloudy as you brush away that plaster dust. For me, it didn't take very long before I didn't notice any more...maybe just a week? The more you brush the sooner it'll be done! At least you can get into the pool to do it. Mine was filled in April and the water was too cold. I do know what you mean by the brush being unwieldy and awkward. Maybe it's because we are shorter?
Enjoy your pool and happy testing!!
The water is so pretty! It feels like it's not the real color until you see it in the sun! Do you keep staring at it?
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That water is gorgeous....It must be surreal after the wait!!!
This pool turned out awesome. I tried to read all 79 pages.....but couldnt make it lol. I noticed you are doing fire bowls, which I am doing as well. Wondered if you found a good place to lool for them or if you already got them what they look like?
I think the white ball we see is your beaming face I am so happy for you to be done with this. The decking looks great too.
I'm looking forward to being done and down the road from all of this stress, that's for sure!We were filling our pool only 12 months ago - next year, like us, you will hopefully look back and be so happy with how amazing it is to have a pool. It is now easy to forget all the trouble, mud, dirt, "difficult" pool builder and all - I can't imagine dealing with the problems you have endured, but now at least you can enjoy your new pool!
And your pool is stunning!
So happy for you!! It's gorgeous. Love your step tiles.
Awsome looking pool. Make sure you run your spa jets and spa floor drain to flush fresh chlorine in them at least once a day. I run the spa main drains for 15minutes each day and also the spa jets for 5 minutes and blower for one minute during that time.
Well my spa jets have a separate pump that needs to be turned on for them to work. If yours are always running when the pool is on you should be fine. Also if I don't have the spa in spa mode there is no water circulating through my main drains in the floor of the spa. This is why I turn it on spa mode once a day for 15 minutes to flush fresh chlorine in those pipes as well as our blower which has four returns in the bottom of the spa. I still have water pumped through the spa when the pool is on with the spillover. When I first got my pool I didn't realize this and would get cloudy water when you go into spa mode.
Thank you so much - that helps! It sounds like I should still turn on my spa once a day for the spa main drains and also turn on the spa blowers (not sure I should have bothered even getting those!). I did notice a couple of weeks ago that when I used the spa after not using it for a while, there were milky bubbles coming out of the jets. I had never thought about the spa blowers needing to be run or the main drains flushed.
You can't imagine how much newbies like me appreciate info info. I love this site and all you experts - I learn things I didn't even know I needed to learn!!! Lol!!!
Suz :sunny: