Short Version: I’m having trouble getting my pH above 7.0.
Long version:
We had our pool refinished at the beginning of the season last year. Turned out beautiful. Shortly after, I was getting white spotting in the shallow end. By mid-August the deep end was about 2/3 like a cloudy white color on the floor. I had the pool company (SHE owns the company) out and she talked to her plasterers who said they could do an acid bath to take care of it, but it should wait until after opening this year. Well, sure enough the blue got much more dull over the winter and the cloudy white was now covering about half the pool.
This June after opening and balancing, I reached out to tell them it was worse than it was at closing last year. They finally came out two weeks ago to do the acid bath. They added 20 gallons of “acid”. I don’t know exactly what the acid was, I’m assuming muratic, but I don’t know the concentration. They ran their pump to circulate for about 24 hrs for 4 days. The second day they added another 5 gallons because it wasn’t responding as they would have liked. By day three the blue was back! Just like original. Except for the original white spots. Which we would be good with. They said they couldn’t do anything else and I should talk to the office about how they want to handle the spots. They said they “neutralized” the water and I should go ahead and balance. That was the beginning of last week.
Since then I’ve not been able to get my pH above 7.0. The color in my test is about the same shade of yellow as the cap of the chlorine reagents! So far in the last 7 days, I have added 5 x 4lb boxes of borax and today a 12lb bag of baking soda (because I had it and have already bought out the local grocery and hardware stores. Also, since Saturday I’ve been aerating for about 3-4 hours each day. (A side not about my aeration: I don’t have a water feature and my returns just don’t quite sit high enough to aerate. I had this awesome 2“ PVC tube that I had created as a stand up “sprinkler” running out of the return. But the new return fittings are just slightly bigger and now it doesn‘t fit. I also had made this skinny tube sprinkler that sits on the pool deck that ran off of a really old automatic vacuum pump that has since died. So the only option I have right this minute is using the deck top sprinkler attached to the house hose. I’m only running it in 1 1/2 hours at a time to protects my well.) So, I’ve also swapped out maybe 10-20 % of the water so far.
I just came in from testing. Here are my numbers:
FC: 0.0
CC: 0.0
pH: Somewhere south of 7.0
TA: 20
CH: 530
CYA: 34
Also when I was out there, after adding the baking soda a few hours earlier the water is seriously cloudy, I can’t see the bottom in the deep end.
Prior to the acid bath, my numbers were typically here:
FC: In ideal range
CC: 0.0 - 0.2
pH: 7.5 - 7.8
TA: 60 - 80
CH: 320
CYA: 35
I’ve been following the TFP method for the 11 years I’ve owned this pool and read everything I could think to search. I’m at a loss.
Thoughts?
Long version:
We had our pool refinished at the beginning of the season last year. Turned out beautiful. Shortly after, I was getting white spotting in the shallow end. By mid-August the deep end was about 2/3 like a cloudy white color on the floor. I had the pool company (SHE owns the company) out and she talked to her plasterers who said they could do an acid bath to take care of it, but it should wait until after opening this year. Well, sure enough the blue got much more dull over the winter and the cloudy white was now covering about half the pool.
This June after opening and balancing, I reached out to tell them it was worse than it was at closing last year. They finally came out two weeks ago to do the acid bath. They added 20 gallons of “acid”. I don’t know exactly what the acid was, I’m assuming muratic, but I don’t know the concentration. They ran their pump to circulate for about 24 hrs for 4 days. The second day they added another 5 gallons because it wasn’t responding as they would have liked. By day three the blue was back! Just like original. Except for the original white spots. Which we would be good with. They said they couldn’t do anything else and I should talk to the office about how they want to handle the spots. They said they “neutralized” the water and I should go ahead and balance. That was the beginning of last week.
Since then I’ve not been able to get my pH above 7.0. The color in my test is about the same shade of yellow as the cap of the chlorine reagents! So far in the last 7 days, I have added 5 x 4lb boxes of borax and today a 12lb bag of baking soda (because I had it and have already bought out the local grocery and hardware stores. Also, since Saturday I’ve been aerating for about 3-4 hours each day. (A side not about my aeration: I don’t have a water feature and my returns just don’t quite sit high enough to aerate. I had this awesome 2“ PVC tube that I had created as a stand up “sprinkler” running out of the return. But the new return fittings are just slightly bigger and now it doesn‘t fit. I also had made this skinny tube sprinkler that sits on the pool deck that ran off of a really old automatic vacuum pump that has since died. So the only option I have right this minute is using the deck top sprinkler attached to the house hose. I’m only running it in 1 1/2 hours at a time to protects my well.) So, I’ve also swapped out maybe 10-20 % of the water so far.
I just came in from testing. Here are my numbers:
FC: 0.0
CC: 0.0
pH: Somewhere south of 7.0
TA: 20
CH: 530
CYA: 34
Also when I was out there, after adding the baking soda a few hours earlier the water is seriously cloudy, I can’t see the bottom in the deep end.
Prior to the acid bath, my numbers were typically here:
FC: In ideal range
CC: 0.0 - 0.2
pH: 7.5 - 7.8
TA: 60 - 80
CH: 320
CYA: 35
I’ve been following the TFP method for the 11 years I’ve owned this pool and read everything I could think to search. I’m at a loss.
Thoughts?
