Smileddog's Pool Chronicle

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Today I added 4lb 8oz of Stabilizer, Wallyworld was out so I made my first trip to the pool store. I was worried I was going to be bombarded with different things to buy. Luckily I got right in and out since I knew what I was looking for. I dumped it into a Knee High (Skimmer Sock) and tied it off in front of the return. It all dissolved out the sock in about 30 minutes. I brushed the bottom of the pool several times to help stir up any particles that made their way to the bottom. I also Installed the Ladder/Step system. I added a water resistant lock on it and put up the pool alarm. Im having a heck of a time with the pool alarm. I almost chucked it into the woods. I for the life of me cant get it to sit in the water without the alarm going off. And it so loud. All my neighbors came out and were wondering whats going on. So for the time being its sitting on the back side of the pool out of the water serving no purpose. I just hope I can get it figured out before the Town Codes officer comes for final inspection. I also picked up (4) 186 oz of 6% bleach from wallyworld, 2 boxes of 20 mule, and a big box of Baking Soda, and then some Stabalizer from the pool store.

I added 186oz of bleach after the sun set off the pool. and 4lbs 8oz of stabalizer
Todays test results:
FC 5.5
CC under .5
TC 6
PH 7.3
T/A 160
Temp 70 degrees
 
Todays test results:

FC 4
CC under .5
TC 5
PH 7.3
CYA 25 (I added yesterday and didnt see any residue on the bottom of the pool anymore, its probably not 100% accurate.) will measure again fo CYA at end of the week.
Temp 72 degrees F

Now I dont know if i should add bleach tonight or wait until tomorrow when it drops to around 3. I seem to lose about 1-1.5 per day. Should I work on areating my pool by pointing the return to the surface to raise my Ph a little? Do i do this for 24 hours or longer. Not quite sure how long it would take? The pool looks great. Wish we could swim in it. We built a temporary patio with slate stone today so we have a place to hang out next to the pool. Just need to get the fine stone to put around and in between the slate. Plan on doing that next weekend. The electrician is coming over tommorow morning to start hooking up the electrical. I still cannot figure out this stoopid pool alarm. Everytime I set it in the water it goes off no matter how careful I am setting it in there. I might make the town codes guyt figure it out if he tries to give me a hard time. I understand how they could be helpful but geez my neighbors have to hate my by now and Im suprised I have any hearing left. Hopefully we will get the final ok from the town by Wed,thur or Fri so we can swim next weekend.
 
hey smile,

Glad to see you making progress...yeah, I know what you mean about the pool alarm...we get our inspected this week I hope...it's a poolguard...I need to put a 9v in it so I can call the inspector.

Your ta, although on the high side is OK for now as long as your ph stays stable...if you decide you want to add a swg or borates, then you can bring it down to the 70-80 ta range...otherwise don;t reduce your ta just to hit a target.

Definatley wait 5-7 days to test for CYA...the reagent goes fast, so I let it dissolve nice and good before I test.

On the bleach...before my swg I would add two solo cups of bleach to raise my FC by 1-1.5ppm...I would add it daily so you do not have to much swing in FC.

Assuming your CYA will hit around 40-ppm you want to keep your FC around 4-6 PPM (5 is your target)...otherwise your FC burn rate sounds perfectly normal...

I hope to get rid of both our ugly permits this week (pool and deck)...we ended up getting the water up to 79 deg with the one solar panel...so in we went today

Good luck w/ the electrical
 
Sounds like you had some nice temps for your water. Cant wait to get mine to that temp. Thanks for the advice. I will keep posted on how electrical goes today (i told him to throw in a timer as well,better to be safe and do it nowthan sorry and want to do it down the road). we havent put on our solar cover yet. Wife said as soon as the electrician is done she is putting it on to warm it up before the weekend because she is going swimming with an ok or not from the town. LOL
 
looking at your liner...it's pretty dark like mine. The best bet would be to leave it uncovered while in full sun and then cover with the solar cover in the evenings. I know this is sometimes tough if you are both working, but I just pull mine off early am. The solar cover (if it's blue... the name is somewhat misleading) during the day doesn;t actually let the sun rays warm your water....the little bubbles actually act sort of like an insulation blanket...so the key is...keep the cover on at night and rainy days to keep the warmth in the pool and the take it off on sunny days so that your water is warmed from the liner (bottom) up.
 
thats a good tip bout the solar cover we will have to try that. So electrical is done. Hopefully they can inspect it tomorrow. They installed the timer, a GFI outside for a radio or lighting, and the twist lock socket for the pump. I will take pics and post in the next day or so. I dunno how long to run the pump tho. so far ive been running on low 24X7. but was thinking of turning the pump off from 9pm-9am. so 12 hours on during day when were probably going to be most active in it and then off at night. If i do this do i run it on low for the 12 hours or on high?

Tonights test results. (Keep in mind i pointed the return up at the surface and airated the water for most of the day yesterday and into the night and in the morning pointed it back down.

FC 3.5
CC under .5
TC 4
PH 7.5
Temp 72


So i think the airating raised my Ph. i didnt think it would happen that fast. I added 24 oz of Bleach tonight and will check tomorow to see if I am back to 3.5 FC. if so then i know my avaerage daily bleach will need to be about 24 oz. to keep it steady.
 
Test results tonight.

FC 2
CC under .5
TC 2-3

So i added 84oz of 6% bleach to bring it up to 5.
I would like to bring it to 5 each day and have it drop to 3 if i am going to loose 2ppm per day. I thought i would only loose 1 to 1.5.

I vacuumed the entire pool suprisingly i sucked up alot of debris. I also enjoyed a nice swim. The water is hovering around 72. feels pretty good. Cant wait to get everyone swimming.
 
There is stuff on pump timing in some of the discussions, you can probably find more stuff with the search... Essentially it's a balancing act, you need enough pump time to turn the water over once or twice a day to keep the chemistry mixed, and make sure everything gets sanitized, but not a lot more as that wastes electric.

With my IG pool, I run 12 hours a day, using a 6hrs on, 6 hrs off pattern. Sometimes I will cut it down to 5 on / 7 off.

The suggestions I've seen say that it is best to split the pump time into blocks spread more or less evenly around the clock, starting with about 12 hours / day, and slowly cutting back until you start having problems keeping your water under control, then bump it back up... If you are having a heavier than usual bather load, run it a bit extra.

Gooserider
 
tonights test results;

FC 2.5
CC under .5
TC 2-3
Ph 7.5
Temp 76

so i added 70 oz of 6% bleach. to bring it up to FC 5. tomorrow im going to test my CYA. and then i will see if its because of the sun and not having enough CYA in there and thats why its depleting so fast.
 

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hey Smile...yeah go ahead and post a full set of #'s...my guess is the low CYA...not sure if you made it above 25 or not, but that's too low. I am currently at 60ppm CYA..It's been cloudy lately and my solar cover has been on since sun...FC is down 2ppm since Sunday with the swg turned off...I lose about 1-2ppm on a sunny day.

Unfortunately CYA is a delicate balancing act...too little, might as well get a truckload of bleach....too much and the truckload is worthless :hammer:
 
todays test results

FC 3
CC under .5
TC 3
PH 7.5
T/A 160
CYA 30
Temp 76

going to add some more bleach to bring the FC back up to 5
also going to add some more stabalizer to get it up around 50,will use the pool calculator to figure our the right amount.
 
OK...shoot for 40ppm on the CYA...you can fine tune from there...I bet ya that intex swg is sounding pretty good about now...it was a little touchy getting used to it, but I haven't had to add any bleach for 3wks now.

Once you get into a rythm, you be able to just add the same amount of bleach every evening...good luck
 
Ok i will get my CYA to 40. Yea I am still keeping my eye on the SWG. Hopeing i can scrounge up some money to be able to get it. 3 weeks with no bleach sounds nice. I am getting sick already of adding bleach every day. It makes it really hard on days like today when its a complete down pour and im out there slowly adding a trickle of bleack by the return. would be nice if i could be sitting inside knowing my SWG was out there doing the work for me. Do you have the Intex Krystal Klear model? Right now its about $159.95 at Wallyworld. thats bout the lowest I can find it. seems to be hit or miss for people who have issues with it. Im thinking i might take my chances.
 
Tonights results.

FC 3
CC 0
TC 3

So I added about 60oz of 6% bleach to bring my FC to 5-6.Because tomorrow we will have a heavy swimload. But i think we have it pretty set to go from 5 FC to 3 FC in a day. which means I will keep adding about 56oz of Bleach. Which will make it nice to pre plan how much bleach to buy for next week when I go grocery shopping this week..... Wow as I was typing this our pool alarm just went off. its almost midnight. Alarm going off in the house, out in the yard. The cats freaking, my wifes worried, and im scrambling to turn off the house alarm to go out and check on the pool and turn off the pool alarm. I think im about done with it. I know its supposed to be good and all but they have a long way to go before they are practical. I think with ou 52 inch tall wall and locked ladder we are pretty safe. Geez my neighbors are probably going to really hate us now and I cant be running out at all hours of the night when this thing decides it is lonley. GRRRRR
 
Great pics. So is it made out of composit for the decking floor? I love the White railings, were those PVC? were they expensive. I would love to doa treated deck floor (for cost we wouldnt be able to afford the composit and i worry about it fraying after a few years of wear. heard its a common problem. and i would love the white railings like you did. but wonder if we would be able to afford those. But it looks great. You need a small privacy fence out of lattic to hide the pump and filter area. Im planning on building a quick one in a week or two and getting some vines or rose vines to grow on it to hide the pump section.
 
Hello All. Long time no see. Well I am happy to say we opened the pool this past weekend because it was near 90 degrees here in Syracuse NY in April. Which doesnt happen often. When I pulled off the winter cover what to my eyes should appear?!?!? But a crystal clear pool. We could see the bottom and it was awesome. I want to thank everyone for their help last year and the BBB method is proven to work. I love it. I proved my dad wrong, he has been a skeptic the entire time and kept saying well winter will be the true test. I think he is now convinced. My neighbors have seen how easy it has been for me and are now thinking of getting a pool. I tested the water just to see where I was at with FC. and it was still at 4. I left it at that and want to see what it is again this weekend to see if its holding steady.

I do need some input though. We took off the winter cover. I put on my solar cover. I then put the air pillow that we used during the winter under the winter cover on top of the solar cover. I then bought a leaf net and put it over the air pillow and strapped it around the sides of the pool. Its keeping the leaves, buds, and debris out of the pool just as i planned. Still some small bugs and stuff get through the net but thats what the filter is for. I then set my pump timer to have the pump run on low for 1 hr each day. Do you think this will be ok? Is the water sitting in the pump and in the pool not moving for 23 hrs a day going to be bad? I want to not waste electricity, but dont want to screw up now and have a green pool. Once we officially start swimming in the pool I will run the pump like i did last year 24X7. High when we are swimming, and low when we are not. But with no one in the pool is it needed to run 12 hours on and off or more? any help would be appreciated. Thanks
 
It's really whatever works for you, but personally I'd run it at least a couple hours at a time twice a day separated by 12 hours. Especially since you're running the pump on low. Also keep a good check on that FC as now that you've taken the winter cover off.
 
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