Hi,
I have so many questions, but here's a quick backstory. I recently moved my family back into the house that I grew up in. The plan was to take care of my mother with Alzheimers, but it just became too much and we recently put her into memory care. The pool was built in 1992 and is completely faux rock. It is a very unique pool for the Dallas area as every pool company/person who's seen the pool is always quite shocked. The builder I believe did resorts and putt-putt golf water features, so he was reputable and construction wise, the pool has withstood time pretty well.
About 4 years ago, shortly before she started getting bad, my mother completely drained the pool. She battled probably a good 5 years prior having lots and lots of algae issues. When I moved into the house this summer, the pool/backyard was completely terrible. I really never sat down and asked her in detail what all the problems she had were and i wish i would have before she got sick. What I do remember in the visits we would come over, is that she always complained about algae getting into the rocks that were submerged in the water. The main thing I remember her saying is that she wished she didn't have half the rocks on the edge submerged in the water because they were impossible to keep clean. Anytime I would go over, I passed it off that most of her issues stemmed from having fence high bushes that constantly dropped leaves and debris in the pool. I also thought it may have been her water feature as she had lots of buildup in the basins.
So, before I redid the pool this month, I went back and forth whether to even keep it. I though long and hard about doing a complete demo of the pool, but because of a super small lot size, it was going to cost upwards of 20k to manually break apart all the rock. I just couldn't justify spending that much money to knock something down. Something that really brought our family a lot of joy during the mid to late nineties when I still lived there.
Prior to starting this project, I ripped out all the trees and bushes in the yard. The neighbor still has quite a few, but none that are directly over the pool. I also drained and completely sprayed down all of the waterfall basins with bleach and they dried out for many weeks prior.
I hired a company and they began working on the pool the first of this month. Up until today, everything has gone smooth. Water has been clear, everything fairly good..... And today I noticed GREEN ALGAE all along the waterline of the submerged rocks!!! I've gone ahead and cleaned it off completely with a metal brush, but now I'm getting seriously concerned. Am I in for constant problems by getting this pool up and going again? Granted, I know very little about water chemistry. Growing up, I cleaned the pool up and things, but never messed with the water. I wish I would have.....
The Taylor k2006 kit finally came in the other day, and I've been doing some tests. The water has been crystal clear, but my question to you guys (especially people who have these faux rock pools), is it something with the rocks/concrete that I'm always going to have an issue with algae? Is it the waterfall? That didn't actually start running until a few days ago because of a pipe issue. Because all the time prior to turning it on, there was no algae. Is the waterfall bringing in the algea and do I need to only run it when we swim and people are over and otherwise turn it off and drain the water from the basin? Is it simply not enough chlorine? I also haven't done a shock or anything to the pool yet. I guess I just want to know what I"m in for. If it's water chemistry related, that can be solved. But if it's because of the rocks, I just don't know what to do. Cleaning the rocks below the water is hard enough in the pool, I don't know how it's even going to be possible come winter and I can't get in it!
Please help... Here is a timeline of what's been done so far, my water tests, and I have my equipment listed in my signature. Sorry for the long post!
Attached is a pic when it was at it's worst state (after cutting down the trees) and a pic of now with the waterfall and a close up of one of the rocks with the algae.
I have so many questions, but here's a quick backstory. I recently moved my family back into the house that I grew up in. The plan was to take care of my mother with Alzheimers, but it just became too much and we recently put her into memory care. The pool was built in 1992 and is completely faux rock. It is a very unique pool for the Dallas area as every pool company/person who's seen the pool is always quite shocked. The builder I believe did resorts and putt-putt golf water features, so he was reputable and construction wise, the pool has withstood time pretty well.
About 4 years ago, shortly before she started getting bad, my mother completely drained the pool. She battled probably a good 5 years prior having lots and lots of algae issues. When I moved into the house this summer, the pool/backyard was completely terrible. I really never sat down and asked her in detail what all the problems she had were and i wish i would have before she got sick. What I do remember in the visits we would come over, is that she always complained about algae getting into the rocks that were submerged in the water. The main thing I remember her saying is that she wished she didn't have half the rocks on the edge submerged in the water because they were impossible to keep clean. Anytime I would go over, I passed it off that most of her issues stemmed from having fence high bushes that constantly dropped leaves and debris in the pool. I also thought it may have been her water feature as she had lots of buildup in the basins.
So, before I redid the pool this month, I went back and forth whether to even keep it. I though long and hard about doing a complete demo of the pool, but because of a super small lot size, it was going to cost upwards of 20k to manually break apart all the rock. I just couldn't justify spending that much money to knock something down. Something that really brought our family a lot of joy during the mid to late nineties when I still lived there.
Prior to starting this project, I ripped out all the trees and bushes in the yard. The neighbor still has quite a few, but none that are directly over the pool. I also drained and completely sprayed down all of the waterfall basins with bleach and they dried out for many weeks prior.
I hired a company and they began working on the pool the first of this month. Up until today, everything has gone smooth. Water has been clear, everything fairly good..... And today I noticed GREEN ALGAE all along the waterline of the submerged rocks!!! I've gone ahead and cleaned it off completely with a metal brush, but now I'm getting seriously concerned. Am I in for constant problems by getting this pool up and going again? Granted, I know very little about water chemistry. Growing up, I cleaned the pool up and things, but never messed with the water. I wish I would have.....
The Taylor k2006 kit finally came in the other day, and I've been doing some tests. The water has been crystal clear, but my question to you guys (especially people who have these faux rock pools), is it something with the rocks/concrete that I'm always going to have an issue with algae? Is it the waterfall? That didn't actually start running until a few days ago because of a pipe issue. Because all the time prior to turning it on, there was no algae. Is the waterfall bringing in the algea and do I need to only run it when we swim and people are over and otherwise turn it off and drain the water from the basin? Is it simply not enough chlorine? I also haven't done a shock or anything to the pool yet. I guess I just want to know what I"m in for. If it's water chemistry related, that can be solved. But if it's because of the rocks, I just don't know what to do. Cleaning the rocks below the water is hard enough in the pool, I don't know how it's even going to be possible come winter and I can't get in it!
Please help... Here is a timeline of what's been done so far, my water tests, and I have my equipment listed in my signature. Sorry for the long post!
Attached is a pic when it was at it's worst state (after cutting down the trees) and a pic of now with the waterfall and a close up of one of the rocks with the algae.
