Hey first time trying to open/maintain a pool (officially starting to hate it already)
Ok so long story short, we bought a house with a pool. The house was the nicest one in our price range so we went for it, I would have preferred no pool and a larger yard...but here we are with the wife and kids outvoting me. I have no idea how to open a pool. I've watched some videos on youtube for above ground pools and it's still not helping me. I've got the chlorine levels where they should be according to the strips I have, but the portions of the strip for alkalinity and PH are showing nothing....which I find difficult to believe. Water should still show up somewhere in the PH range between 6.5 and 8.5, do I have defective strips maybe?
I'm also having difficulty getting the algae out of the bottom of the pool with the vacuum, it just seems to stir up and "muddy" the water rather than get sucked up.
So I have some questions:
1) Is there a digital sensor that I can use to measure chemical levels in the pool? I think it would be more accurate than using a test strip.
2) How do I get that algae out of the pool? The vacuum has suction, I checked that. It's starting to tick me off and I'm tempted to just completely drain the pool and clean it by hand/shop vac instead.
3) What kind of automation is available to make my life easier in the future? I frankly don't want to waste a lot of my time cleaning/maintaining a pool that I hate and would rip out of the ground if it wasn't for my wife and kids. I do not want to pay for a yearly service to keep costs down as much as possible.
Thank you
Ok so long story short, we bought a house with a pool. The house was the nicest one in our price range so we went for it, I would have preferred no pool and a larger yard...but here we are with the wife and kids outvoting me. I have no idea how to open a pool. I've watched some videos on youtube for above ground pools and it's still not helping me. I've got the chlorine levels where they should be according to the strips I have, but the portions of the strip for alkalinity and PH are showing nothing....which I find difficult to believe. Water should still show up somewhere in the PH range between 6.5 and 8.5, do I have defective strips maybe?
I'm also having difficulty getting the algae out of the bottom of the pool with the vacuum, it just seems to stir up and "muddy" the water rather than get sucked up.
So I have some questions:
1) Is there a digital sensor that I can use to measure chemical levels in the pool? I think it would be more accurate than using a test strip.
2) How do I get that algae out of the pool? The vacuum has suction, I checked that. It's starting to tick me off and I'm tempted to just completely drain the pool and clean it by hand/shop vac instead.
3) What kind of automation is available to make my life easier in the future? I frankly don't want to waste a lot of my time cleaning/maintaining a pool that I hate and would rip out of the ground if it wasn't for my wife and kids. I do not want to pay for a yearly service to keep costs down as much as possible.
Thank you