Recent content by achianese

Hi everyone, I'm looking to replace an aging Hayward Superpump with a VS pump. I'm trying to keep on 115V to avoid an electrical upgrade. I've come down to two options: Pentair Superflo VS - $810 Waterway Power Defender 140 - $630 I will be doing a DIY install, so the Pentair will have its...

I just want to chime in and suggest that you probably don't need to change your sand if you are replacing all your water. Because you won't have to do the Baquacil conversion, you won't produce the goop and you won't ruin your current sand. Just make sure to rinse off your sand with plenty of...

It sounds like the pH of 6.5 came from the pool store, because the phenol red indicator test in the normal test kits can only read down to 6.8 (and up to 8.2). Is that correct? I'd recommend using your own pH test if you have it, and adding the chemical to raise pH in portions, letting the water...

It's interesting that your CYA jumped up so much when it doesn't look like you added any. Do you still have the container of "shock" that you added and can you tell us exactly what chemical was in it? If it was dichlor that would explain the jump in CYA. The best chemical to use to add chlorine...

I'm going to offer a contrary opinion, based on my intuition as a chemist, but having no experience with Baquacil except reading about the conversions here. The reason a sand change is needed for a conversion is because you add a ton of chlorine to thousands of gallons of pool water, which...

Certainly focus on getting the chemistry under control as well, but it does sound like your filter is probably returning material that has just entered it based on this description. I'm a new pool owner this year, so I don't have a lot of experience, but the story of my pool opening earlier...

I think you have the right perspective on the costs. The only way to win is if you can find a better deal on chlorine. Assuming your Chlorox is 6% bleach, Poolmath tells me that you're adding 1.7 ppm chlorine every day (that's for 64 oz) To add 1.7 ppm of chlorine using trichlor tabs, you...

OK, so if you are at normal FC levels and you fail the OCLT, you have something in your water. If you pass it, you may be OK bit you can't be sure you don't still have a little something growing.

I'm curious about this too. Is the worry that you might pass an OCLT but still have organics in the water at normal FC levels, or that you might fail it even if things are fine? I've done the OCLT casually many times at normal FC and passed.

Wow, speedy reply. Those Jandy Neverlubes look promising. Anyone have thoughts on the airtight-ness of those? Or do you think my existing valve might do the job?

A belated thanks for all your help. My leak kind of fixed itself with a lot more working of the valve, so I think whatever twig was stuck in there just came out eventually. I'm starting to think about winterizing and realizing that if I want to properly blow out my main drain, I need a...

Re: New owner of neglected pool Have you had any luck with this? Sorry I'm no help with plumbing.

Sounds like you're in good shape. Have you tried the Overnight Chlorine Loss Test? http://www.troublefreepool.com/content/136-perform-the-overnight-fc-chlorine-loss-test-oclt This is the final criterion to know you're done SLAMming. If you didn't added any chlorine at all (including with the...

If you search amazon for "skimmer socks" you'll see what I mean. Here's an example: This only helps in vacuuming if the vacuumed stuff runs through the filter basket, which isn't necessarily the case. My vacuum goes over the skimmer basket using an adapter that looks like this: They make...