Warning About Walmart Liquid Chlorine

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PopcornGirl2

PopcornGirl2

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Bronze Supporter
Mar 24, 2011
58
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Pool Size
13000
Surface
Plaster
Chlorine
Liquid Chlorine
Hi All,
I just want to share my experience with you in hopes that it will prevent someone else from going through this hassle...
I have been a (mostly silent) member of this forum for many years and I come back each spring to refresh my knowledge and keep updated on swimming pool care. I have been managing our pool's chemistry for almost 17 years and I started using the SLAM/Bleach method about eight years ago.
This spring, I noticed that my local Walmart had started selling Pool Essentials (brand) Liquid Chlorine (10% Sodium Hypochlorite) for a really good price. I decided to try it and was delighted with the results. I used it to slam my pool and tested carefully, every day, to get my chemistry just right. My pool was pristine, sparkling and balanced as of three weeks ago. Then, suddenly, about a week later, I noticed some algae starting along the walls and steps. We've had quite a lot of rain down here so I attributed it to an alkaline rain. I tested, meticulously, and treated with acid and chlorine. Nothing seemed to change.
We were getting ready to leave town for 12 days and I had promised our house-sitters use of our pool while we were away, so I purchased more liquid chlorine from my local Walmart and kept testing... My Calcium Hardness was great (300), my CYA was 30, and my TA was at 90, but for some reason, my chlorine levels were barely inching up (that should have been my first clue, but I was stressed about other things that were happening right before our trip -- both my washing machine and clothes dryer broke down, and then my kitchen sink developed a leak!).

Desperate, the night before we left on vacation, I tested and added 4 more gallons of liquid chlorine to the pool. I also left a couple of gallons for our house-sitters to add while we were gone. We arrived home last night to dark, GREEN SWAMP! :( Not only did my guests NOT get to use the pool, but my once perfectly balanced pool now looks like the nasty fish tank from "Finding Nemo!" At midnight last night, I added some acid and my last gallon of liquid chlorine thinking it would be better than nothing, but I swear, this morning it looked WORSE. I went to Walmart, bought several more gallons of liquid chlorine and was in the process of pouring them in when it suddenly occurred to me that I couldn't smell the chlorine. I cautiously lifted the jug to my nose: NOTHING. It smelled like stale water. I have a very sensitive nose, but I never bothered to check the chlorine I was pouring in my pool, probably due to all the stress before our trip, the chaos of getting ready to leave, etc. Anyway, it never occurred to me that the chlorine was bad! And ALL FOUR gallons I bought today are bad. They all smell like water, without a hint of chlorine. :(
I know for a fact that the chlorine they were selling at the start of the season was good stuff, but either Walmart has been sold some bad chems or they are clueless about how to store liquid chlorine and they are ruining their own merchandise! I will be returning the still full bottles first thing tomorrow and I doubt I will ever buy chemicals from Walmart again! :mad:
 
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OH NO! What are the date codes on the bottles? If you don't know how to "read" them just post everything printed in blue (I think that is the color they use). Most of the time it is on the top but sometimes they do put it on the bottom ring. It looks like it is stamped on the bottle.

There was a member a couple of years ago that had the same thing happen only it was Home Depot. She bought $60 of liquid chlorine. Like you she was NOT seeing any increase in her FC. We had her check the date code and they were over a year old! It had "turned" to water. Chlorine does lose it's effectiveness over time and when it is stored in a hot area. She was able to get her money back.

I noticed your name on another thread. You post was spot on and I looked over at your join date and say you had been here for a while but have not posted much but when you do it is good! Just like this post! THANKS!

:hug:

Kim:kim:
 
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Wow, that's unfortunate. Appreciate the heads up, as I just purchased 2 cases of the same chlorine. Dates are recent and my Walmart keeps it inside the store. Doesn't mean it hasn't been playing in the heat at some point. So far, so good. I keep a Julian Calendar on my phone for quick reference when shopping my chlorine, in case of a senior moment.

https://www.calendarlabs.com/view/2017-yearly-julian-calendar/743
 
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I bought some the other day, it comes in a translucent gallon container that looks like a milk container. Last year it was in a white bottle that looked more like a bleach bottle but it was a true gallon. Date code is 17 038 so February 7th. It is quite yellow and almost looks like lemonade and smells fairly strong. So far FC targets have been hit dead on. Makes me wonder where they store it though because a worker said they have "more in the back" when I bought the last 4 gallons the other day.
 
I've been using Pool Essentials from Walmart almost exclusively for the last 3 months and I've always hit my target. This last week in particular, I've had to hold my FC at 20 because my pump has been out. Last night I added 5 jugs to reach 20 and this morning it was at 24.

I will be checking the smell in the future just to be sure though.

Thanks

Crystal
 
I've been getting my chlorinating liquid at WalMart, as well -- specifically this brand, which is what I am pretty sure PopcornGirl2 is talking about.

There were many, many bottle on display. I looked through a lot of bottles looking for the most recent dates. I noticed that several of the bottles either had a heavily-smudged or even an absent fill date. I ended up finding some bottles that were about 5 weeks old, so that was fine. And they have performed as expected. But going forward, I'm going to continue to be careful about bottles with dubious or missing fill dates.

FWIW -- at our local WalMarts, the Pool Essentials Chlorinating Liquid bottles have the fill date printed in gray or black ink right above the label.
 

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I've been using it as well and was curious about the quality. I actually like the milk jug like containers, as they're easier to smash down and take up less room in the recycle bin (I always rinse them really well).
 
Thank you so much, kimkats and everyone!

I don't remember the specific dates, but I did check them before I returned the bottles this morning and they were not expired. I will say, one of the bottles did not have a date on it. :(
I went ahead and returned them to Walmart and the manager agreed with me that there was NO chlorine smell coming from the bottles. When I asked him how they were storing them, he couldn't tell me, but he did say that they were transported on trucks that are not climate-controlled and those can get pretty hot. I ended up going to my local pool store and buying their liquid chlorine, which I will add tonight.

- - - Updated - - -

By the way, I'm not suggesting that everyone take a big whiff of their chlorine :p , but when you open a sealed jug of 10% chlorine, it should have SOME smell! And since my bottles were not expired, maybe just waft it toward your nose and make sure you can smell it. ;)
 
PopcornGirl2 said:
Thank you so much, kimkats and everyone!

I don't remember the specific dates, but I did check them before I returned the bottles this morning and they were not expired. I will say, one of the bottles did not have a date on it. :(
I went ahead and returned them to Walmart and the manager agreed with me that there was NO chlorine smell coming from the bottles. When I asked him how they were storing them, he couldn't tell me, but he did say that they were transported on trucks that are not climate-controlled and those can get pretty hot. I ended up going to my local pool store and buying their liquid chlorine, which I will add tonight.

- - - Updated - - -

By the way, I'm not suggesting that everyone take a big whiff of their chlorine :p , but when you open a sealed jug of 10% chlorine, it should have SOME smell! And since my bottles were not expired, maybe just waft it toward your nose and make sure you can smell it. ;)
Click to expand...

Just to clarify - I don't think they have an expiration date, they have a "born on" date. If you read the date as an expiration date, you'll never buy non-expired chlorine :)
 
Ohhh... I see! Thanks!

Okay, so I have a new development which may or may not be related to my original post. I promise, I'm not trying to rag on Walmart, but this just doesn't make sense... I just tested and my CYA is at 0. I tested 3 times and used two different bottles of reagent and the results were still 0.
Here's the problem: On May 5th, my CYA was at 50 where it had been since opening my pool in mid-April. On June 5th (the night before we were leaving on our trip), I tested it and my CYA had dropped to 30. Since we get a lot of rain here during the summer months, I like to keep my CYA at 40-50. Knowing we were supposed to get more rain while we were gone, I decided to preemptively add two pounds of stabilizer (HTH brand, purchased at Walmart last month), which should have raised my level by at least 10.
Fast forward to today (2 weeks later): My CYA is at 0. HOW is this possible?? The people house-sitting for me confirmed we got a fair amount of rain, but nothing crazy. And they didn't backwash or drain/add water to the pool. How could my CYA be 0?? I'm thoroughly confused. :confused:
 
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PopcornGirl2 said:
By the way, I'm not suggesting that everyone take a big whiff of their chlorine :p , but when you open a sealed jug of 10% chlorine, it should have SOME smell! And since my bottles were not expired, maybe just waft it toward your nose and make sure you can smell it. ;)
Click to expand...

Absolutely!

I had this happen DURING a mustard slam. Bought 12 gallons of walmart generic 8.25%.
I should have known seeing dust on the containers was a bad sign.

I poured in 1 gallon...no smell. Then picked another randomly and no smell AGAIN!
And it only raised FC by 2 instead of 8 as that dose should have.

I promptly returned the other gallons and bought Clorox at a different store
across the street.
 
PopcornGirl2 said:
Ohhh... I see! Thanks!

Okay, so I have a new development which may or may not be related to my original post. I promise, I'm not trying to rag on Walmart, but this just doesn't make sense... I just tested and my CYA is at 0. I tested 3 times and used two different bottles of reagent and the results were still 0.
Here's the problem: On May 5th, my CYA was at 50 where it had been since opening my pool in mid-April. On June 5th (the night before we were leaving on our trip), I tested it and my CYA had dropped to 30. Since we get a lot of rain here during the summer months, I like to keep my CYA at 40-50. Knowing we were supposed to get more rain while we were gone, I decided to preemptively add two pounds of stabilizer (HTH brand, purchased at Walmart last month), which should have raised my level by at least 10.
Fast forward to today (2 weeks later): My CYA is at 0. HOW is this possible?? The people house-sitting for me confirmed we got a fair amount of rain, but nothing crazy. And they didn't backwash or drain/add water to the pool. How could my CYA be 0?? I'm thoroughly confused. :confused:
Click to expand...

Honestly, I don't think that is possible. Something is amiss here... scratching my head...
 
I agree! I've been doing my own pool chemistry for 17 years, and this doesn't seem logically possible! But I checked it twice the night before we left town because (quite frankly) I was shocked it had dropped 20 points in just a month. Today, I bought a new container of Taylor CYA reagent and used that to test. When it came back zero, I checked the expiration date on the bottle and saw it was fine and re-tested. When it came back zero again, I used the remainder of my previous bottle (which expires in two months) and it tested as zero, as well. Now, I don't have a precise measurement for how much rain southeast Louisiana got over the past two weeks, but even a monsoon shouldn't be able to knock it down to zero! :eek:
Anybody have any idea what's going on??

Here are all my test numbers from 2 weeks ago and today:

June 5th Tests: pH:7.8, FC:1, TA: 90, CYA:30, CalH:270 (not 300 as I stated last night) -- Temperature: 86*

Today, June 19th: pH:7.4 FC:5 (I treated with acid and shocked last night with some powder shock my guests had bought after I realized the liquid chlorine was bad), TA: 100, CYA: 0, CalH: 270 -- Temperature: 89*

The reason (I'm guessing) my CC was 1 two weeks ago was that I had been pouring weak/bad liquid chlorine in my pool that week. I was kind of shocked to see it that low since I had managed to keep it in ideal range (3-5) up until then. I don't know because I didn't notice if the chlorine I was using 2 weeks ago was good or bad.

HELP! I don't understand this.
 
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When you add your chlorine tonight add enough to reach 10ppm and then retest in 15 minutes. If most of the FC is gone bump it up to 10ppm again and retest in another 15 minutes. Keep the cycle going until the chlorine starts to hold. Don't add any more CYA until the chlorine starts to hold.
 
Okay, will do!

UPDATE: So, my chemistry geek daughter just came in and I told her what was going on... She says that she thinks cya is only stable when it's bound to something (like chlorine), so if I was indeed pouring "bad" liquid chlorine into my pool the week before I left, then my chlorine may have gotten low enough for the cya to be eaten up by bacteria. ((Scary thought))
Yes, I added 4 gallons of chlorine to my pool that night (along with 2 pounds of cya), but I didn't go to bed until well after 2 AM and we got up early to leave the next day, so I never re-tested the water. I just assumed that the chlorine and cya would rise to normal levels. But, supposing that what I actually poured into my pool was just water -- or really, really weak chlorine -- then the bacteria would have continued to grow, unabated, thereby eating up my cya. This would explain why I came home to an ugly green swamp with 0 chlorine and 0 cya.
Does that make sense to y'all?

And with her explaining all this to me, I have to wonder: Why isn't SHE in charge of the pool chemistry??? LOL! :rolleyes:
 
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