Drained my pool after years of battling 700+ CH. Scrubbed the tile and sprayed down the pool and drained every last bit of water. Re-filling now but through my softener so its slow going. I've searched and looked through some older threads on chems order but want to confirm. Salt and CYA right off the bat right? Cell will be off during initial phases. It's mid 60s here during day and 30s at night. Liquid bleach to get FC levels up.
Filling now/next steps
- Thread starter Uhhello
- Start date
- Jul 21, 2013
- 54,784
- Pool Size
- 35000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
Salt, stabilizer, liquid chlorine can all be added at the same time. Just leave at least 15 minutes between adding chlorine and acid.
So pool is filling at 8 gpm with three hoses. Thats about 21 hours of straight run time apparently. If my fill water is at around 125-150 CH, I will have to add calcium right? So can I run the fill water a bit in bypass mode to make up for that? Seems like a wag but.....
- Jul 21, 2013
- 54,784
- Pool Size
- 35000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
@mknauss or @JoyfulNoise is the best to advise how to manage your CH in your area.
- May 3, 2014
- 59,366
- Pool Size
- 6000
- Surface
- Fiberglass
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-40
You should not fill the pool with softened water. You need 250 ppm of calcium in the water. Then you use softened water to make up for water lost to evaporation.
- May 23, 2015
- 24,650
- Pool Size
- 16000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
I would wary with adding any calcium. Tucson water is hard enough. Just keep the TA at or above 100ppm (it’s probably around that out of tap) and keep the pH in the high 7’s while the plaster is curing.
- May 23, 2015
- 24,650
- Pool Size
- 16000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
Just fill it and let it be. Fill it with regular, unsoftened water.
Sounds good. It's on its second cycle of soft water so i'll just let it run all night. Should be a good balance and auto-fill is soft now so should see less scaling I hope. I should have had the tile professionally cleaned as I failed and gave up today. Evening Braves games with some MA and scrubbing this spring I guess.
I agree with Matt and Marty. Do not go strictly soft on your fill.
Soft water is not "nice" or "fluffy" like we tend to think of it. It's corrosive.
Not only is it going to waste a lot of water (depending on the trigger [threshold vs schedule] when the salt system recharges), but proper calcium levels are foundational to your water's stability. Some of our new clients had done what you were planning because our local water can range from 300-500ppm out of the tap, and developed issues directly related to the low CH and their first pool guy couldn't stop it because he'd NEVER tested the CH and had no idea.
Water will always seek equilibrium - this is why classic scaling and corrosion occur with poor pH balancing, but thats not the only characteristic that influences water to "let go" when it's saturated (scale) and "grab" when it's lacking (corrosive).
Overly low CH can etch the plaster in search of those minerals harsher than low pH. We've even seen it nearly remove all of exactly half the grout (in a neat line all the way around the tile starting right at the water line) in a new plaster pool with a pH of 8+.
You really want at least 250. Most of our pools are happy at 300+.
Soft water is not "nice" or "fluffy" like we tend to think of it. It's corrosive.
Not only is it going to waste a lot of water (depending on the trigger [threshold vs schedule] when the salt system recharges), but proper calcium levels are foundational to your water's stability. Some of our new clients had done what you were planning because our local water can range from 300-500ppm out of the tap, and developed issues directly related to the low CH and their first pool guy couldn't stop it because he'd NEVER tested the CH and had no idea.
Water will always seek equilibrium - this is why classic scaling and corrosion occur with poor pH balancing, but thats not the only characteristic that influences water to "let go" when it's saturated (scale) and "grab" when it's lacking (corrosive).
Overly low CH can etch the plaster in search of those minerals harsher than low pH. We've even seen it nearly remove all of exactly half the grout (in a neat line all the way around the tile starting right at the water line) in a new plaster pool with a pH of 8+.
You really want at least 250. Most of our pools are happy at 300+.
Not as much bypassed as I thought. Recommendations for calcium increase. Bought one 4 lb bag at Wally World with the rest of the stuff but obviously need much more. Wife is going to Costco today. Will add a bit more salt and stabilizer later after everything has settled down. All brushes and robot is running.
Attachments
- May 23, 2015
- 24,650
- Pool Size
- 16000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
I honestly would not try to increase it. Simply use regular city water for fill and, in 4-6 months you’ll be up to 250ppm. Tucson has extreme evaporation rates — our pan evaporation rate is over 100” per year. Our city water has a CH of anywhere from 180 to 250ppm depend on where you live in the system. Before I used a water softener, my pool CH would increase at a rate of 300ppm per year. Be patient, it will go up. Just manage your CSI properly using pH and TA which are much easier chemical parameters to increase or decrease.
- May 23, 2015
- 24,650
- Pool Size
- 16000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
Can you turn it off and just use a hose for a while? Spigots are typically plumbed on their own loop to the main to bypass the softener loop.
I've tried that. All three of my outside spigots are soft. I'll go take a look to see if the fill is able to be bypassed but I doubt it. All three spigots were at 150 or less CH. I'll steal a sample from the neighbors spigot to see what they are at on city water.
- May 23, 2015
- 24,650
- Pool Size
- 16000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
Unless the plumber that fitted your home was instructed to do so, or your water softener is tied into your water main, no spigots are ever plumbed into the same line as the rest of the house. This is to avoid watering with softened water outdoors which is not good for plants and would cause excessive regeneration.
You might want to track down how your plumbing is arranged. Also, 150ppm CH is not soft water. It’s hard water. So if your softener is outputting water with any measure able CH, it’s not working properly.
So someone else dumb like me might learn, my water softener was completely bricked solid at bottom 12 inches of tank. It ended up working out in my favor for the pool fill but I don't know what I was thinking when I was testing the potential fill lines I was going to use.