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  1. O

    Is my diluted dichlor still a viable source of CYA?

    Then the chlorine gas escapes into the air, and the CYA remains in the bucket -- either in the yellow liquid or in the large white chunks -- correct? There could be several year's worth of CYA left in that bucket, and I don't see any reason to waste it . If chlorine off-gassing is the biggest...
  2. O

    Is my diluted dichlor still a viable source of CYA?

    Me either. I'm just hoping to figure out a way to measure a consistent amount each time I need some more for my pool. Then I will be able to calculate my CYA increases rather than run the CYA test. So unless someone has a better idea, maybe I will try removing the chunks, crushing them up, and...
  3. O

    Is my diluted dichlor still a viable source of CYA?

    Thanks Richard320. Do you think the CYA and acidity is still in the white material? Or is it more likely that the CYA is all in the yellow liquid now? The reason I ask is because if the CYA is still in the white material I can probably remove those white chunks from the yellow liquid, dry it...
  4. O

    Is my diluted dichlor still a viable source of CYA?

    A crack in the lid of my half-full dichlor bucket allowed rainwater to seep in all winter. Now the bucket is full of yellow liquid and large chunks of white semi-floating material. It looks like the dichlor granules have gotten stuck together and some (or all?) of the chlorine content has...
  5. O

    TFP--Why does it work so well?

    I think the TFP system works well because most of us refuse to pay a professional pool service person to come in every day, test the pool chemistry, make the correct adjustments, and do all the other work that's required to keep the pool in optimal condition. So we come here and are told to 'get...
  6. O

    Does clarifier reduce or eliminate CYA?

    You may think so, but refilling the pool will push us over the standard water allotment and cost us $20-30 alone. Then there's the time to drain and refill, and the time and chemical cost to start over from scratch and re-balance with more dichlor, acid and bleach. No, an $8 bottle of...
  7. O

    Does clarifier reduce or eliminate CYA?

    Does alum flocculant eventually release the coagulated particles like clarifier does? If not, what would be wrong with vacuuming into the top of my sand filter? Then I wouldn't lose any of my water. The description of Leslie's Alum Enhancer Flocculant says it's good to use as a sand filter...
  8. O

    Does clarifier reduce or eliminate CYA?

    Good point! It's not slow at all. The water is draining out of my filter as fast as my pump can pump it in! I understand this. I also understand that very few people use gravity-fed sand filters. Therefore my situation is unusual, and it seems to me that clarifier may be ideally suited to this...
  9. O

    Does clarifier reduce or eliminate CYA?

    This year I put my new homemade sand filter into service. It's a 55-gallon plastic drum/barrel with the top cut off, and it sits up on a platform so the barrel bottom and pool top are at the same level. A PVC manifold in the bottom of the barrel is connected to a 2-inch outflow port through...
  10. O

    TA 50 and pH 7.2, both have been stable for more than a week

    My son and I have both been in the pool several times this year, and neither of us are uncomfortable with the current pH level. Our eyes are just fine. Thanks for confirming that the current TA is acceptable. I like the fact that the pH has not moved in more than a week. If I'm lucky maybe...
  11. O

    TA 50 and pH 7.2, both have been stable for more than a week

    After my initial fill I gradually lowered my TA to 50. I was going for 60 but overshot a little bit. Then I adjusted my pH to 7.6, and after checking pH again a few hours later -- to confirm that it was still 7.6 -- I immediately added 46 ounces of boric acid to reach a calculated 50 ppm of...
  12. O

    My water source is TA 240 ppm, should I adjust it before adding borates?

    Heh. I was thinking that municipalities would try to raise TA so their water wouldn't be so acidic that it eats through old iron distribution pipes. But it seems some of them have just the opposite problem. I'll definitely check the TA of my deep well water if I ever get the pump...
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    My water source is TA 240 ppm, should I adjust it before adding borates?

    Right ... because every time we add more water it's going to increase the TA and pH thus requiring more acid. Fortunately we had a very easy-to-use cover last year, and most of the time it was on the pool. We're not so lucky this year because we do not have a cover yet, and the pool gets a lot...
  14. O

    My water source is TA 240 ppm, should I adjust it before adding borates?

    That doesn't sound good. Will do ... and thanks!
  15. O

    My water source is TA 240 ppm, should I adjust it before adding borates?

    This probably explains why I found myself adding acid so frequently last year. I'll give your suggestion a try. This sounds better than adding acid every 2-3 days like I did last year. Do you think your pH might stay at 7.7 for a month or more without adding more acid? Or is 10 days the point...
  16. O

    My water source is TA 240 ppm, should I adjust it before adding borates?

    Last year when I first filled my pool, I brought my TA down from 240 to 80 ppm so I could add 50 ppm borates to help stabilize my TA and pH for the entire season. This 80 ppm TA level was recommended by someone as being a good level to start with when adding borates, so I followed that person's...
  17. O

    TA / pH chart to quickly choose the correct adjustment

    I think I can use some help here. I've begun to create a chart that can quickly show me what action to take when making pool chemistry adjustments, but I have three blanks. Can you fill them in for me? pH high and TA high: add muriatic acid pH high and TA good: pH high and TA low: pH...
  18. O

    Is there really Combined Chlorine in my pool all the time?

    Thanks for the recent posts everyone. It looks like I have valid reasons for seeing an 0.5 ppm CC value every time I test. I did not realize it takes sunshine to eliminate CC so I will leave the pool uncovered most days from now on. I ran the FAS-DPD tests a couple hours ago using 0.2...
  19. O

    Is there really Combined Chlorine in my pool all the time?

    I think this describes my pool, assuming the test results are accurate. Yes. This pool is 70% shaded all day every day, and quite a bit of "stuff" seems to jump off the overhead Live Oak tree and land in the pool, mostly ferns and leaves and small bugs and such. I skim it out manually a...
  20. O

    Is there really Combined Chlorine in my pool all the time?

    I bought the Taylor FAS-DPD Chlorine Test kit (K-1515-A) because I had all the other tests I need. I've been using it with 10 ml pool water samples so I am getting readings of 0.5 precision. The FC portion of these tests seem reasonable and are likely correct every time, but I'm not sure about...
  21. O

    How to make my own test reagent?

    Yes that helps, thanks chem geek. Sorry for the delayed response. For some reason I was unsubscribed from all the threads I was participating in. I just reset my subscriptions again. Hope it sticks this time ...
  22. O

    Diverting rainwater away from pool

    That's precisely why I said he needs a high-capacity pump to go along with it.
  23. O

    Diverting rainwater away from pool

    If the neighbors are not at fault for diverting their runoff onto your property, and if your property is higher than the nearest municipal storm drain and/or the street, you might get away with installing surface or near-surface storm drains that lead out to the nearest municipal storm drain, or...
  24. O

    Swimming after adding dichlor at shock levels -- is it bad?

    Exactly! I used poolmath to figure out how much dichlor I would eventually need to add to bring my CYA up from its initial level of zero to my target of 40 ppm. The answer was 12-13 ounces. The first time I added some I had a 4 ounce measuring cup handy so that's what I used. It was teasy to...
  25. O

    Swimming after adding dichlor at shock levels -- is it bad?

    Here's my scenario. I have a very small above ground pool that currently has a CYA of about 20 ppm or maybe a little higher. If I had any straight cyanuric acid I would use it instead of dichlor to raise my CYA without increasing the chlorine level, but I'm using the dichlor for this purpose...
  26. O

    Questions about OTO chlorine testing and total / active / free chlorine ...

    So for all practical purposes the time required for CYA to release its bound chlorine is negligible. This explains a lot, thanks. This suggests that when Combined Chlorine is zero both results should be the same. And normally, in a properly maintained pool, Combined Chlorine should be zero...
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    Questions about OTO chlorine testing and total / active / free chlorine ...

    I have a few unrelated questions that all deal with chlorine: 1- To get a more accurate total chlorine reading via an OTO test, can I dilute my test water with distilled water? For example, if I dilute it at a 1:5 ratio and the diluted sample shows 2.0 ppm in my test, my total chlorine level...
  28. O

    How to make my own test reagent?

    PoolMath is actually more accurate than the acid demand test in this particular kit, or at least that's been my experience so far. The chart that comes with the test kit tells how much acid to add, but I always seem to need about twice as much as the chart suggests. I've done more testing...
  29. O

    How to make my own test reagent?

    The MSDS claims "Trade Secret" ... so it looks like I'll have to titrate the remaining reagent to determine the HCl concentration myself, then make some more by diluting my Muriatic Acid with distilled water.