Hi all,
I just bought a 20 year old house that has a 20 year old IG plaster pool. I'm not sure how many gallons it is yet but I plan to call the company who made it to see if they have it on record. Otherwise I'll be guesstimating. It's a standard sized playpool in AZ. I started with test strips and saw it had off the charts CYA. I knew from previous experience that I needed to drain it, and the CYA was so high I figured I'd drain the entire thing and start over. I got the pool about half way drained and then heard that I shouldn't drain a plaster pool in the middle of AZ summer because of how hot it is, so I stopped draining and filled it back up.
I bought the Taylor K-2006 and ran the whole battery of tests. Here are the results after the half drain:
Here are the options I can think of but I would love anyone's input:
Couple other somewhat related questions:
I'd love your thoughts, ideas, input and tips. Great site and I've learned a ton so far! Thank you!
I just bought a 20 year old house that has a 20 year old IG plaster pool. I'm not sure how many gallons it is yet but I plan to call the company who made it to see if they have it on record. Otherwise I'll be guesstimating. It's a standard sized playpool in AZ. I started with test strips and saw it had off the charts CYA. I knew from previous experience that I needed to drain it, and the CYA was so high I figured I'd drain the entire thing and start over. I got the pool about half way drained and then heard that I shouldn't drain a plaster pool in the middle of AZ summer because of how hot it is, so I stopped draining and filled it back up.
I bought the Taylor K-2006 and ran the whole battery of tests. Here are the results after the half drain:
- FC - 9 (I put 3/4 a gallon of 10% chlorine in after the refill)
- CC - .5
- PH - 7.6
- TA - 160
- CH - 750 (not 100% sure I did this test right. Going to try again tomorrow)
- CYA - still off the charts. Definitely over 200 and probably close to 300 or something. I tried the half normal water/half pool water and it still clouded the dot almost instantly.
Here are the options I can think of but I would love anyone's input:
- Run it as a high chlorine pool for the rest of the summer, then drain it once it cools down. Is this even possible with CYA this high? Can the tests measure it accurate enough? Is it safe to swim in?
- Continuously drain while refilling until the CYA comes down. I would imagine this will take forever and waste a bunch of water. I bought the harbor freight pump that uses a garden hose and it works but takes a while.
- Drain it as fast a possible at night and pray I can drain and refill a decent amount before the midday heat of the next day. I've heard the Home Depot pump you can rent will drain an average playpool in 6 hours. Not sure if I can refill it fast enough to avoid the heat.
Couple other somewhat related questions:
- Pool store is offered a Hayward SWG for $1350 installed with 5 bags of salt. Is this a good deal or is it fairly standard price?
- In AZ I've found I need to drain the pool every year because of hardness anyway. Is there still a benefit to using the TFP way over tablets?
I'd love your thoughts, ideas, input and tips. Great site and I've learned a ton so far! Thank you!