Help - ASAP!

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LaurenB

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Jun 4, 2014
123
Fawn Grove, PA
Hi all...

The pool builder is here right this moment fixing an issue with my pool. I don't have time to explain in full detail because time is of the essence.

Basically, the pool needed to be drained to roughly 6" so a crevice that formed under the liner could be repaired.

Afterward, a water truck is delivering 6,000 gallons of water to se the liner, and we are closing our pool for the winter immediately after.

My plan was to use pool math and add the recommended amount of bleach to bring to shock level, pouring the bleach in while the water truck was pumping water in to mix (as the water level will not be high enough to run the pump and circulate).

However, it just occurred to me that I will have next to NO cya because of the drain!

I have the powder CYA but no liquid cya. I know the powder form takes up to a week to dissolve.

What do I do?

If I run out right now to buy some liquid stabilizer, I might miss the water truck and not have any way of mixing the chemicals afterward. If I add the powder CYA, it won't dissolve before closing, and again, no way of mixing.

Any advice please!


Do I just add a small amount of bleach while the pool is filling, say a hail Mary, close it and deal with it in the spring? I can't believe I forgot about CYA.
 
If you must close right away, you're in a tough spot with little to no CYA to protect your liner. Adding a small amount of bleach (2-3ppm) is fine, but certainly isn't the shock level of about 10-12 you ideally need. I'd hate to see you spike that FC level and have it do any thing to your liner. Were you planning on adding Polyquat 60 as well? Since your water is fresh, you might get by with an FC of about 5 along with the Polyquat. Maybe you can add some bleach now, then pop the cover off and slowly add a little a few days later? Now I'm the one throwing-out some hail Mary's. :)
 
I honestly don't even know what polyquat 60 is.

The water is already here and filling. Ughhhhhh!


So I have one of those automatic robots. Should I go out and buy some liquid stabilizer and mix using that little guy plus a pole and brush? Then add some bleach later? I'm going to do a full water test after the water is completely in.

- - - Updated - - -

automatic robot being the kind that doesn't hook up to the pump
 
I'd go liquid CYA, just enough to bring it up to 20-30 ppm and then bring the FC to 10. You should be able to very thoroughly brush after adding the CYA, which is actually very thick liquid so mix and brush really well. Put your robot in on a cleaning cycle for an hour or so, then add the bleach slowly around the pool with frequent brushing and a full brushing of the pool after that. Lots of brushing is a good substitute for circulation when you don't have a working pump or have drained. Did I mention lots of brushing? :p
 
I need help again. God hates me today.

I ended up needing a second load of water, so while I was waiting, I ran to the pool store to get liquid cya. They didn't have any. So I ran back home just in time for the water delivery. I decided to pour the powder cya infront of the water hose, thinking it would dissolve it because it's so powerful... Wrong. Anyway, I had added the bleach too so now I'm worried I've messed up.

Currently I have enough crystallized cya sitting on the bottom to raise my cya to 20. FC is at 11.

Should I run to another store and get enough liquid cya to raise it 20 (effectively making it 40) once the rest dissolves? Or just let it go? Is 10 FC with roughly no cya enough to bleach the liner? Pool store lady said it won't but I try not listen to them. Thanks!!!
 
The problem you have now is the CYA sitting on the bottom of the pool. You can try brushing it around but you would have to do so about every hour to prevent the CYA itself from leaving spots on your liner as the CYA is acidic and may bleach your liner if it sits in one place for a while. If you have a fine mesh net, you could try to scoop most of the CYA up in the net, then transfer it to a sock or stocking, tie it off and suspend it from something like a pool noodle with a rope so it will float around the pool while the CYA dissolves. Squeezing the sock periodically will help it dissolve.

The 10 FC should not bleach your liner very quickly as long as you've thoroughly mixed and brushed your entire pool. Getting the CYA to dissolve is what you need now. Adding a bit more to bring it to 30 or wouldn't be a bad idea but at 20 ppm CYA, 10 ppm FC is fine for the winter closing.
 

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Sorry, I was using my experience again. The two times that I've put CYA in my pool were both straight in and brushed around. All dissolved in a few hours. I have a small pool and fiberglass.

Better to listen to the folks with more experience here...
 
Some granular CYA is very fine powder/particles and dissolves fairly quickly, within hours sometimes. Others are large particles and take several days to dissolve. It's hard to say but my advice is leaning toward the larger particle CYA that I've used in the past.
 
I shouldn't have gotten out of bed today.

So I decided to use the pool blaster vacuum so I could manually steer it and suck up visible piles. Since the filter bag is a mesh material, I figured afterward I could just use that to float in the water until it all dissolves. It was working GREAT... until the battery died. I pulled it out of the water and laid it on the deck, took the bag out and clumsy idiot me dumped a ton of cya crystals all over the deck!! I quickly hosed it off into the gravel. Any foreseeable problems this may cause?

The vacuum is charging and I will go back out and finish the job. A lot of the cya was forced out of the vacuum exhaust as powder that dissipated quickly... So hopefully that is helping also.
 
Lauren......take a deep breath......all will be OK.

If were me I would simply vacuum up all the undissolved CYA from the pool (don't worry about the gravel, it's not going to hurt anything) and go enjoy some TV. I would personally pass on adding any bleach and deal with it next Spring. Adding any chemicals without a way to mix it can bring major issues where as simply not closing 100% correct will only mean a chance you'll need to SLAM to start off the Spring next year.

I will ask this question however........is the Pool Company doing the closing or are you? Any way you can get them to push back the closing for a day?
 
Thank you all for your advice and responses.

I vacuumed up all of the cya. I currently have the vacuum still in the pool and running in hopes that pulling water through the mesh filter bag will dissolve and disperse some more of it.

We are attempting to close the pool ourselves this year for the first time (last year, our first year, the builder did it... And a pipe burst in the spring so we figure we can't do much more harm than that if we do it ourselves). I had everything planned out to close it, but this repair really threw a wrench in my plans. We wanted to close it tonight when my husband gets home from work. We could always postpone, but is it good for the water to sit stagnant like that for a few days?
 
I removed the thermometer so I can't say for certain but it was 66 a couple days ago.

I poured some liquid stabilizer in (enough to raise approx 20ppm) and brushed like a maniac. Then added bleach and brushed some more. I took random samples from different areas of the pool and came up with on average 35-40 ppm cya and FC 7.

The cya was higher than I expected but I guess this is due in part to 1) not being completely mixed in the water evenly and 2) not being able to gauge how much of the crystallized cya had dissolved. I measured this morning prior to adding the liquid stabilizer and it was much less than 30 ppm (which is as low as you can measure with the comparator).

Thanks for all your help everyone. I guess ideally my chlorine should be a bit higher (especially since there was some combined chlorine) but I think it's as good as I'm going to get it. Do you think I'm okay to close?
 
Hi Lauren. Some feedback on your latest post:
- Ideally, the water temp should be below 60 to significantly slow the growth of algae; if you can wait just a bit longer that would be ideal
- Estimated CYA is 40, so your closing SLAM FC level should be 16; If you plan on using the Polyquat 60, then let the FC come back down on its own to about 8 before adding. If you decide not to use the Polyquat 60, the FC level of 16 is still good; increase with bleach as required per the calculator
- You mentioned some combined chlorine. Are you concerned you may have algae or something in the water now? If you're not sure, you could do an overnight chlorine loss test to validate. If you're not sure how to do that test, here is a basic snapshot:
When performing the OLCT, remember that it must be done when the sun has dropped – no sunlight on the pool. About 8 hours total is recommended. Also, your FC level should be elevated more than normal. Starting (bedtime) FC could be close to your SLAM level, but no lower than 10. Anything less and you may not receive an accurate portrayal of FC loss (by percentage), even if it’s only 1 ppm.
Click to expand...
So basically, test FC just before bed, then again in the morning before the sun hits the pool.
I'm sure you're anxious to close, but the better the water is now, the easier things will be for you next spring. :)
 

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