2 Commercial Pools - Reopening Project

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bgriffith1990

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Apr 20, 2015
9
Carterville
Alright guys, I know this place is where all the experts reside. I also know how cool it is to see a pool project come along from not-so-great to sparkling crystal clear. I am Director of an aquatic center at a community college. We recently shut down both of our pools (see signature) for about 4 months due to a completely new roof being put on. The pools have been covered during this time and receiving very minimal chlorine/acid at periodic junctures.

Well the time is nearing for us to re-open as the contractors complete their project. The covers were just removed and anticipated opening is November 16th. That gives me a little under 2 weeks to get this thing popping. There is a little bit of debris in each pool, which is mostly just some piles of dirt that fell in while they removed the covers. I attempted to brush some of it towards the main drain today, but found it pretty difficult from the edge. I intend on getting down and dirty tomorrow, getting in the water and trying to sweep more of the dirt towards the main drain, as well as removing any other debris. I also shocked each pool, putting about 15 lbs of granular chlorine in the lap pool and 7.5 lbs in the therapy pool. We now have our pumps running with chlorine tabs, and I currently have them set to manual so they will continually run (for now). The PH pumps are set to automatic and pumping acid periodically.

Readings for the pool (Taylor K-2005), right before I shocked, were:

Lap Pool: chlorine 0.5 PH 8.0
Therapy Pool: chlorine 1.5 PH 7.8

If necessary, I can have our maintenance staff do a pool dump and replace 2/3's of the water. We missed our last scheduled pool dump anyway due to the closure. I also am curious when would be a good time for me to drop in my automatic pool vacuums and let them do some work. Color in the therapy pool is not terrible. In the lap pool, it is pretty green. I am going to try and post some pictures.

Anyway...any suggestions on my course of action?? I am sure there is plenty more information I am missing that would be helpful. I greatly appreciate any comments or suggestions.
 
Well, I'd certainly like to help but the problem is those are high bather-load, commercial/public pools. You are required to maintain them (and report your maintenance) according to whatever your state and county public health regulatory authorities require. This site and the information here is intended mostly for residential pool owners (low volume, low bather-load pools) so I'm not sure how much of what we teach here is applicable to your situation.

You say you've used "granular" chlorine shocks and pucks? Are you talking about calcium hypochlorite shock or dichlor shock and trichlor pucks? Typically in indoor public pools, one would not use a lot of granular chlorine that has stabilizer (CYA) in it because you only need a small amount of CYA in indoor pools (assuming your local public health dept doesn't ban the use of CYA). Also, because it's a high bather load pool, do you have a secondary oxidation system installed, such as UV/Ozone? What chemical automation systems are you using?

The more information you can provide the better, but we may be only able to provide limited guidance. Do you have CPO (Certified Pool Operator) on-site? Whoever your CPO is, you should be getting guidance and approval from them.
 
JoyfulNoise said:
Well, I'd certainly like to help but the problem is those are high bather-load, commercial/public pools. You are required to maintain them (and report your maintenance) according to whatever your state and county public health regulatory authorities require. This site and the information here is intended mostly for residential pool owners (low volume, low bather-load pools) so I'm not sure how much of what we teach here is applicable to your situation.

You say you've used "granular" chlorine shocks and pucks? Are you talking about calcium hypochlorite shock or dichlor shock and trichlor pucks? Typically in indoor public pools, one would not use a lot of granular chlorine that has stabilizer (CYA) in it because you only need a small amount of CYA in indoor pools (assuming your local public health dept doesn't ban the use of CYA). Also, because it's a high bather load pool, do you have a secondary oxidation system installed, such as UV/Ozone? What chemical automation systems are you using?

The more information you can provide the better, but we may be only able to provide limited guidance. Do you have CPO (Certified Pool Operator) on-site? Whoever your CPO is, you should be getting guidance and approval from them.
Click to expand...

I have gotten help in the 201 forum before...I know some users here also have experience with commercial pools. I am a Certified Pool Operator and our facility has stayed in touch with our Department of Public Health to assure compliance.

We rarely use the granular chlorine except whenever hyperchlorinating. It is calcium hypochlorite. We do not have a secondary oxidation system. We have two PACO Type L Centrigul pumps. For pumping acid, we use Stenner classic series chemical feed pumps. For chlorination, we use a Accu-Tab tablet chlorinator system. For automation we use Santa Barbara Systems Chemtrol units.

I feel comfortable getting through this process...just looking for some suggestions from others as I know there are many pool operators way more knowledgeable and experienced than myself here. Would anyone recommend that we go ahead and do a 2/3 pool dump?
 
OK, well hopefully some members with commercial experience can help you out. I see the AccuTab system uses 3" cal-hypo tablets. That's unusual to find those in residential pools (cal-hypo tablets) but I can see how that would be useful in commercial pools of your size.

I'm curious, do you use any cyanuric acid stabilizer in your pools? I only ask because CYA moderates the active chlorine level (hypochlorous acid) so as to allow one to use a slightly higher FC level but with a significantly moderated hypochlorous acid concentration. Typically pool water that has no CYA in it and even just 1ppm FC is incredible harsh on skin, eyes and hair due to the high active chlorine level. I've read that some jurisdictions do not allow the use of CYA but yet also require FC to be at 1ppm which makes the water really difficult to stay in for any length of time.

Just curious.

Good luck to you in opening those giant pools.

Matt
 
JoyfulNoise said:
OK, well hopefully some members with commercial experience can help you out. I see the AccuTab system uses 3" cal-hypo tablets. That's unusual to find those in residential pools (cal-hypo tablets) but I can see how that would be useful in commercial pools of your size.

I'm curious, do you use any cyanuric acid stabilizer in your pools? I only ask because CYA moderates the active chlorine level (hypochlorous acid) so as to allow one to use a slightly higher FC level but with a significantly moderated hypochlorous acid concentration. Typically pool water that has no CYA in it and even just 1ppm FC is incredible harsh on skin, eyes and hair due to the high active chlorine level. I've read that some jurisdictions do not allow the use of CYA but yet also require FC to be at 1ppm which makes the water really difficult to stay in for any length of time.

Just curious.

Good luck to you in opening those giant pools.

Matt
Click to expand...

Thanks!

To answer your question, no we do not use any CYA stabilizer in our pool. We keep our free chlorine levels between 1.0-4.0 ppm and I haven't really ever had any complaints about eyes burning or skin irritation--although I have only been here for a little over one year.
 
Wow! Too high for me. But probably fine for folks who are used to it.

Update:
Sorry for the offhand remark. I have read that without the buffering effects of CYA, a seemingly small FC like 1ppm can be a little harsh. So I personally, would not wish to use that pool. I'm sure that in the grand scheme of things, this is probably fine, just not my cup of tea.
 
I'm far from an expert for giving advice on commercial pools but I can offer a couple of suggestions.

Run the cleaners to get the debris out of the pool.

Depending on the CalHypo strength, you added about the right amount to the smaller lap pool to raise the FC to 10 and not nearly enough in the larger pool. If the CalHypo is 73% then the large pool would need 24lbs. for each 10ppm of FC. Obviously each pool will quickly go through the chlorine and must be replenished often to keep the water at shock levels.

If you replace 2/3rd's of the water the pools will get through the process sooner and use less chlorine to clear them, but you will still need to use chlorine to kill all the algae. We call this procedure the SLAM process, Shock, Level, And Maintain. The water will need to be raised to shock level and maintained at shock level until all the algae is killed, see my signature for the link to this process.
 
Thanks, Ping.

Here is my course of action for today:
1. Pour some acid directly into the pools. Our automatic feeder pumps are running, but they go slowly and the PH is still fairly high in both pools.
2. Run the vacuums and try to clear up some of the dirt
3. Hyperchlorinate - I only did it once yesterday. Sounds like it would be wiser for me to do it several times a day for a little while.
 
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