New swamp (hopefully pool again) owner

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Sabercatpuck

Sabercatpuck

0
Feb 13, 2016
122
Deltona, FL
Just bought and moved into a new home in Deltona, FL. The pool outside has been off for probably a year or more. Had to get a new cover for the Hayward 1200 cartridge filter. Got it started up yesterday and I am steadily working on clearing out the muck since if I understand it right I need to get the solids out before worrying about trying to shock. I am going to get a sample down to the pool store to test out in a few hours but a quick check yesterday showed everything that my test strip tested for at the low end except TH which was at 250. From the previous owners I have a new gallon jug of muriatic acid (not very useful at the moment with my pH so low) and 15 pucks of trichlor (possibly a bit more useful, but only if I can get the pH up, if I have read up on things right). One question is it possible to break up the trichlor to get them to dissolve faster? The pool itself is 28' x 14' and I am for now estimating 4' deep so pool math guestimates 11700 gallons, figure better to underestimate on everything but chlorine for now so I don't overshoot.
Let me know what I am missing, figure it will likely be quite a bit at this point

Matt
 
Hi Matt, and welcome to TFP. :wave: You're here because you want a nice pool, and hopefully to take carve of it yourself. So let's get you going in the right direction with these pages first:
Pool School - ABCs of Pool Water Chemistry
Pool School - Chlorine / CYA Chart
Poolmath calculator
Pool School - Recommended Levels
Pool School - Recommended Pool Chemicals
TFTestkits.net
Pool School - Test Kits Compared

Some basic starters: "Yes" remove as much solids as possible before performing a Pool School - SLAM - Shock Level And Maintain. The SLAM will clear your water. In the meantime, order a TF-100 (XL size) test kit. The paper strips and store testing is virtually useless. Trust us please on that one. You need the kit of your own. Also consider getting the "Speed Stir" to mix easily. Do not use tabs right now at all. Until you know your current CYA level, tabs may work against you. For those of us who manually feed our pool, regular liquid bleach (generic is fine) is the best. No splashless or scented bleaches. Stick with the links I gave you, order the TF-100 now, and read the SLAM page. Until your kit arrives, continue to remove solids and consider adding about 1 gallon of bleach initially to the water, the maybe 1/2 gallon each day after that. You'll know how much exactly once your test kit arrives. Stay close and keep up posted. We'll help any way we can. Welcome!
 
Welcome aboard.....I would repeat what Texas said above. I can attest to the effectiveness of the TFP method personally. For the last 2 years I've added regular bleach, some muriatic acid, borax and baking soda and my pool has stayed crystal clear. Best of all, no more time wasted in the pool store getting conned into buying mystery potions that only create problems.
 
HI! Oh yeah another FL person! I LOVE your user name!

Pat has you covered on what needs to be done. We CAN get your pool clear!

Let us know when you get your test kit so we can get your started turning your pool in to a jewel!

PLEASE take a picture! We LOVE to watch as you clear your pool. Take a picture looking down at the steps. This will help you as it starts to clear and you do not think it is working. With the pictures you will be able to see the color changes.

Kim
 
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Here ya go, assuming this works.

The name I got from the Tacoma Sabercats, a hockey team in the WCHL. If I saw right it looks like over time some of those old clubs play in the same league as the team here in Orlando.

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Nice to hear. Make sure you get the Taylor 2006 as the 2005 does not have the tests you will need. BUT I will tell you the TF-100 in my siggy is the best bang for the buck.

LOL on the froggy! He is about to get evicted!

Kim
 
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pool frog evicted

I do have my test kit coming, but it will probably be a bit longer than I can wait. I have a week till I have to be back to work so after that paying attention to the pool will get a little harder. Will keep plugging away with what I can do before I can really get to getting it balanced. As for the equipment I have a decent idea on most of it. Three way valve on the inlet valve for turning off, or controlling sourcing from the main drain and skimmer. Output valve controls to regular outlets, which I think goes through a 4 way splitter (seen in the background of the pool picture) and a set of air massage jets in the seat cutout. Took a minute to realize that the timer wasn't really broken, just in timeout when the motor stopped on me, but after moving the timer around all was right again. Will see what I can do tomorrow, one thing will be hooking up the pressure washer to clean up the pool deck area, but I will still be getting on the solids.

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Here is the link to the SLAM. See what you think you can do until your kit gets there.

Pool School - SLAM - Shock Level And Maintain

I HATE this idea BUT it is better than nothing but not by much. Have the pool store test your CYA so you have a big ball park idea of your CYA so we can keep you from adding too much chlorine. Of course the CYA test is THE one they get wrong more than they get it right so you might be better off just adding jug of bleach a day with your pump running 24/7 until you kit gets there.

Kim
 
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well the pinch a penny guy said that the numbers would be meaningless until I hit it with a shock dose of chlorine and something like an anti-yellowing? thing. I was running late for dinner so didn't buy anything then. By the time we were done with dinner they were closed so I figured I wouldn't be out much and picked up a bunch of bleach at the dollar tree (figured it would likely be weaker, but would start the process). I knew I was pulling huge amounts of algae off the bottom so I figured it wouldn't take long to eat it all up anyway. I did recheck my stats with the test strips I have and yesterday it showed no CYA, today it is right about 50. Ph went very high, but it sounds like that was to be expected. Obviously the FC and TC are showing way up there. I will get a set of as real as I can get numbers in a bit when the PAP opens up. Figure they can't argue too much, plus I can go to a different one, they are just about equidistant so the only difference is how many turns it takes to get there.

The good thing is there is still a green tint, but I can see down the steps so at least when I get the algae brush going in a bit I can at least see what I am doing. I do promise, I am an electronics tech by trade and I am not a fan of the shotgun approach, but sometimes it is the better option, but doing tests and making moves based on those tests is my preferred method.

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I would recommend to simply stay patient until your kit arrives. It's difficult I know. Really, you'll be surprised how different your test kit numbers are form anything else you've tried. We all learned that as well. Just stick with adding about 1/2 gallon of bleach each day and keep manually removing what you can. Once we have your full suite of test numbers, we'll help get you on track ASAP.

Oh, and it's a good thing the store was closed last night. Save your $$ for now until the kit arrives. :)
 
One nice thing about it though is I can now halfway see the bottom so I can go after the big pockets of algae with my big leaf net. Figure every bit of that I get out that way I won't have to dig out of the filter later.
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You found the Swamp Thing's poop! LOL

THAT is what I would be spending my time doing. It HAS to go. Do NOT bother going to the pool store. Do NOT buy anything if you do go.

Right now your levels really do not mean a thing with that in there.

Save your time and money for scooping and cleaning.

Can you do me a favor please? Go to settings (upper right hand) then go to edit signature to add what kind of filter and such you have. That will help us help you better.

Kim
 
I will get my SIG line updated later today. It will go much easier with a regular PC and right now it is still in pieces, but I do want to get it together tonight anyway.

Only thing I bought was a new 15' garden hose and a fine mesh basket strainer, and both of those I got next door at Lowe's. In reality even the PAP people agreed that I need to get all the muck up first. Figure will keep going with the leaf net until I am not getting much, then I will let it settle down and set the pump to vac to waste for the rest.
Did run the numbers since I was there though :
TC 5.0
FC 5.0
CC 0.0
PH 8.0
ACID DEMAND 4
BASE DEMAND *
TA 100
CH 275
CYA 0
TDS 1300

figure that should give me an initial baseline to work from till I can get a real baseline when my kit shows up. Well back to the muck.

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