Confused with keeping Fc at the right levels

[sersee]

This morning I got my FC up to 4 and my ph from 8.2 to 7.8 by following pool math. So I didn't get a chance to test it again earlier but did tonight. Here are my current numbers:

FC 1.5
CC possibly .5. I thought it was 0 at first but there was a slight pink tone (unless its just in my head from concentrating on the ph so much). I added one drop and then thought it went perfectly clear
PH 7.8
TA 120
CH 150

CYA.. I filled the tube and could still see the black dot. It was quite murky . Thought I was pretty close to not seeing it when I filled the cylinder


I tried to get stabilizer today but they store was out. Is this my issue? Because of the cya? Im putting in the last 2 lbs of acid for ph tonight and will add some dichlor according to pool math. The stabilizer would be why my fc drops?

 

[needsajet]

If there's zero CYA your FC is plenty. Is the pool clear? With no CYA, the chlorine burns off in the sun very quickly. Was it cloudy today or lots of sun on the pool?

For the CYA test, be sure the water is 75 degrees or warmer and you shake it for 30 seconds after mixing and before testing. Some people let it sit a minute or two and then shake it again before the test.

 

[sersee]

The pool is clear. I always have lots of sun because we have a huge yard and no trees. It always gets sun. It definitely is warmer than 75 degrees. But..I don't shake for 30 seconds. I read it as shake it, wait 30 seconds and then shake it again. So I am supposed to shake the whole time?

So I should be fine not adding dichlor tonight? Just let my swg do the job?


I guess what I am confused about is if my pool should be at fc 3-5 and I was at a 3 or 4. Isn't my goal to keep it there all the time? I understand it will burn off but then in the morning when my swg , should it get back into that range? We have been running our system at 100% because we kept registering very small levels of chlorine . If it's at 1.5 , is that enough to keep my pool sanitized?

 

[needsajet]

You add your pool water to the mixing vial, then the CYA reagent, and then shake the mixture. Then pour it into the test tube with the black dot. No need to shake the test tube with the black dot.

If it were me, I would get the stabilizer tomorrow and use that to raise the CYA level to 50 for now.

I would discontinue using dichlor or dry acid, and switch to bleach as the FC top-up, and muriatic acid to lower pH.

If you have dichlor you want to get rid of, let me know how much you have, and I can work out how you can do that.

 

[sersee]

I was told Muriatic acid can be tough for the chemically sensitive so I avoided it. I have dichlor so was trying to use it up. It wasn't cheap. I also have a hubby who is very nervous about using bleach. Im slowly convincing him. I figured my cya was nil so the dichlor wouldn't give me a cya monster. I didn't shake the tube. I did wait 30 seconds before adding it to the tube though ..

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[needsajet]

Sure, the dichlor can be used up. Just need to know how much you have, and then we can work it in. It's just not the handiest way to raise your CYA level, because that would be adding too much chlorine all at once. Over time, it will work fine.

Any source of chlorine adds the same molecules we need to the water. We just like to use pool chlorinating liquid or bleach because they're the same thing and both only add chlorine and salt. Sounds like you have this figured out from your CYA monster description. If uncomfortable with bleach for now, just buy swimming pool chlorinating liquid. It's usually 10% or 12.5% sodium hypochlorite instead of strong bleach which is usually 8.25% sodium hypochlorite. It all tastes bad to algae and bacteria!

Main thing is to get the CYA up so the chlorine is protected from sunshine and will hold up through the daytime.

 

[sersee]

Thank you so much for all your advice!! I will check to see how much dichlor I have. I know we bought a box. I find cya extremely confusing. my husband is confused because we have to keep adding chlorine and we have a swg. I keep reading pool school (haha) to try and get this into my brain. So by adding cya it protects my fc from being eaten by the sun and having the level drop. But I have to be careful not to get a crazy cya level . So if I get it up to say 50 that will help the levels not burn off and drop so much? With a swg.. if my fc is 4 and it dropped tonight to 1.5(my system had just run)... is it possible it will be back up tomorrow after my swg runs in the morning? But if my cya is say 50..that should help my water hold the fc and my swg will be able to do its job? Basically we are confused with having to manually put in chlorine.. what is the swg doing? Sorry for all the questions. At some point I hope I get this.

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[DKT113]

Just tell him you are no longer Sersee but you are now Tyrion Lannister
You Drink and You know Things...
:study:

And you are as sure as you can be this method will keep the water clearer than any pool water he has ever seen, it will be healthier than any water he has been near and he will have more riches than all the Lannisters, because this saves both time and money. He can take it all right to the The Iron Bank of Braavos.

You need to try and find Stabilizer tomorrow. Our town was out of it as well over memorial weekend, our Home Depot was the first to get any back in stock. Think of that CYA as PoolSun Block ~ it allows the Liquid Chlorine to be in the water longer to have fun (register when tested kill and keep the nasties at bay) Just like a person out in the sun without sunblock, they get burnt and leave the sun. Your Liquid Chlorine gets burnt up by the sun as well and leaves (dissipates).

Get a container and add a bit ~ don't go crazy because you have some in there, just not sure how much. Add a dose to boost it. If it were me and I was left to my own devices I would assume I had 10 in ther just because you know you have some but it didn't cover the dot ~ I would use pool math starting level 10 and have it calculate to get you to 30. That should put you at a minimum of 30 you may get to or exceed 40's. And that's manageable. I would dose for 40 and expect to get more mileage out of the Liquid Chlorine. In 3-5 days retest the CYA to dial it in a bit better. Dose according to the reading. You do the test, keep your number to yourself and with the same water (pour it back into the little redcapped bottle and give it to your husband and have him test and see what number he comes up with. Do that CYA testing on a sunny day with both of your back to the sun when you test and the view tube at your waist. You will have a number, he will have a number ~ if they are close call it what is is. If they differ and you both have decent eyes and it was sunny out go with the lower number ~ that's how we do it here and it's worked for us.

Dose accordingly. Once you get some CYA in there levels are so much easier to manage on these hot, sunny days.
THis takes a little bit of getting used to, but the rewards are great on all fronts ~ appearance of water, ease of maintenance, and savings of dough!

With those SWG's I think you run CYA at a higher level. I don't have one of those, but I do believe your keep a little more CYA in the waters than non users do. Someone will certainly get you sorted on that. If it isn't registering regardless what the outcome of that is ~ you do need CYA in that water, enough to register with certainty in the view tube.

 

[cowboycasey]

it is confusing at first isn't it no issues

you really need your CYA up at 70, that will help you SWG keep the free chlorine in the pool...

think of CYA as sunscreen for your pool, if you use no sunscreen you get burnt, your chlorine does the same thing, it burns up... if you take your CYA to 50 it will help but you will need to run your pump and SWG a little longer to keep up FC loss...

CYA is always the tricky part for a salt water pool, for a non SWG pool we say only 30 CYA and have a higher free chlorine every day, with a SWG it add's chlorine a little at a time and at a constant rate, so we can have a lower free chlorine but we really have to protect that lower FC...

I hope this helps

 

[sersee]

Lol thank you so much! Loved the post... I watch got but it didn't dawn on me about my nickname. I've had it forever... It's actually the Sersi from the x-men comics. Thank you for the explanation. That made total sense to me. I guess there was a run on stabilizers!

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[needsajet]

If you like, give me the model number of your SWG and I can get back to you about that.

There's no need to put any bleach in right now. Occasionally with an SWG you may use it as a top-up, but no need to do that just now, because you have very little CYA and you had 1.5 PPM FC at the end of the day, and that's fine. You had 4 PPM FC at the beginning of the day - more than enough.

 

[sersee]

it is confusing at first isn't it no issues

you really need your CYA up at 70, that will help you SWG keep the free chlorine in the pool...

think of CYA as sunscreen for your pool, if you use no sunscreen you get burnt, your chlorine does the same thing, it burns up... if you take your CYA to 50 it will help but you will need to run your pump and SWG a little longer to keep up FC loss...

CYA is always the tricky part for a salt water pool, for a non SWG pool we say only 30 CYA and have a higher free chlorine every day, with a SWG it add's chlorine a little at a time and at a constant rate, so we can have a lower free chlorine but we really have to protect that lower FC...

I hope this helps

yes it did! It is so confusing and I feel like it shouldn't be which makes me feel like a dumb butt. So if the cya is good.. I won't need to manually add chlorine. My swg will take care of it. This is exactly what I need to tell my husband...

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[sersee]

If you like, give me the model number of your SWG and I can get back to you about that.

There's no need to put any bleach in right now. Occasionally with an SWG you may use it as a top-up, but no need to do that just now, because you have very little CYA and you had 1.5 PPM FC at the end of the day, and that's fine. You had 4 PPM FC at the beginning of the day - more than enough.

not sure of the exact model. It's a breeze. It looks like the breeze 540 when I Google it.

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[needsajet]

OK, yep. The SWG will do most of the work. What I had in mind was to take it to 50 PPM CYA first, just to make sure we don't overshoot if pool volume is off. The longer term target will be 70 to 80, I entirely agree.

Bleach is used as a top up, for example to jack it up before a kids birthday party.

Bleach might also be used to bring the FC up to the right level after adding CYA.

I'll go look up your SWG and see what I can find. Often, the SWG is meant for maintaining the FC level, unless it's a nice big model (like Casey's ) that can raise the FC on its own.

 

[DKT113]

Yep I knew someone would have a number for you for that SWG.

So you will want to get to 50 like needsajet said, but when you are using the calculator assume you have some in there.

If you both test you'll get a ballpark. The dot will cover though ~ and that test frustrates more people than you can imagine. You'll get the hang of it, it's just a learning curve, getting a feel kind of thing now ~ everything uncertain and then boom it all makes sense you will be a master. That CYA test though is the one that gives everyone a rough time getting the hang of initially. Sometimes I mess with the kids and use my towel as a cape lol. You'll have this mastered and hubby will come around, he probably also be thankful you took the reigns.

The folks here will absolutely get you sorted, have a little blind faith, but follow what they say until it makes sense to you. Ask as many questions as you need along the way ~ everyone is super cool about that.

Edit to add: You are shopping for 100% CYA/ Cyanuric Acid

Have a great night!

 

[needsajet]

If it's the Breeze 540, it produces 1.35 lbs of chlorine per day. Based on your calculation of 27,000 gallon volume, you can make 2.5 PPM FC per day by running the chlorinator for 8 hours at 100%.

2.5 PPM FC per day is a rough average for a clean, open pool with people regularly swimming in it. On extremely hot days with lots of swimmers you may use as much as 4 PPM FC per day. In winter here, I only use 0.5 PPM per day. Just explaining that it varies a lot depending on what the chlorine needs to do. For right now, if you run your pump 10 hours a day and your chlorinator at 100%, you'll probably produce a little too much, and then you can dial it back by reducing either the % or the pump run time.

 

[sersee]

We were told to run our swg at 50% but we run it at 100% because we thought that would help with the chlorine level. I think I will have to try and understand my salt system better :/ Yes I am good with gradual cya increasing. So you would add chlorine before a kids party- or after? That's good to know because we always have kids here.

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[sersee]

If it's the Breeze 540, it produces 1.35 lbs of chlorine per day. Based on your calculation of 27,000 gallon volume, you can make 2.5 PPM FC per day by running the chlorinator for 8 hours at 100%.

2.5 PPM FC per day is a rough average for a clean, open pool with people regularly swimming in it. On extremely hot days with lots of swimmers you may use as much as 4 PPM FC per day. In winter here, I only use 0.5 PPM per day. Just explaining that it varies a lot depending on what the chlorine needs to do. For right now, if you run your pump 10 hours a day and your chlorinator at 100%, you'll probably produce a little too much, and then you can dial it back by reducing either the % or the pump run time.

I will double check in the morning. Right now we run it four in the morning and four at night at 100%. I'm thinking my pool is more 25000 gallons if that makes a big difference. Someone mentioned they had a 20 x 40 rectangle with 8 foot deep end and that was 26900. Mine is 6 feet I the deep

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[sersee]

Yep I knew someone would have a number for you for that SWG.

So you will want to get to 50 like needsajet said, but when you are using the calculator assume you have some in there.

If you both test you'll get a ballpark. The dot will cover though ~ and that test frustrates more people than you can imagine. You'll get the hang of it, it's just a learning curve, getting a feel kind of thing now ~ everything uncertain and then boom it all makes sense you will be a master. That CYA test though is the one that gives everyone a rough time getting the hang of initially. Sometimes I mess with the kids and use my towel as a cape lol. You'll have this mastered and hubby will come around, he probably also be thankful you took the reigns.

The folks here will absolutely get you sorted, have a little blind faith, but follow what they say until it makes sense to you. Ask as many questions as you need along the way ~ everyone is super cool about that.

Edit to add: You are shopping for 100% CYA/ Cyanuric Acid

Have a great night!

Thank dk! The cya is frustrating. I'm never did if it's supposed to go away so you can't see it at all. I always can see it even through the murk. .. but barely. I think it's because I have never had it disappear so I don't know what it looks like.

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[DKT113]

I always bump mine a smidge on the weekends ~ when the little kids are in when they hop out to reapply lotion ~ I test quickly to make sure I am keeping it in the zone.

Once it clears for the night I test again top it off and tuck it in.

Little kids with swim diapers or a large bather load I always bump just a smidge the mornings of.

Test morning of, interim if you think you may need to/ lot of folks in there (if you can test) if you can't/ don't want to test when things are rolling along make sure to test once everyone is out at night and top up if necessary.

~~

When you get enough in there it will disappear. Also when you take your sample, allow it to warm a bit before testing. You'll have a better result with water that has warmed a bit. Don't boil it, just let it come up in temp some.