Hello,
First post so please bare with me
I am in Jakarta and unfortunately there are not a whole lot of pool supplies available here. I can only test the chloride and ph. Lately, I have been doing ok using granular 90% chloride, a little copper sulfate to keep it from getting greenish, and once in awhile a little PAC to clean up the dirt. My outside pool is about a 100m3. My main problem is a low Ph (max 7). The PAC won't even work at first so I then add a few bags of soda ash until I see the PAC effect. I have wrinkled fingers within minutes and I think that is because of the low ph. So I decided to try something else. Borax!
Last week, I read about Borax and I found it online so I tried a few (3) kilo and the result was great. My water looked more clear, blue and sparkling than ever. I expected the ph to go up as well but that didn't happen strangely. So I went back to the old method and added just one kilo of soda ash. The water became cloudy but that didn't bother me as I seen that clear up within a day. The next day to my surprise I found that the water had cleared up but now there was a layer of blue slush on the bottom of the pool, and a greasy oily layer on top of the water. I figured the increase in ph triggered the PAC that probably was still in the water and had some reaction with the Borax. It is normal to see a layer of slush after using PAC, but never this blueish so it must have been the Borax.
I vacuumed the pool and the bottom is clear now, but the layer of whitish oily slime is still on the surface. So basically, I wonder if anyone knows if Borax tends to react to PAC. They don't sell the 20 Mule Team Borax here, but they sell 'homemade' Borax to make slime for kids or something. They sell it as Borax or Borax mule, but I am now doubting if it is really the same as 20 Mule Team Borax. Anyway, no more 'Borax' for me.
So how do I clean this up? I use the leaf skimmer but that not really helps a lot. I read about scum balls or pool enzymes but unfortunately they don't sell that here. Do I add PAC again, more chloride (already close to 3)? Wait for the acid rains to take care of it? Any natural products I could try? Thanks for your help.
First post so please bare with me
I am in Jakarta and unfortunately there are not a whole lot of pool supplies available here. I can only test the chloride and ph. Lately, I have been doing ok using granular 90% chloride, a little copper sulfate to keep it from getting greenish, and once in awhile a little PAC to clean up the dirt. My outside pool is about a 100m3. My main problem is a low Ph (max 7). The PAC won't even work at first so I then add a few bags of soda ash until I see the PAC effect. I have wrinkled fingers within minutes and I think that is because of the low ph. So I decided to try something else. Borax!Last week, I read about Borax and I found it online so I tried a few (3) kilo and the result was great. My water looked more clear, blue and sparkling than ever. I expected the ph to go up as well but that didn't happen strangely. So I went back to the old method and added just one kilo of soda ash. The water became cloudy but that didn't bother me as I seen that clear up within a day. The next day to my surprise I found that the water had cleared up but now there was a layer of blue slush on the bottom of the pool, and a greasy oily layer on top of the water. I figured the increase in ph triggered the PAC that probably was still in the water and had some reaction with the Borax. It is normal to see a layer of slush after using PAC, but never this blueish so it must have been the Borax.
I vacuumed the pool and the bottom is clear now, but the layer of whitish oily slime is still on the surface. So basically, I wonder if anyone knows if Borax tends to react to PAC. They don't sell the 20 Mule Team Borax here, but they sell 'homemade' Borax to make slime for kids or something. They sell it as Borax or Borax mule, but I am now doubting if it is really the same as 20 Mule Team Borax. Anyway, no more 'Borax' for me.
So how do I clean this up? I use the leaf skimmer but that not really helps a lot. I read about scum balls or pool enzymes but unfortunately they don't sell that here. Do I add PAC again, more chloride (already close to 3)? Wait for the acid rains to take care of it? Any natural products I could try? Thanks for your help.
