Aquateen82 ~ Out of pool store products, ready to BBB

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aquateen82

aquateen82

0
Jul 30, 2016
13
Bedford, Texas
Happy Saturday!

I'm a new pool owner. We bought our house in November with an existing gunite in-ground pool built in the late 70s/early 80s. The tile is falling off, the plaster has been painted over at least 3 times, and could use a new coat as I speak. I spent the winter learning how to take care of the pool. Now that I understand, I am trying to tackle it head on with as little impact to my pocket book as possible.

My pool is peanut shaped, and aprox 25,000 gallons. I have yet to figure out the exact gallons. I have a sand filter, with a Jandy energy filter and Polaris Vac-Sweep 360 Pressure Side Pool Cleaner. I recently switched my pool pump to nights from 6pm to 7am (I get free electricity at night). My biggest concern is algae. Since the pool needs to be refinished and retiled, algae has found all kinds of new places to live and proliferate. Last week I used the last of my pool store powdered chlorine "shock" and 3" tabs, so today I'm starting fresh (or not so fresh, I should say :p )
I just purchased 16 jugs of 8.25% bleach, 16lbs of baking soda, and 2 boxes of borax. I'm looking forward to SLAMing the pool tonight.

As of 12:30pm today 7/30/15
FC - 0
CC - 0
pH - 7.6
TA - 80
CH - (unknown, but I have a TH of 200)
CYA - 40

Any recommendations on how and where to start are appreciated!
 
Welcome to the forum. :wave:

Your numbers indicate you are ready for the SLAM. I am worried that your words seem to imply you will finish it this evening. It doesn't work like that......it's a process that can take several days.

You should read "The ABC's of Pool Water Chemistry" up in Pool School. You have no need for Borax or baking soda.
 
duraleigh said:
Welcome to the forum. :wave:

Your numbers indicate you are ready for the SLAM. I am worried that your words seem to imply you will finish it this evening. It doesn't work like that......it's a process that can take several days.

You should read "The ABC's of Pool Water Chemistry" up in Pool School. You have no need for Borax or baking soda.
Click to expand...

Thank you, thank you!

I'm ready for the multi-day process, I'm off from work and studying for a big exam over the next few weeks, so I have the time. My hubby is on vacation Aug 7th, so we need a working pool in the next week! :cool:.

I will be sure to read the ABC guide this afternoon. I figured I didn't need the Baking soda or borax at this moment, but I thought I'd go ahead and buy all 3 of the Bs now, in case I did. I read somewhere about adding DE to the sand filter to help with cleaning up the dead algae. So I just bought a huge bag of that as well. at FC 0 I have cloudy dead algae water that needs a good cleaning.
 
You have the bleach and the willingness so you are good to go!

Please put your info in your signature-settings-upper right, edit signature-middle left. Put your pool kind and size ??Gals. We can help you figure that out as you SLAM, equipment size and kind. That will help us help you at a glance.

Have you started putting the bleach in yet?

:kim:
 
kimkats said:
Have you started putting the bleach in yet?
Click to expand...

Ok, I added my pool info in my signature. Is there a formula to figure out the actual gallons in my pool? I've got a peanut shaped pool that is 100 feet in diameter, 35.5 feet long, 15.25 feet wide at the shallow end, and 17.5 feet wide at the deep end, 3.5 feet deep in the shallow, and 7 feet deep in the deep end.

Kimkats, I haven't started bleach yet. I'll pour it in at 7pm tonight, test an hour later, and let the pool pump run all night without the filter and test again in the morning. I will turn the filter on in the morning and add more bleach.
Is there a place I can put the pictures of my system for members to access? Also, for some reason my avatar picture is sideways :( Anyone know how to fix that?

I've got a great picture of the nasty wall algae I'm up against, but I'll start a new thread in the algae forum.... I'm kinda excited to do a before and after!
 
"Before" Algae pic; Going to SLAM for the first time tonight

IMG_6659.jpg
This is what I'm up against this weekend! its all along the entire pool wall. I'm going to SLAM for the first time tonight. Hopefully I can successfully eliminate ALL of this from my pool walls so I can finally enjoy the pool.

This algae starts out black but as it grows its really green. at best I've been able to shock and scrub it down to black or dark grey marks that won't ever seem to come off. Anyone have experience with this large of a problem?

It certainly doesn't help that the pool needs to be sandblasted and replastered. As it is right now, it has about 3 layers of paint over the original plaster, and could really use an update! I purchased the home in November thinking we would renovate the pool this year. Well the reno budget went to the inside of the house, and we have to wait at least another year. I hope SLAMing works!
 
Re: "Before" Algae pic; Going to SLAM for the first time tonight

That is yucky but not the worse we have seen by far! I think the worse one was Swampwoman's pool and one other. We were betting they would find the Creature in their pools before they cleared! Oh wait there was the one that had a whole eco system growing-frogs, snakes, turtle, plants etc.........

Let talk about your brush and brushing skills. What kind of brush have you been using? How often have you been brushing? Brushing while inside or outside the pool?

You are so going to love TFP! Your wallet the most of all!

:kim:
 
Re: "Before" Algae pic; Going to SLAM for the first time tonight

So, brushing... I have a small metal algae brush I use on the tile grout while I'm hanging out in the pool by myself. My tile is so clean! I've used that small metal brush on the pool walls and it seems to tear up the plaster/paint more than remove the algae. I have another large plastic bristle bush with a few metal bristles hanging out in there. Its a typical pool brush. I use this one at least once a day. As you can see, it does nothing! haha.

When we fist moved in, back in December, the pool was BLACK and full of leaves. We've come a long way believe it or not. I just have the hardest time staying in the clean zone.
 

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Re: "Before" Algae pic; Going to SLAM for the first time tonight

BUT you found TFP now! I am very hopeful we can really help your pool out when your test kit gets there.

For now keep brushing and adding the chlorine. If at all possible run your pump 24/7 so we can really get it filtered good with all of your work.

:kim:
 
I've been merged! :cool:

tim5055 said:
The problem that I see is that you can not properly follow the SLAM Process without one of the recommended test kits. Your 6-way kit will not accurately test FC high enough to make the FC adjustments necessary. Additionally, the 6-way kit is not precise enough to conduct an Overnight Chlorine Loss Test
Click to expand...

Tim, this is a solid concern! One that I didn't even realize until just now when I went to check my FC levels after adding 6 jugs of bleach. I'm mitigating the issue by using Chlorine pro aqua check test strips. These strips go up to 20 FC. However, that doesn't help me in the morning when I go to check OCLT :(... unless the drop is so drastic that it brings me back down to 5 FC. grrrr....

At any rate, the bleach is in, and the pump is on. I couldn't set my filter to recirculate like I wanted to because some of the water was leaking form the waste pipe. I'm not sure why, and I'm not up for tackling that problem tonight. So I backwashed and have it on filter all night.

My levels as of 9:30pm 7/30/16: EVERYTHING increased. is this normal? Maybe because I also plugged in the polaris so everything is being kicked up right now?
FC - 20
CC - ? my test it doesn't go this high :roll:
pH - 8.0 (this increased.... hmmm?)
TA - 100 (also increased)
CH - (unknown, but I have a TH of 300)
CYA - 50
 
Good morning!

FC - 4
CC - 0
pH - 7.5
TA - 90
CH - (unknown, but I have a TH of 300)
CYA - 50

Lots ok chlorine loss overnight, which doesn't surprise me at all. According to PoolMath, I need to add 4 jugs of bleach. But I MUST SAY, the algae on the wall has turned grey.... which I think is a good sign!

*Edit* I'd like to add that I am going to take my water down to the pool store to have them test it, just to be sure.
 
We have years of experience and have seen THOUSANDS of pools that were the results of pool store testing. There is a reason we do not trust them. They are in business to make money. How they make money is sell you stuff you do not need from their test results.

I was a victim of pool stores :( with my first pool. My levels were so out of wack that my liner "rotted" with water in it! I now know that my PH and CYA were all wrong :( but I was only told "drain your water about 2 inches and refill and you will be fine after you add this". I was lucky in that I was able to get out of the pool before all of the water took me out. :shock:

I was never going to get another pool but my hubby wanted one. I told him if he could find a way for me to take care of the pool without having to rely on the pool store we would get a new one. He found TFP!

I even went so far as to get the test kit before I ordered the pool to make sure I could do it. It was EASY and way cheaper using my own test kit and buying what I needed from Walmart and Lowes.

We REALLY want your pool to be a Trouble Free Pool but have found that pool stores and TFP do not mix as it leads to confusion and wasted time and money.

With a good test kit YOU will be in control of your pool and it look better than it ever has before.

I hope you stick around and learn how to care for your pool with your own test kit.

:kim:
 
kimkats said:
We have years of experience and have seen THOUSANDS of pools that were the results of pool store testing. There is a reason we do not trust them. They are in business to make money. How they make money is sell you stuff you do not need from their test results.

I was a victim of pool stores :( with my first pool. My levels were so out of wack that my liner "rotted" with water in it! I now know that my PH and CYA were all wrong :( but I was only told "drain your water about 2 inches and refill and you will be fine after you add this". I was lucky in that I was able to get out of the pool before all of the water took me out. :shock:

I was never going to get another pool but my hubby wanted one. I told him if he could find a way for me to take care of the pool without having to rely on the pool store we would get a new one. He found TFP!

I even went so far as to get the test kit before I ordered the pool to make sure I could do it. It was EASY and way cheaper using my own test kit and buying what I needed from Walmart and Lowes.

We REALLY want your pool to be a Trouble Free Pool but have found that pool stores and TFP do not mix as it leads to confusion and wasted time and money.

With a good test kit YOU will be in control of your pool and it look better than it ever has before.

I hope you stick around and learn how to care for your pool with your own test kit.

:kim:
Click to expand...

I will, I just need the test kit first. I've already started the SLAM process, so I will finish this up, and test kit will be here soon.
 
Your pool needs a little TFP tlc, but is really not so bad, at least you can see the bottom. Maintaining constant chlorine additions to knock back the algae helps to tide things down until the test kit arrives. I opened my neighbor's pool in May (it's a rental, the owners live 1000 miles away) and couldn't see the first step! While the SLAM is a specific procedure, getting ahead of it with CL is still a good thing. Occasionally new members panic (it doesn't seem like you are at all) when they read some of the replies, expecting their pool to become a Superfund Site within the hour. Others feel that some of the replies are a bit overbearing and that following the suggestions are really not that important. Its a SWIMMING POOL, not a nuclear power plant! Welcome to the forum, things will work out.
 

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