Added chlorine and the pool turned green

[blupomx]

The pool was not used for 6 months for the past 2.5 weeks I have been working w/ the pool running 24/7. adding a package of quick dissolving shock daily and have added muriatic acid 3 different times. Just 2 days ago it was looking clearer, I backwashed and rinsed the filter, added another pack on shock and with in no time the pool was green. I have no idea what is going on I am hoping someone can give me some idea what I did...thank you for any help you can offer.

 

[zea3]

Is the water clear green or cloudy green? Do you have a set of test results you can post?

 

[blupomx]

Clear green and I haven't run any test...will do but at this hour it will be in the a.m. Thanks for coming back to me

 

[tim5055]

Following up on zea's question, have you used algecide in the pool in the past?

 

[blupomx]

Never to the best of my knowledge..

 

[misplacetexan]

Have you check for metals in your water?

 

[duraleigh]

You have iron in your pool water. The temporarily high pH precipitates the iron into a rusty yellow combining with the blue pool water........turning your pool green.

It will go away on it's own as the iron precipitates out......usually a few days. Removing it faster than that is a little tricky and requires careful testing.

Adding muriatic acid will help but I am concerned you do not post any test results. How do you know when to add chemistry....are you testing?

 

[blupomx]

My test results are:
FC 4.4 but I must say the water was grey pink after adding the R-0870 and after R-0871 it lost the pink and went back to grey.
No CC

PH 7.4
TA 140/ppm
CYA >100
Calcium Hardness ran out of R-0012 at 45 drops so it is high.

This was the first I had tested since turning the pool back on, it was so murky and dirty thought I would shock it first to get some better numbers.

How do you test for metals?

Thanks for the help....

 

[Caco]

You can buy metal tests but usually people go to the pool store and ask them to run metal tests for them
Its one of the few times we suggest the pool store does the testing for you

If you are on town water supply you could also check to see if they publish their water results, most places do

It sounds to me like you do have metals, because you had problems with the calcium test. Did the test flash blue or purple and fade back to red? Can you please post what you did/what happened with this test?

 

[YippeeSkippy]

Stop tossing in odd and assorted amounts of "quick dissolving Shock" as with each bag you toss in you are raising your CYA level higher and higher. The higher the CYA, the more chlorine (alone) it will take to avoid algae.

Any pool stores near you that can test for iron? Green is usually either algae or iron, sometimes copper.... but without knowing what you're dealing with you could be adding other problems to the pool by adding the wrong chemicals.

 

[duraleigh]

You have iron in your pool water. The temporarily high pH precipitates the iron into a rusty yellow combining with the blue pool water........turning your pool green.

That is your problem. Anytime the pool turns green that quickly, it is because the pool water has iron that reacts to the chlorine.

This is not a guess.

The iron may have mostly precipitated by now so a test for iron often yields a negative result. The solution to this problem is to stop adding large doses of chlorine and simply maintain your FC roughly where it is. Run your pump 24/7 as the visible iron now can be filtered and your filter will catch it.

 

[blupomx]

thank you for your suggestions, I will heed your advice. The pool is back to clear! So that is a good start.

 

[Holydoc]

thank you for your suggestions, I will heed your advice. The pool is back to clear! So that is a good start.

So did you determine that the green was from Iron? What suggestion cleared the pool?

 

[duraleigh]

So did you determine that the green was from Iron? What suggestion cleared the pool?

The iron may have mostly precipitated by now so a test for iron often yields a negative result. The solution to this problem is to stop adding large doses of chlorine and simply maintain your FC roughly where it is. Run your pump 24/7 as the visible iron now can be filtered and your filter will catch it.