Water Features, PH, and Chlorine Pucks

[Rob]

Our pool uses Chlorine pucks (tri-chlor) to chlorinate. After running the pool for almost 2 months, the thing is pretty much maintenance free, all I have to do is drop 10 pucks into the in-line chlorinator once every 3-4 weeks or so.

The one thing that I have had to do once, is raise the pH up. It ended up drifting down to around 7.2, I raised it up to 7.8, and its down to maybe 7.6 now.

It's really not a big deal, but i'm thinking with the right work, I can eliminate that as well. From what I've heard aerating a pool causes it's pH to rise.

Anyone ever look at using a water feature to offset the acidity in tri-chlor pucks? Would there be any other problems associated with this that you can see?

 

[JasonLion]

Using aeration to raise PH will lower TA over time, so you will end up having to add some alkalinity increaser reguarly. This combination might reduce the frequency of chemical additions, but I don't think it will improve things all that much. Plus, it will be difficult to control the rate of PH rise. You will need to be able to vary the amount of aeration so you get the correct amount.

Using trichlor pucks will constantly raise your CYA level. You will need to raise your FC level as the CYA level goes up. If you replace water reguarly, lots of splashout and backwashing, that might not be too much of a problem. For most people the high CYA becomse significantly troublesome before the end of one season.

 

[DavidD]

I must concur with what Jason is saying.

1. To me, It would be easier to add a little borax to raise pH as it is to constantly monitor and adjust Alk. My own experience with a waterfall is that it will burn off Alk faster than you might think, especially when the pH drops to that 7.2 range. With using trichlor, you want to be sure to keep the Alk up to prevent the pH from nose diving the first acidic rainstorm. Also, if you chose to stay with the trichlor, I'd raise it up above 120ppm.

2.Everyone I know that says they have a bad algae problem actually had a high CYA problem.

During my "experimenting days" (before the Pool Forum) I though exactly as you. Pucks are the answer. It took only 5 or six weeks to change my mind as I was adding pH up , watching the CYA climb and constantly adjusting the in line chlorinator. Once I started using bleach (Thank you Ben Powell), things actually got easier. Sure, I was adding it every day but once I got my pools pattern down, it was so easy my wife or then 11 year old would do it when I didn't. I know use mostly bleach and a couple of pucks a month. I have discovered that there is no such thing as a "maintenance free pool" however I do believe that a SWG is about as close as it gets. I will probably get one some day as I believe in the technology and the principles are proven. Right now, the bleach is not that big f a deal.

Dave

 

[Rob]

I really haven't had a problem so far with the pucks. Perhaps it's because of location.

Our pool season is really only 3-4 months up here, and at the start of the season, CYA was at 0 (the pool basically freezes right over, which dropped it down to 0 somehow I suspect).

I actually added some CYA, and after 1.5 months, we still have a sub 30 CYA, I'll keep an eye on it, but I doubt we'll exceed 60 CYA by the end of the season.

I've only had to add the pH Increaser (the former owners of the house left a container of it, I'll use borax next time), and used a bucket of Cal-Hypo to keep it at shock levels for a week or so after opening, and the pool has been going great.

Thanks for the note on Alkalinity, I'll probably just keep increasing the pH, since it looks like we only will have to do it maybe once a month anyways, which really isn't too bad.