Taking care of my pool

[mac4lyfe]

Mac, I will read more on the SWG, my concern is that I have travertine coping and decking (a lot of it in my small yard). I was told that it will start eating away at the travertine, and I do not have it sealed. I may need to stick with the chlorine. I was going to the pool store every few days to get a reading on the water, on 3/11 my CH was 600 and they did not mention that it was an issue, on 3/23 ch 275 and on 3/26 my CH was 350. I don't think this Pool store knows what they are talking about, the turn over on people is a lot, and everyone is always training.

Hey Vegas - I remodeled my pool 3 years ago with travertine coping and I have zero etching of the deck. It looks just as beautiful as when it was installed. Here's an old thread of my build. I got so busy at work that I never did upload the total finish but I'll do it in the next week. Mine was not sealed but if I start to see any degradation, I will go to Home Depot and get a sealer.

West Houston Pool Renovation

The convenience of a SWG can't be overstated. Not having to go to Walmart, especially the horrible customer service Walmart close to me is worth it alone. My pool is pretty large and it takes me buying 10 - 12 gallons to shock at about $3 a gallon. I get a lot of hard looks carrying that much bleach in a cart. Plus I travel a lot so it's hard to sometimes to maintain proper FC levels. I looked into getting a auto liquid pump but I'd still have to buy the bleach bottles. I looked into having drums of bleach delivered to my house but it was very expensive. The SWG pays for itself for me quickly. Stick with the bleach at first but if you're like me, eventually a SWG is just too convenient and economical. I helped a friend with a new build find a cheap SWG on Craigslist. It took us about 2 hours to install and setup. She is a happy camper. You might be able to find a real cheap used control panel then you can buy a new cell.

Something is not adding up with your CH. Even if your fill water is 350, that should not ever increase your CH above that number. It doesn't matter if you add more water. It will always be added at 350 ppm. If you were adding Trichlor then your CYA should have increased like it looks like it has but not your CH. Your CH should only rise above your fill if you were using Cal-Hypo shock. Of course your CH should not change from 600 to 275 unless you diluted the sample with lower CH ppm water. Since your fill is 350 then it should not go to 275 using your water. Unless it was raining (CH should be zero) and your pool water wasn't mixed and you sampled off the top?

When you refill your pool you should look into using low CH fill water. Trucked in water with low calcium or even run your water through a softner. One idea I had about reducing CH was to rig up a water softener type system. I thought about using like a tub filled with softner resin and drive a tube into the membrane to exchange the CH ions with salt. You probably could find an old tank on Craigslist and change out the resin in it and use it to fill with a simple hose. You should be able to fill about 2,400 gallons with a 48,000 grain water softner without having to regenerate the resin. So it would only take 1 regeneration for you to have 4,800 gallons of 0 CH water that should take your 350 fill water to 175 when you drain it in half.

 

[mac4lyfe]

Your water at that ppm is considered "hard". It's probably a good idea to install a water softener for your entire house anyway. My Houston water is about the same hardness level. A water softener makes a huge difference when you bath, wash laundry, water fixtures scaling, etc. I've seen used systems on CL for under $200. Now, it's not really necessary as you should be okay with your fill water at 350 ppm. As long as you don't ever add calhypo. But if your CH is really 800 ppm then you need a low CH fill water when you drain.

 

[DeanP66]

dcvegas,

Since it appears that your pool equipment has a separate line for both the main drain and the skimmer, you should be able to drain it by simply attaching a garden hose to the hose bibb right after the pump and simply running your pump. You just have to make sure that the suction to the skimmer is turned off, so the pump doesn't suck air once the water level goes below the skimmer.

 

[BeachSunH20]

I tested my water, i am trying to get the TC to a 10, I think I have that correct.


FC is a 6
CC.5
TC 6.5

Thank you Kim for the link, if I open the nozzle I wonder if the water will coming shooting out of it.. I will look in to the pump as you and Dean mentioned, by the way Dean your pool looks very nice!

ff702 has been helping me, I have been texting her all he info.

 

[DeanP66]

View attachment 58474

I will be testing the water this evening. I am very nervous about doing this draining.

I don't think I can drain the water in the street, I know where the sewer line is in the front of my house. I think I can drain it in there?? My pool is a bit smaller then your pool, it is 10,000 gallons. I think I can start the process on Friday night and Saturday morning I can fill it. I won't be hiring a pool person to clean my pool for the reason why you had to drain your pool, I believe they all use pucks and they don't really check the water accurately. I will be looking in to buying/renting a pump just in case the pump will be easier to use.

I upload some pics of the equipment, if some can walk me through the process in draining, I would appreciate it. I have a nozzle in the back, can I put a water hose in it and drain from it?

I still need to read more on the CYA and CH - it is a bit confusing for me. I was not very good a chemistry when I was in school. My sink water was at a CH 350, how do I prevent the pool water CH from going up again, will I be able to control it more with only using only liquid chlorine and of course MA? I have a lot to learn.

In regards to your fears about your CH, set your mind at ease. Once you empty the pool and refill, your CH level will be at the same level as your fill water. Mine was over 1000 after years of the pool guy adding "who knows what" and after the drain and refill, I'm down to a nice 250 PPM. My CYA level went from 200 to 50 after the refill, and after I added 2 bottles of CYA granules (8 Lbs) .

My rule of thumb will be NEVER to put in anything in my pool that has CYA in it (pucks, granules) or calcium in it (Hypo chlorine , aka, shock packets). Hopefully, I'll be good to go.

Dcvegas, thanks for the compliment about my pool. I'm pretty happy with it. It's not perfect, as I have quite a bit of plaster discoloration and such, but it's much cleaner looking than I expected, and the color of the water is nice and baby blue now as opposed to blue-green because of the dirty walls and floor.

 

[kimkats]

Ahhhhhhhh but with the CH you forgot about evaporation. The CH will stay in the pool water. When you add water from the fill hose you are adding some more CH. It will add up in time. Many people with hard water will fashion a way to harvest their rain water to use for replacement water. It is really not big deal until the CH gets WAY high. You CH in your fill water is not near as bad as some I have seen so you are good to go! It is just something to keep an eye one every once in a while.

Kim

 

[BeachSunH20]

I tested my water last night, I added 66 % Bleach at 8:15 and I added 9oz MA at 9:30pm

Results after the above was added
FC 6
CC .5
TC 6.5
PH 7.8

I tried using the pool math to find out what I need to be added this morning, (still learning how to use it ). I need he TC at 10, should I add MA or Bleach first and how much should I add, and I can add the other later today?

 

[BeachSunH20]

Mac, your pool is very nice. I will read up more on the SWG and the travertine. I would also prefer not using the pucks when I leave town. I will look in to the cost new and used. My neighbor across from me has salt water, he had a lot of algae last year and he has it again. I informed him of this sight, and he has decided to go with hiring someone to take care of his pool. I would also prefer not using the pucks when I leave town.

I will hook up the hose to the hosebib, I think that is the nozzle? I will need to get a longer hose to reach the sewer line in the front of the house. I hope I can get the lid open. I would like to try to get it done this weekend, I believe this is why the tile is starting to get scale. That may also explain why the Variable pump lid has a white scale. My garage is set up to add a water softener, I will look in to this too.

I added 1/2 gallon of Bleach 10%, thank you ff702. I will test this evening and try to figure out what is needed.

By the way any thoughts on my equipment, I new nothing about the equipment when decided to do the build. I kicked it around for a year before I said lets do it. I am now committed to this pool stuff. I wish I knew about TFP, before I decided to do the build.

 

[mac4lyfe]

Ahhhhhhhh but with the CH you forgot about evaporation. The CH will stay in the pool water. When you add water from the fill hose you are adding some more CH. It will add up in time. Many people with hard water will fashion a way to harvest their rain water to use for replacement water. It is really not big deal until the CH gets WAY high. You CH in your fill water is not near as bad as some I have seen so you are good to go! It is just something to keep an eye one every once in a while.

Kim

Good point Kim. We get so much rain in Houston that CH is rarely a problem. I know Vegas is very dry, but DCVegas has a new pool, only a few months old. I would not expect CH to go up that high just from a few refills. They must have been adding CalHypo or the test results are inaccurate. Something is not adding up. I'm not sure the CH could get that high in a few months like that anyway. If Vegas added 6 oz of CalHypo to the pool, it would take ~200 doses to get CH that high. I don't think he added that many doses over the last 6 months.

Vegas - you might be able to manage a higher CH level. Your main concern is CSI and keeping it in check to prevent scaling. Look at the pool calculator to calculate CSI. Adjustments in pH and TA are ways that can move your CSI one way or the other to lower the potential for scaling. I still think you need to get an accurate CH? Unless you were adding Calcium Chloride or a lot of Cal Hypo, I am not believing those results.

 

[ff702]

I will be happy to bring over my own reagents to test the CH one more time before draining. My own CH is testing at 325 right now so I believe that would give us an accurate number if DCs CH is 800 using mine. We tested DCs chems at my house in early March with my set and it was showing 550 at that point. We don't know exactly what was put into the pool since the builder was maintaining prior.


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[mac4lyfe]

Mac, your pool is very nice. I will read up more on the SWG and the travertine. I would also prefer not using the pucks when I leave town. I will look in to the cost new and used. My neighbor across from me has salt water, he had a lot of algae last year and he has it again. I informed him of this sight, and he has decided to go with hiring someone to take care of his pool. I would also prefer not using the pucks when I leave town.

I will hook up the hose to the hosebib, I think that is the nozzle? I will need to get a longer hose to reach the sewer line in the front of the house. I hope I can get the lid open. I would like to try to get it done this weekend, I believe this is why the tile is starting to get scale. That may also explain why the Variable pump lid has a white scale. My garage is set up to add a water softener, I will look in to this too.

I added 1/2 gallon of Bleach 10%, thank you ff702. I will test this evening and try to figure out what is needed.

By the way any thoughts on my equipment, I new nothing about the equipment when decided to do the build. I kicked it around for a year before I said lets do it. I am now committed to this pool stuff. I wish I knew about TFP, before I decided to do the build.

I like your equipment. Very nice build. I just wouldn't use that auto chlorinator to add trichlor once my CYA is in range. Once all your numbers are in range, the only thing you should be adding is bleach and occasionally adjust PH. Once you get tired of going to Walmart for bleach, get a SWG. LOL. But you'll still have to adjust PH. I wish we could just set it and forget it but it's never easy.

I'm still not sold on you draining the pool because the CH results aren't making sense to me. Even if it is high, I would look at other ways of managing it first than reduce it as you go. Water the lawn and garden from time to time while you fill with rain water or lower CH water. Which brings up the ultimate point moving forward. How are you going to refill with low CH water?

The more I think about it the more I would try a water softener. I just looked on CL Las Vegas and saw several cheap water softener units. There's one for $75 that would do the trick. Most of these softeners still work well. These things last for decades. You just want to make sure it doesn't leak and that the controller is functional. The resin last a very long time (like 15 - 20 years), most people don't know how to operate it, so they don't know how to add salt to regenerate the resin. So their water is hard and they think it's not working. You can easily test the resin and see if it's totally exhausted in which you can just add new resin (ebay, Amazon). I would attach a hose to a sump pump and push it through the softener and run another hose back to the pool. Thus using the same pool water. Pump from the deep end and return to the shallow end. You should only have to regenerate a couple of times to reduce your CH.

Since your garage is already setup. You might want to add a softener there just to reduce your fill water CH.

 

[mac4lyfe]

I see a free Culligan softener listed as well. They say they think there was a problem with the bypass. That tells me that the line is clogged which is easy to fix.

Man, one good thing about Vegas. You can find a lot of stuff for cheap/free.

 

[BeachSunH20]

I have tested the water for PH

PH 8.2 - I tried to use the pool math the MA I have is a 29% I moved to 29 and it is not showing me how many oz of MA I need, what am I doing wrong....

 

[YippeeSkippy]

That's not a normal concentration of MA, I think? Did you input your pool size up at the top?

 

[mac4lyfe]

I have tested the water for PH

PH 8.2 - I tried to use the pool math the MA I have is a 29% I moved to 29 and it is not showing me how many oz of MA I need, what am I doing wrong.... I am going to start the pool and add 16 oz of MA to get the PH down, then I will test the TC and PH.

Yeah, make sure you put in 10,000 as your gallons first. You would enter in the Now column PH = 8.2 then put in the target PH = 7.4. It will tell you to add 22 oz of MA. If you hover over the 22, it will convert for you and tell you up to to add 2 cups and 5 oz. I NEVER take a measuring cup out to pour acid as it could be potentially dangerous transferring it to the cup then to the pool. I just best guess. Some bottles have a little measuring aid on the side.

- - - Updated - - -

I will be happy to bring over my own reagents to test the CH one more time before draining. My own CH is testing at 325 right now so I believe that would give us an accurate number if DCs CH is 800 using mine. We tested DCs chems at my house in early March with my set and it was showing 550 at that point. We don't know exactly what was put into the pool since the builder was maintaining prior.

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That's why I'm very leary about DC's CH. To go from 550 to 800 in a few weeks would take over 30 lbs of calcium chloride.

 

[BeachSunH20]

When I had the water tested at the pool store on Feb. 13th they told me to add 2bags of shock in it, my TC was a 2 a 2. I put a (1) 1lb bag of shock only, they informed me that said my CH 300, TC 5, PH 8 ( I added 16oz of MA). I was only using pucks and MA at that time, the chlorinator has been on a 1 until, and March 10th I was told to move it to a 3 or 4, now I have it off.

FC 9.5
CC.5
TC 10
PH 8.2 - I added 18oz of MA, trying to get to a 7.5.

When is a good time of the day to test the water and add what is needed? I don't always have time to test in the morning. I was thinking maybe I can test at night and add whats needed in the morning.

This is all making a little more sense to me. I love the Tester and speed stirrer, everyone with a pool should have this!! I will retest the CH soon to double check the numbers, ff702 and I did it twice, and we came up with the 800 both times.

Mac I will look at CL, the only problem with that, I don't know how to install. I don't know if i can start learning how to do that, one thing at a time...LOL. The CSI said scaling likely, when I change the PH to a 7.5 it says balanced. Maybe I got some scaling from the PH never being correct. I am having second thoughts about those pool stores testing my water. I am glad the equipment is good. That makes me feel good

I am learning a lot with everyones help here on TFP, Thank you!

 

[mac4lyfe]

^^ You can test the water at any time. It's probably better to add Chlorine at sunset if you are shocking the pool so the sun won't burn any off but it's pretty negligible anyway. The main thing is to make sure you are recirculating your pool adequately so that you are getting a good representative sample of your pool water. Make sure you keep your PH in range. You need to check PH and CL probably 2 times a day for now so you can get an idea what's happening in your pool. I also record everything I put in the pool and at what amount. That way I know what to expect. What type of shock were you adding to the pool? Are you sure you weren't adding Calcium Chloride? I just don't understand how your CH could get that high after only a few months of use.


I would first find out what my real CH is. Most people here are not real proponents of the pool store but maybe take it by a couple stores to verify your results. Especially since you're new to testing. Unless someone has been dumping calcium chloride in your pool without your knowledge, there's no way your CH can be that high in just a few months. Trichlor Pucks can't do it and cal hypo shock won't do it that quickly.

If for some strange reason your CH is that high, I would definitely look at that free softener if it's still available. Hard to beat free and it looks in good shape from the pictures. It is not hard to install a softener. You don't even have to install it into your house plumbing, you can start with just trying it on your pool water or your garden hose for good fill water. Attach the garden hose to the inlet and get another hose on the outlet and test your water from the outlet. If the resin is working, it will attract the CH ions and your outlet should have 0 CH. There's strips you can use to test hardness. Once the resin removes enough CH, you eventually need to regenerate it. A salt brine is washed into the resin in order to refresh it. The connection on that softener was a simple hose hook up. You can hook your garden hose or you could connect a sump pump sitting in your pool and push your pool water with it. Your pool is small enough that you won't have to regenerate the resin but maybe 1 time. I would try a softener to at least filter your pool water first or at least use it to clean up your high CH fill water.

 

[kimkats]

ff702 and I did it twice, and we came up with the 800 both times.

I am learning a lot with everyones help here on TFP, Thank you!

With the two of you testing AND using the speed stir aka magic stirrer LOL I would say your CH is that high. It is what it is and we will work on that after the rest of the levels are balanced and you find what works for you.

I test at night right after dinner. The sun is off the pool, the pump has been running all day so it is a good time. That gives the FC all night to work on any thing in the pool without the sun taking any of it. I let the pump run for another 30 mins or so to mix the chlorine in good.

Repeat after me: "I have the best test kit there is! I know how to use it! I have the support of TFP and ff702! I don't need no stinking pool $tore!"

The only thing you are allowed to enter the pool store for now is to buy fun pool toys or to get their chlorine. PLEASE do not let them test your water or sell you anything for you pool UNLESS you run it by us first! Pretty please?

Kim

 

[BeachSunH20]

Kim I repeat after you the best kit there is and I will not let the pool store selling my stuff.

I actually forgot to mention that I was told to add the Pool perfect , 1 lid full of this pool perfect once a week, I stopped using in the it in begging of this month. This is the 1 bag shock I used the last week of Feb. I am going to go with do not use these items.


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[mac4lyfe]

Good read on pool perfect... It is not recommended.

Pool Perfect with Phos Free

Chlor Brite is Dichlor. Dichlor and trichlor add CYA and lower pH. Cal-hypo adds CH. It is not out of the question or necessarily bad to use any of these BUT you have to know your numbers. If your CYA is low, you can use Dichlor and Trichlor to sanitize (add FC) plus it will raise your CYA in the process. If your CYA is already high, you do not want to use these. Same goes for CH. If your CH is low then Cal-hypo will sanitize with FC plus it will raise your CH. With your high CH, you don't want Cal-hypo (or especially calcium chloride) near your pool. The pool calculator will show you how much all these chemicals add which is a great tool.