3 weeks into pool ownership = already fed up with Leslie's

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ptxAggie08

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May 25, 2017
21
Richardson, TX
3 weeks ago I closed on a house for my family and it has our first pool. House was built in '79, so I assume the pool was built shortly thereafter. The plaster was redone "3-5 years ago." It looks great. Pool is clear, and other than some missing tiles and damaged coping, we are enjoying having it.

Leslie's has been testing my water and coaching me on chemicals, but every time I go in, I get a different answer as to what my strategy should be. (which is very frustrating)

This morning I order the TF-100.

My big issue is the CYA. One guy at Leslie's tells me I should pull out the tabs, and another guy tells me I should always have the tabs in. (my CYA is "well above 100") (FC is below 2, and ph is 7.6)

After reading up with you guys, I have pulled the tabs out, and I have some leftover CAL-HYPO SHOCK that I'm using to try and keep the chlorine the water. When that is gone, I will start using bleach.

I plan on trying to do a 40% drain this weekend to lower the CYA.

Advice, warnings, and encouragement are appreciated. :)
 
Stop with the Cal hypo... you are adding Calcium hardness every time you add it... and since you don't know what you current levels are you could be contributing to a problem. At 20k gallons, you could add a half a gallon of bleach/liquid chlorine (it adds nothing but chlorine and a bit of salt) a day to stay in a holding pattern until your test kit arrives.

Once it arrives, post the full battery of test results and the experts here can guide you. You're likely right that you will have a water exchange in your future.

Welcome, to TFP... the experts here are the best, and Good luck.
 
Pool store CYA test is not much better than a coin flip. There's a good probability it is that high, but I'd wait until you confirm with a real test kit before draining too much.

Cal-Hypo will also increase other stuff (calcium hardness), so you may not want to use it. It's pretty shelf stable, so it won't hurt to move to bleach now and use Cal-Hypo later if you also need CH or the grocery store runs out of bleach when your whole town discovers TFP. ;)
 
Welcome to the forum:wave:

You are on the right path. When your TF-100 gets in, be sure to check everything and pay attention to your Calcium Hardness. Some parts of Texas have high calcium water and you may not want to dump anymore Cal Hypo in.
 
RadEngr70 said:
Stop with the Cal hypo... you are adding Calcium hardness every time you add it... and since you don't know what you current levels are you could be contributing to a problem. At 20k gallons, you could add a half a gallon of bleach/liquid chlorine (it adds nothing but chlorine and a bit of salt) a day to stay in a holding pattern until your test kit arrives.

Once it arrives, post the full battery of test results and the experts here can guide you. You're likely right that you will have a water exchange in your future.

Welcome, to TFP... the experts here are the best, and Good luck.
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OK, I guess I wasnt completely transparent. Leslies also told me that my CH is 200, my TA is 90, and my phosphates are 300. (They freaked out about my phosphates, but according to pool school, its not a big deal)
 
Ya, I still wouldn't add anything that would raise my CH until I tested the water myself... see numerous posts that describe inaccurate pool store water testing. That said, Cal hypo is one of the more innocuous forms of solid chlorine that you can add you your pool.
 
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ok, well, I will be the first to say that I have gotten ahead of myself, so here is my confession: I do not have my TF-100 kit yet (it arrives on Wednesday) so I am using a combination of test strips and Leslies.

Leslies told me that my CYA was 100, and my test strips were bright purple, indicating at least 150+.

Over the weekend, I used a sump pump to drain the pool around 50%, filled it back up, and the test strips are telling me my CYA is still around 125.

I have decided to wait for my test kit before I drain again, but I was honestly hoping 10,000 gallons of fresh water would fix my problem. I guess the previous owner really like his floaters...
 
ptxAggie08 said:
I guess the previous owner really like his floaters...
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I'm not one to blame pool owners. They don't know what they don't know. You are supposed to trust an "expert", aren't you?

So, why do pool stores push these products? Several reasons.

- Money would be the first. Unless a pool store is in Florida, Arizona or other year round areas they must make their profit in a short swim season. So, they need to sell you as much as they can as quickly as they can. Additionally, chemical sales is their bread and butter. Profit on a bucket of tabs is much higher than on a gallon of liquid.

- Secondly, we are an immediate gratification society. We want a magic potion that will fix our problem right now. This is where the industry has tried to add items like clarifiers, floculants and the like which in a perfect world help get the bad stuff out of the water quickly.

- Third in my book is training. Most pool store employees learn on the job or through seminars taught by chemical salesmen. So, bad information is handed down from employee to trainee and the chemical salesmen teach them to push high profit items. This is especially true in large chain stores (like th eone you visited) where employees are paid commission and managers jobs are based on how much product flows out the door.

Pool store methods can work for a long time and many are oblivious to what is happening in their pool. If you are in an area where your pool is drained down a lot each winter and winter snow/rains fill an overflow the pool each spring you are starting with a blank canvas, chemically speaking.

Are there good pool stores out there, yes! But, most of them are in the "sun" states where a family can own a small store and operate it 12 months a year, give good service and make a profit.

In the rest of the country you mainly have a high school/college kid who has about an hour training testing your water and telling you what to buy to add to your water. I guess that's like going into a carpet store and asking if you need to buy new carpet.

Unfortunately the pool industry has evolved into sales by scare tactics, misdirection, misinformation and marketing hype. Go in to the store and tell them your TA is low and they are going to sell you baking soda in a fancy package at four times the cost of WalMart. Do they have a right to make a profit, yes - but lets be reasonable. Heck, even their definition of "low" can many times put you on a pH roller coaster that's hard to get off of. Is that lack of knowledge or a sales technique to sell you more chemicals to control your pH????

What the industry does not understand is that the internet is changing the industry. My favorite story is about my pool light. When I bought the house with the pool along with high CYA my pool light was not working. I could get a new bulb from Amazon for $19, but heck I'm part of that immediate gratification society as much as the next guy. I went down to the local pool store and there was the same bulb, $39. I talked with the manager. I didn't want them to match the price, they have to keep the lights on - just be a little more reasonable. The manager gave me two choices, take it or leave it.
 
tim5055 said:
- Money would be the first. Unless a pool store is in Florida, Arizona or other year round areas they must make their profit in a short swim season. So, they need to sell you as much as they can as quickly as they can. Additionally, chemical sales is their bread and butter. Profit on a bucket of tabs is much higher than on a gallon of liquid.

...

Are there good pool stores out there, yes! But, most of them are in the "sun" states where a family can own a small store and operate it 12 months a year, give good service and make a profit.
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I agree with everything Tim mentioned above, except I will say that the pool stores in year-round areas are just as bad. At least in AZ they are. Most of the mom and pops are now gone or been bought out by a big chain

The only time I go into a pool store is to buy muriatic acid, which is the one pool chemical that they are competitively priced. As for liquid chlorine or bleach, I find better deals at the grocery store. For example, in a strip mall by me they have a pool store that sells 2 one gallon bottles of 10% liquid chlorine for $8. In the same strip mall is a Fry's grocery store. They sell 2 one gallon bottles of 10% liquid chlorine for $5.99.
 

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ptxAggie08 said:
OK, I guess I wasnt completely transparent. Leslies also told me that my CH is 200, my TA is 90, and my phosphates are 300. (They freaked out about my phosphates, but according to pool school, its not a big deal)
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Of course they did. They've got something to sell you for that, too.

attachment.php
 
Update: Last weekend I drained roughly half the pool. This was based on Leslie's and test strips telling me that my CYA was "over 100."


IMG_0072.jpg



My TF-100 arrived last night, and I did my first test today. Whoop! I never have to go into Leslie's again!

FC: 1
CC:0
pH: 7.8
TA: 170
CH: 225
CYA: 140


This means that my CYA was probably closer to 250-280 last week before the drain!

Unless wisdom from this forum dictates otherwise, I plan on doing another heavy drain this weekend.

Comments welcome!
 
More Pictures. Becuase I know you guys like that. :)

IMG_0021.jpg

- - - Updated - - -

borjis said:
Excellent work. I've been there myself. My first pool had 300+ Cya from the previous owners misdeeds.

I'd shoot for a cya of 50 if you can, but 70 is manageable.
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Yeah, thats what I am going to try and do, if patience allows. My water bill is going to suck this month... I just keep telling myself that new water is cheaper than "CYA Reducer"
 
With that high of CYA you dodged a bullet not having a swamp.

On the right track.

Good Luck.
 
spinPHD said:
I....The only time I go into a pool store is to buy muriatic acid, which is the one pool chemical that they are competitively priced. ....
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.
The only chemical i have found in any pool store that was close to competitive is CYA at 6% markup over big box store. that is not bad. I spot checked muriatic acid recently and the pool store was over twice the big box (same size and conc)...that is horrible.
 
Drained again this weekend. The pump got away from me for a bit, so I actually drained more than I planned.

Regardless, I got the pool filled up again, and I tested again, just to be sure.

FC: 0
CC: 0
ph: 7.8
TA: 100
CH: 175
CYA: 0

I got some bleach in the water, a little muriatic acid to get the pH down a bit, a little of calcium hardness added, and Ive got the CYA soaking as of last night.

This morning, my FC was at a 7, which is where I expected it to be. I think I am on the right path.
 
Agreed, you will feel a lot better now that you stated over fresh. I was in same boat as you a few months ago after buying my home with a pool. Getting a fresh drain and now knowing everything that is put in it makes manageing it a lot easier.

Looks like you got chemicals you need to add figures out. You want to keep PH on high end with low CH. You can add CH to get to required level, but it will raise over time so managing high PH to keep your CSI in range is an option as well.

As for CYA, I would shoot for 30 first. You will likely eventually find that 50 is better at reducing daily FC loss.
 
spinPHD said:
Agreed, you will feel a lot better now that you stated over fresh. I was in same boat as you a few months ago after buying my home with a pool. Getting a fresh drain and now knowing everything that is put in it makes manageing it a lot easier.

Looks like you got chemicals you need to add figures out. You want to keep PH on high end with low CH. You can add CH to get to required level, but it will raise over time so managing high PH to keep your CSI in range is an option as well.

As for CYA, I would shoot for 30 first. You will likely eventually find that 50 is better at reducing daily FC loss.
Click to expand...

All makes sense. And yes, Im very gunshy of shooting for CYA over 30. I added 4 lbs, which should keep me in line with suggestions. I plan on doing a full battery of tests again in a few weeks to see how it all ironed out. But also watching my FC every day...
 

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