Calcium Scaling Stain Removal with Jacks Copper and Scale Stuff

[lews]

Here's the numbers:

FC: 2
PH7.2
TA 70
CH 175
CYA 30

I have brown large area stains on the steps, shallow end and part of the deep end. I had first thought iron or manganese from the well until i used Jack's stain test id kit. The iron packet #1 (and some AA I had) did nothing, but Stain #2 made it vanish in 35-40 secs except for a some small spots. I tried the iron test on these spots with no luck but they are tiny compared to the big stain ugliness. Jacks' treatment is Copper and scaling stuff, about $150. They say anywhere from 48 hrs to several weeks and don't swim because of the PH.

I've searched the forum and see some suggestions to try AA in nylon hose for 30 minutes but that doesn't seem to work on the stain. Why doesn't AA affect it? What is in Jack's treatment that's different?

BTW, I know there no copper in the pool because I had it built and have always used the BBB method. Only Jack's purple stuff, which now shows only 4ppm. I haven't been perfect but generally have kept the pool okay on chems, excepting FC issues and algae. When I feel the surface, it feels as smooth on the stained areas and non-stained. Any ideas what caused this scaling?

I performed an AA treatment 2 years ago and it worked, but did it a few weeks ago and it only helped a little (30% improvement) . I know I have iron and maganese in the well and even with 2 metaltraps in series, there must be some iron in the pool. Is the staining the result of iron trapped in the scaling? I would think scaling would be colored like that.

Has anyone used Jack's treatment that can share the experience? Did it work? Is an acid wash a better choice (pool is 10 yrs old and has marcite cracks in several places)? And should I wait until cold weather?

Answers to any and all would be appreciated.

Lewis

 

[pooldv]

You can try a few more things before an acid wash. An acid wash is a last resort and will remove plaster fro the pool and shorten the life of the plaster.

Have you ruled out an organic stain? Have you tried a trichlor puck? Or elevated FC and brushing? More here, Pool School - Pool Stains.

You can also try some dry acid, sodium bisulfate, in a sock.

You can also try lowering your CSI to -0.8 to -0.9 and brushing often. More here, Pool School - Calcium Scaling

You can do a no drain acid wash, The Zero Alkalinity Acid Treatment

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Calcium scale can trap dirt and metal in it giving it unusual color. I have have two small patches of calcium scale near my waterfall where the water flows into the pool. One patch is a creamy white color that one would expect calcium scale to look like. The other is a yellowish-brown color. The only difference between them is the type of rocks the water washes over. The yellowish patch picks up the minerals from the stone above it.

The Jacks scale remover is, in part, sulfamic acid. It removes copper oxide scale very easily as well as calcium scale. Copper oxides and calcium scales are unaffected by ascorbic acid (AA). The downside of the Jack's scale remover is that it will cause the FAS-DPD chlorine test to register very high CC levels for a long time until all the sulfamic acid breaks down. So it definitely will fix the problem but it will cause you some testing headaches in the near term.

 

[lews]

Thanks guys. I did try the puck - nothing.

That's good information about Jacks and it explains why AA didn't work. And it must have bound iron from the well with the scaling. Since it lifted so easily, do you think that means that the scale/stain would come up in the 48 hours versus several weeks?

Also, can anyone think of a reason the scaling occurred outside of thinking I somehow let CSI get wacky and didn't know it? I had a major problem with Aquarite SWG reading salt correctly and my salt got too high. Could that be it?