It's a MIRACLE!! It held!!! Last night my last test was at 9 pm and at that point the FC was 15.5! Got up this am and it's at 15!!! So once I saw that I passed, I ran a whole new battery of tests which are as follows.............
FC - 15
CC - 0.5
PH - 7.6
TA - 130
CH - 220
CYA - 30
To refresh, my OLD ORIGINAL TEST BEFORE SLAM was:
FC - 0
CC - Didn't test
PH - 7.6
TA - 90
CH - 230
CYA - 30
So it looks like my TA went up some and CH down a tad.
Awesome! You're PH might be lower, since a FC reading over 10 can skew the PH to show falsely higher then it is. DON'T treat the PH just yet, let the FC drift down under 10, then retest the PH
You can create some aeration to raise PH (turning eye returns up so the break the surface)
Sooooooooooo, my questions now are:
1. Should I just leave it all as it or does anything need adjusting?
2. Where should I let my FC drop to and where should I leave it between? (I'm guessing 4-6 due to my CYA?)
3. How long do you think it will take my FC to drop down to suggested level(s) from where it is now?
4. Once it gets to target range, how often do you think I'll need to add bleach? Every day? Every so many days?
It's time to read
Pool Care Basics! You're in maintenance mode!
a-1) See above note
a-2) Yup
, which you can add enough CYA (per
PoolMath) to bump it up +10 (to 40(ish), for the impending summer UV protection, OR you can wait see how it does)
a-3) UV will burn the unprotected FC off pretty quickly during the day, I'd offer a guess of just a day or two, likely
a-4) That is dependent on too many variables for each pool to say for sure, UV loss, organic debris blow-in, etc, (just a note, I add the dose for min FC for my CYA to our tiny pool everyday, it keeps it on the high range of my suggested CYA level and it means I can be away for a few days at a time at any given time and not have my pool "crash", despite it being a tiny pool!)
Also, as is right now, we usually run our filter 12 hours a day from 8am to 8pm. As suggested by the pool people when we first bought the house. Can, or should, we cut that back some? During what hours do you suggest we run it or does it not matter? They suggested running it during the day because that's when the pool is used the most. But of course that's peak time and our electric is higher then. I mean, I'm not worried about the cost too much since we've been doing it that way all these years but yeah, saving on electric would be nice if possible. LOL
I would definitely switch to evening hours to save $! No reason to spend money unnecessarily!
One more thing, we have an old Polaris 360 that I have NOT used this year yet. We didn't want to put it into our pool if we had a threat of algae growing. BUT, I did use it last year most likely when we did have stuff growing or lurking. Is it safe to say that whatever MAY have been on or in it, algae wise, would be dead by now? I'd like to use it again eventually but don't want to re-introduce any kind of funkiness, ya know? Thanks!
If you can make a diluted bleach solution and give that good scrub inside/out, you'll be good to go!
I really want to thank you all for all of your help, kind words, and encouragement. Because there definitely were times I was ready to give up. Like yesterday! LOL I am really hoping that things will stay in check this year. I worry like crazy already about having another outbreak like last year that sent our pool into a downward spiral. I had been adding chlorine as normal but then suddenly it just wasn't holding. Anyway, I don't want a repeat of that and hope it all goes well this year. You can be sure I will definitely be up on it. Thanks again!!
You are on the right track! I'm thrilled the forum gave you the support to push through! You can enjoy "trouble-free" liquid crystal this year!
