I hate to rain on the parade, but you should not turn on the SWG for 24 hours after adding salt (unless your manual says differently).
Forming a Plan of Attack
- Thread starter DirtyRat91
- Start date
- Jul 21, 2013
- 52,480
- Pool Size
- 35000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
Can you provide a reference for that? What SWG manufacturers have that caution in their manual?
My manual is below. Please note that I did say “unless his/her manual states differently.”
- Jul 21, 2013
- 52,480
- Pool Size
- 35000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
Thanks. That is interesting.
I think what more needs to be emphasized is to run your pool pump for 24 hours after adding the salt to the pool. Many folks have their pool pumps on timers and they run for only a partial day. I think just about all the SWG manuals say to circulate the water for 24 hours after adding salt. It is interesting that your SWG manual sort of implies having pump on for 24 hours since turning pump on is Step 1 and then Step 7 says 24 hours later to turn on SWG. I am not sure many folks with pumps on timers would recognize that subtlety.
Read that hours after I turned it on, seems to be doing fine though.
10 FC
2 CC
At 6:30 AM next morning. I'm off to the beach, I'll play it safe at 50% even though it won't be able to keep up fighting sun and algae. Be back Sun evening.
10 FC
2 CC
At 6:30 AM next morning. I'm off to the beach, I'll play it safe at 50% even though it won't be able to keep up fighting sun and algae. Be back Sun evening.
Update: Got back from the beach at 6 PM today, found a lot of air coming out of the return. I'd love to understand exactly what is going here, but basically a backflush restored my filter operation. Clearly we're making progress, as I'm having to blackwash the filter frequently. Most times I check the sand filter has a whooshing air bubble sound in it. Backwashing restores quiet operation. I didn't expect it to get as bad as it did, but the pump struggling to keep the filter basket 1/2 full of water, a lot of air in the basket, and turbulent air/water in the SWG cell. I knew better than to leave the new SWG alone unattended for so long during its initial conquests, but it must have been doing a solid job as chlorine levels read:
6.5 FC
1 CC
I dosed a 1/3 gallon of 10% to help the SWG out, and I'll keep an eye on the filter. I don't have pressure #s as my gauge is reading incorrectly. Keeps reading about 25 after a backwash, normally reads around 10 psi on a new gauge. I've replaced the gauge several times now, keeps getting to high off pressures (as opposed to 0), and then it is unreliable. Unsure of best gauge practices. Probably shouldn't leave it outside during the winter, but I stopped removing it as I had to replace the multi-port valve one time due to a leak at the gauge threads. The valve housing cracked near the threads.
Pool clarity is again subjective, but I can make out pine needles on the floor step, and can actually see a blue net when I'm skimming for floor trash now. Assuming I see further progress I'm of the opinion I'll fill the pool tomorrow and start adding CYA. Then with the skimmer back operational I'll do a full vacuum and accelerate the cleaning process. I believe this SLAM is taking longer than any before as I still haven't vacuumed, and am at the mercy of the bleach to sanitize all the floor trash before the water will clear up. My floor net grabbing are no longer dripping green stink, another sign of progress.
6.5 FC
1 CC
I dosed a 1/3 gallon of 10% to help the SWG out, and I'll keep an eye on the filter. I don't have pressure #s as my gauge is reading incorrectly. Keeps reading about 25 after a backwash, normally reads around 10 psi on a new gauge. I've replaced the gauge several times now, keeps getting to high off pressures (as opposed to 0), and then it is unreliable. Unsure of best gauge practices. Probably shouldn't leave it outside during the winter, but I stopped removing it as I had to replace the multi-port valve one time due to a leak at the gauge threads. The valve housing cracked near the threads.
Pool clarity is again subjective, but I can make out pine needles on the floor step, and can actually see a blue net when I'm skimming for floor trash now. Assuming I see further progress I'm of the opinion I'll fill the pool tomorrow and start adding CYA. Then with the skimmer back operational I'll do a full vacuum and accelerate the cleaning process. I believe this SLAM is taking longer than any before as I still haven't vacuumed, and am at the mercy of the bleach to sanitize all the floor trash before the water will clear up. My floor net grabbing are no longer dripping green stink, another sign of progress.
You should not be seeing CC levels that high. So that could point to something in the water
You suggesting something more than algae? The pool still has a green tint. Haven't broken past the color hurdle yet. I'm encouraged, and again, I think if I vacuumed the bottom and backwashed the filth out of the filter that would accelerate toward a end of FC consumption.
Didn't see the progress I hoped overnight despite having 16 FC last night, and 15 FC again this morning when I checked. I've got a SJ-40 SWG running at 75% to treat roughly 4500 gallons of water. So I've put the filling the pool idea on the back burner, to keep chlorine ratios in my favor.
I decided to get creative instead, my pole vac normally attaches to the skimmer via a large cone that fits over the skimmer basket. However the skimmer is obviously still dry, and my cone's O-ring is all but gone. Works fine as long as it is under water, but I need an air tight seal. The end of the hose has a pipe end about the same size of the pipe down inside the skimmer hole. The hole in the skimmer is perhaps 1/8" larger than the pipe end of the hose. There is about a 3/4" recess in the skimmer before my vac hose pipe hits the pipe running to the pump. I didn't have a suitable O-ring to try to fill that 1/8" gap. So I grabbed some Saran wrap and built up a steep taper on the end of my vac hose pipe end. This fit fairly snug in the skimmer hole. It wasn't perfect, so I added a garden hose on top to keep the joint underwater. Any small leak would only draw more water to keep the pump happy. I was able to throttle open the skimmer PVC ball valve enough to let the pump suck out the hose air, then it was drawing pool water through the vac. Success!
I vacuumed the dark sections of the pool floor, and completely plugged the sand filter 3x, and packed the pump basket full of pine needles 2.5 times as well. I'm hoping that this floor debris has been acting as a bit of a chlorine sponge, and now the chlorine can work more on suspended life in the water than all the trash laying inside. Still has a pale green/yellowish hue and very limited visibility. Again, roughly 18" of water and I can barely make out the vacuum head.
I decided to get creative instead, my pole vac normally attaches to the skimmer via a large cone that fits over the skimmer basket. However the skimmer is obviously still dry, and my cone's O-ring is all but gone. Works fine as long as it is under water, but I need an air tight seal. The end of the hose has a pipe end about the same size of the pipe down inside the skimmer hole. The hole in the skimmer is perhaps 1/8" larger than the pipe end of the hose. There is about a 3/4" recess in the skimmer before my vac hose pipe hits the pipe running to the pump. I didn't have a suitable O-ring to try to fill that 1/8" gap. So I grabbed some Saran wrap and built up a steep taper on the end of my vac hose pipe end. This fit fairly snug in the skimmer hole. It wasn't perfect, so I added a garden hose on top to keep the joint underwater. Any small leak would only draw more water to keep the pump happy. I was able to throttle open the skimmer PVC ball valve enough to let the pump suck out the hose air, then it was drawing pool water through the vac. Success!
I vacuumed the dark sections of the pool floor, and completely plugged the sand filter 3x, and packed the pump basket full of pine needles 2.5 times as well. I'm hoping that this floor debris has been acting as a bit of a chlorine sponge, and now the chlorine can work more on suspended life in the water than all the trash laying inside. Still has a pale green/yellowish hue and very limited visibility. Again, roughly 18" of water and I can barely make out the vacuum head.
Update:
Did a thorough systematic vacuum of the entire pool floor this morning, despite not being able to see what I was doing. Pump basket was packed full of pine needles, and filter was mostly plugged, pump flow was down. Did another vacuum this evening, but only got 1/3 basket full of debris, and filter flow wasn't too bad. Despite thinking that I've got the pool floor mostly cleared, I still see no improvement what so ever in clarity or color.
My initial hope of progress feels like it was just wishful thinking following the placebo of running the SWG for the first time.
Something feels off. I've SLAMed before, and almost always knock the color back to blue after 24 hrs or less. It is still green/yellow, and visibility is almost nonexistent at 18". I can see the head of the vacuum, but only just. Kind of like the CYA test, I'm pretty sure that's a vacuum head down there, but only because I know it is there.
I just checked, I purchased my TF-100 in May of 2014. I've refilled the FC test powder and drips several times, but even my last bottle refill is 2 years old, and claims to have expired in 7/17. Otherwise none of my chemicals have expiration dates. I thought I bought a CYA refill, but I've found no record of that. Is it possible my CYA is higher than I'm reading? I know I dosed to 40-50 CYA last year. Unless something consumed my CYA it shouldn't be gone. Is it possible I'm using more drips to clear the FC test, resulting in a false high reading? Is it possible my PH tests are inaccurate?
What are your experiences with old test chemicals? Inaccurate? I noticed the R-0012 has white flakes suspended in the liquid. Most of the tests I'm doing are giving predicable (expected) results. The FC readings seem to match when I was dosing without the SWG.
I just feel like something isn't quite right, I expected this algae to relent already.
Did a thorough systematic vacuum of the entire pool floor this morning, despite not being able to see what I was doing. Pump basket was packed full of pine needles, and filter was mostly plugged, pump flow was down. Did another vacuum this evening, but only got 1/3 basket full of debris, and filter flow wasn't too bad. Despite thinking that I've got the pool floor mostly cleared, I still see no improvement what so ever in clarity or color.
My initial hope of progress feels like it was just wishful thinking following the placebo of running the SWG for the first time.
Something feels off. I've SLAMed before, and almost always knock the color back to blue after 24 hrs or less. It is still green/yellow, and visibility is almost nonexistent at 18". I can see the head of the vacuum, but only just. Kind of like the CYA test, I'm pretty sure that's a vacuum head down there, but only because I know it is there.
I just checked, I purchased my TF-100 in May of 2014. I've refilled the FC test powder and drips several times, but even my last bottle refill is 2 years old, and claims to have expired in 7/17. Otherwise none of my chemicals have expiration dates. I thought I bought a CYA refill, but I've found no record of that. Is it possible my CYA is higher than I'm reading? I know I dosed to 40-50 CYA last year. Unless something consumed my CYA it shouldn't be gone. Is it possible I'm using more drips to clear the FC test, resulting in a false high reading? Is it possible my PH tests are inaccurate?
What are your experiences with old test chemicals? Inaccurate? I noticed the R-0012 has white flakes suspended in the liquid. Most of the tests I'm doing are giving predicable (expected) results. The FC readings seem to match when I was dosing without the SWG.
I just feel like something isn't quite right, I expected this algae to relent already.
I need to get out there before the sun is setting and get a pic where the color isn't washed out, but the above picture tells a pretty disturbing picture. When I ran my pump with the return in the pic above plugged and the other return piped down to the water level, this return dripped for a while. And it dripped the untreated vile water that I was trying to clean. Well water wise things are looking up. Just tested at the end of a sunny day and I'm at 10 FC and 0 CC. So the SWG + my wife's once daily bleach dose is maintaining high FC levels during the sunlight hours.
But it also just rained a LOT, we got over an inch in less than an hour, so I can see why the color of my water isn't improving much. It appears the liner is heavily dirt stained. It wasn't so obvious until the heavy rain raised the water level above the stain line. And brushing the area below the water line or that line down from the return makes no improvement. Have I permanently dirt stained my bleached out liner?
Water visibility is no longer subjective. I can 'clearly' see the vacuum head on the pool floor, I can finally see the main drain, I can make out the few spots of debris left on the floor. Still got a ways to go, but definitely can see through the water better than before.
But it also just rained a LOT, we got over an inch in less than an hour, so I can see why the color of my water isn't improving much. It appears the liner is heavily dirt stained. It wasn't so obvious until the heavy rain raised the water level above the stain line. And brushing the area below the water line or that line down from the return makes no improvement. Have I permanently dirt stained my bleached out liner?
Water visibility is no longer subjective. I can 'clearly' see the vacuum head on the pool floor, I can finally see the main drain, I can make out the few spots of debris left on the floor. Still got a ways to go, but definitely can see through the water better than before.
Put some vitamin C tablets in a sock, get it wet and rub that stain area. Could be iron in which case that is probably what is all over your liner too.
Let us know if you test that and what the results are.
Let us know if you test that and what the results are.
My idea behind leaving the pool level low until it was clear was the reduced need for chemicals. If I treat a 5k gallon pool, 1 gallon of bleach will boost the FC by 20. If I fill to the correct level, it would take almost 3 gallons of bleach to give the same boost. If there is benefit to filling the pool before I'm done SLAMing than I'm open to suggestions. While the skimmer is obviously out of play, I have been netting floating debris regularly, and I've got a work around to use the vacuum even with the skimmer above the water line.
More info on the stain, seems we chucked our Vit C tabs a while ago during a pantry clean up, I'll have to go grab some tomorrow if my plan B didn't yield useful results. I used the peel of a tangerine and rubbed on the stain, and it did absolutely nothing. This may mean nothing at all, not sure how much a orange peel might mimic a Vitamin C tab.
Also, I actually felt the stain during my play time with citrus rubbish, and found it peculiar that the stain is very rough. It feels like quite a bit of build up, brushing is wildly ineffective, as in I don't notice any difference brushing one spot vigorously, but the pool liner is rough as sandpaper where it is stained, and slippery above the stain line. (Stain line was where water line was previously)
I'll need to grab more things in town tomorrow anyhow, depleted the bleach supplies today.
More info on the stain, seems we chucked our Vit C tabs a while ago during a pantry clean up, I'll have to go grab some tomorrow if my plan B didn't yield useful results. I used the peel of a tangerine and rubbed on the stain, and it did absolutely nothing. This may mean nothing at all, not sure how much a orange peel might mimic a Vitamin C tab.
Also, I actually felt the stain during my play time with citrus rubbish, and found it peculiar that the stain is very rough. It feels like quite a bit of build up, brushing is wildly ineffective, as in I don't notice any difference brushing one spot vigorously, but the pool liner is rough as sandpaper where it is stained, and slippery above the stain line. (Stain line was where water line was previously)
I'll need to grab more things in town tomorrow anyhow, depleted the bleach supplies today.
Looks like metal stains I guess. Grabbed some Airborne (my bleach outlet, Ollie's, didn't havd straight Vitamin C). Airborne tabs were 25% Vitamin C (1000 mg, 4 gram tablets). Held one tab against a stain on the wall, let another rest on the floor. Results were dramatic. Completely cleaned the wall spot, no more rough, but smooth clean vinal.
Nearby I dumped some 65% chlorine granular, the spot where it rested and the spot I scrubbed with a filled sock made no improvement. Rules out organic stains. Not sure if any of this disproves calcium scaling issues.
Clarity is still very slowly improving. While there's still an off color, I feel a lot of it is from these stains. CC numbers are often below 1. Will reorder some test supplies today, so that when I aim to finish the SLAM I can be sure of what I'm reading.
Regarding the metal staining, where's a good source for the AA? And does this mean I need to constantly maintain a sequestrant level in the pool to keep metal staining from reappearing. Sort of surprised by this result as my fill water is treated city water. And my filter setup is nearly metal free. Only pump and SWG cell are known metals in my pool.
These pics don't show full impact of the Vitamin C tabs, it really was stark. I put the chlorine "upstream" of this spot, and it cloudied the water, diminishing the obvious improvement the tabs made.
Nearby I dumped some 65% chlorine granular, the spot where it rested and the spot I scrubbed with a filled sock made no improvement. Rules out organic stains. Not sure if any of this disproves calcium scaling issues.
Clarity is still very slowly improving. While there's still an off color, I feel a lot of it is from these stains. CC numbers are often below 1. Will reorder some test supplies today, so that when I aim to finish the SLAM I can be sure of what I'm reading.
Regarding the metal staining, where's a good source for the AA? And does this mean I need to constantly maintain a sequestrant level in the pool to keep metal staining from reappearing. Sort of surprised by this result as my fill water is treated city water. And my filter setup is nearly metal free. Only pump and SWG cell are known metals in my pool.
These pics don't show full impact of the Vitamin C tabs, it really was stark. I put the chlorine "upstream" of this spot, and it cloudied the water, diminishing the obvious improvement the tabs made.
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