2gal of 10% bleach/day...Does this seem like too much?

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J4CKBOLT

J4CKBOLT

0
May 22, 2016
109
Friendswood/TX
The past 6 weeks I have had to put 2gallons of 10% bleach in the pool every day to maintain FC. I do not have any CC and have run the OCLT several times just to see if I might have algae, I don’t. Water looks great so I am happy with the outcome but 14gallons of bleach every week is getting a little tiresome to buy, lug around, pour into pool and put empties in trash.

I see others on TFP talk about losing 2-4ppm chlorine per day and adding maybe 1/2 gal of bleach per day. Just wondering if my situation is typical given my variables below or if I am missing something. According to my PoolMath app, I am loosing about 8ppm every day to sun (no algae). Wow!

I am near Houston TX. Super hot, 95degF daily highs. Pool in full sun all day. Water temps can reach 92degF during late afternoon. CYA kept at 50. Calm to slight breeze. No significant rain. I have a waterfall and fountains that run 15min/day. Main pump circulates 24/7. Pool vol between 25k-27k gallons. Light blue plaster color. Keep FC at 6ppm or higher. Add bleach in mornings before sun out.

Thoughts? Anyone from hot locations like TX, Arizona, Florida, etc... have to add 2gallons of 10% daily? Anyone losing 8ppm per day to sun?
 
Jack,

Sounds way too high to me.. As you say, most pools only use 2 to 4 ppm of FC per day.. You are using about 8 ppm per day.

Assuming the results of your OCLT are zero, that just leaves a couple of options... Your CYA is not near 50 as you believe, or your bleach is not near 10% like you believe.

I would do two things.. Jack the CYA up to 60 and as a test, buy some 12.5% liquid Chlorine at a pool store and see what happens.

Have you ever poured in a gallon of your 10% and then tested again in half an hour to see if the increase is what you expected??

Sorry I don't know the answer, but there is no way you should be using 8 ppm of FC per day.

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
I think you’re wise to test whether your chlorine gets you up to target.

I run a saltwater chlorine generator, so I keep My CYA a little higher. A few weeks ago, though, I noticed that despite bumping from 50 to 100 percent generation, my chlorine was dropping rather than maintaining. Sure enough, the extreme UV here in Texas had degraded my CYA by 10 or 20 ppm. (I had also been keeping my chlorine on the high side with liquid supplements because of high use when cousins were visiting, so that may have helped the degradation, too). I ran three overnight tests to be sure I didn’t have algae starting, and they were fine. I bumped the CYA by about 10 ppm (that’s all I had left), and chlorine levels are now holding steady once again. I do still have my generator at 100% instead of 50%, but it’s only for 9 hours a day, so that’s about 3ppm of chlorine. It was 5 ppm a day for a couple of days before I bumped the CYA back up a bit.

You asked for the experiences of others who share your heat and sun, and we were sure feeling it in recent weeks, and my pool felt it, too. CYA definitely matters here, and just a 10 ppm made a definite improvement in my pool.
 
My pool uses about 2 gpd but it is about 3x the volume. I’ would double check the cya value to confirm it is as high as you think it is.

Are you getting bleach in bulk or buying it at the store? Napco?
 
Lap-pool, I was getting chlorine from WalMart but my local stopped carrying it and now just has pucks. I started buying the 3pack gallons from Home Depot a couple weeks ago. The chlorine has a good chemical color and my fingers get that slippery feeling when I touch it. I assume it is still strong and not degraded.
 
J4CKBOLT said:
Lap-pool, I was getting chlorine from WalMart but my local stopped carrying it and now just has pucks. I started buying the 3pack gallons from Home Depot a couple weeks ago. The chlorine has a good chemical color and my fingers get that slippery feeling when I touch it. I assume it is still strong and not degraded.
Click to expand...

What part of Houston are you in? Napco sells the good stuff for $1.81/gal after tax. They are up in Spring. They get a fresh tractor trailer load every day from the chemical producer - so it’s about as fresh as you can buy. No more than 3 days old typically. You can buy up to 100 gal at a time without a special transport permit. Initial investment of about $16/ 5 gal carboy w/ sticker, but after that, the savings add up.
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J4CKBOLT said:
Lap-pool that’s interesting. I’m in Friendswood so Spring is a little far to go for liquid chlorine. Appreciate the info though. I am perfectly fine adding say 1 gallon per day... 2 just seems like a lot to me.
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Yeah - about the same drive for me too (47 Miles each way) - 100 gal trips every other month is tolerable, but it would be nicer if it were closer.
 
Jimrahbe said:
Have you ever poured in a gallon of your 10% and then tested again in half an hour to see if the increase is what you expected??.
Click to expand...

You would do this test after the sun has set.

Do you know how to read the manufacturing dates on chlorine?

I was grabbing some chlorine off a pallet at Lowe's and, using the date codes, could plainly see how they had piled a bunch of fresh boxes on top of the previous stock. Not only was the older stuff too old, it would stay there until they depleted stock, and some unsuspecting soul would end up with the bottom layer...

So some of the big box stores store it poorly (like out in the hot outdoor area), and don't rotate it, either. I doubt they even know it expires...
 
Dirk...no I have not been checking dates. I read something about it a while back in this forum but did not pay attention. The ones I just bought at Home Depot we the last, no longer in the original boxes and covered in dust. Hmmm [emoji15]. I may have been the “sucker”. Yikes.
 
J4CKBOLT said:
Dirk...no I have not been checking dates. I read something about it a while back in this forum but did not pay attention. The ones I just bought at Home Depot we the last, no longer in the original boxes and covered in dust. Hmmm [emoji15]. I may have been the “sucker”. Yikes.
Click to expand...

Here is an older TFP article. I'm assuming this is accurate info. (Guys, can someone else confirm that?)

It explains the date code, by brand. And even explains how to test your current batch.

Chlorine Date Code Decoder/Easy Way to Measure Strength.
 
Two months old. Not bad. But... Two months at HD could be an eternity. Someone here schooled me once: the date is one factor, but sometimes the least important. How the chlorine was stored is a bigger issue. Out in the sun? Or in the hottest part of the store or landscaping area. Etc. So there's that.

And the "twilight" test Jim gave you is only as accurate as the volume number you plug in to Pool Math. Are you confident in your number? So there's that.

You do the best you can, when troubleshooting. Similar to buying a second set of reagents, you could buy chlorine from a completely different source, different brand, and see if that tells you anything.

Are you confident you're doing the test correctly? I was unknowingly testing salt incorrectly for at least a month before someone here spotted what I was doing wrong. I had the wrong multiplication factor, so the result was 50% off.
 

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