Salinity (and NOTHING else!)

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OldNick

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Nov 4, 2009
25
OK. I am the guy with the mucky pool.

I have confirmed the fact that the 7800 ppm TDS is salt, using a NaCl-only test strip. I know they are RnR but it's close to my TDS meter reading and so way out of the ball park that it does not matter.

The PH is 7.4 Yay!

But that is jumping about. It was 6.5 a couple of days back. But according to my test kit, the TA is HIGH ????
- however I have dumped a heap (10,000 litres?) of scheme water in there, and that is slightly alkaline.

Everything else is sick.
CYA = 0
TA = 200
PH = 7.4-7.5
Free Cl = 0
Total Cl= 0
- I bought some liquid chlorine only yesterday, to use until my chlorinator arrives
Total Hardness = 800
- I am assuming that this is because the calcium hypochlorite has been used excessively (dozens of 10Kg packs around the place empty.) Just constant powdered chlorine. No filtering, no backwashing. Dump in tonnes of salt, and you have a "salt water pool" :shock:

Now I am assuming (sadly) that the only way to get rid of the salt and Calcium is to dump half the water?

Can I live with the salt and use something else to kill the hardness? I would allow the salt to fall by backwash and *I assume that the chlorinator will also gradually use it up when it makes chlorine that then goes away.

Desperately yours. Help appreciated.
 
OldNick said:
I have confirmed the fact that the 7800 ppm TDS is salt, using a NaCl-only test strip. I know they are RnR but it's close to my TDS meter reading and so way out of the ball park that it does not matter.

Now I am assuming (sadly) that the only way to get rid of the salt and Calcium is to dump half the water?

Can I live with the salt and use something else to kill the hardness? I would allow the salt to fall by backwash and *I assume that the chlorinator will also gradually use it up when it makes chlorine that then goes away.
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What kind of chlorinator are you planning to install? Some SWGs don't have an upper level on the amount of salt in the pool. But since your Calcium Hardness is also approximately double the concentration necessary, doing a 60-70% drain and refill is probably the best choice. You mentioned "scheme water" and this is a new term for me. Be sure whatever you use for make-up (fill) water is reasonably low in CH.

A SWCG won't use up the salt. Only backwashing, overflow, spash-out and draining/refilling will reduce the salt and calcium levels.
 
Thanks for the reply.

I am awaiting delivery of a SWG. There is one there now but it's a joke for the size of the pool, from all I have read and been told. It is also in pretty bad shape and very old.

So no chemical to lower CH? :x

Scheme water = tap water, from the town mains. I will do a hardness test on it :(
If that's no good I will just have to drain and wait for next winter, arranging a huge catchment from roofs and things.

Come to think of it, dumping 50 Kl of water goes against my feelings so much I may just do that anyway. We are on watering restrictions: twice a week only and just yet moving into Summer.
 
OldNick said:
So no chemical to lower CH?

Come to think of it, dumping 50 Kl of water goes against my feelings so much I may just do that anyway. We are on watering restrictions: twice a week only and just yet moving into Summer.
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I'm not a chemist, but no chemical or process other than draining that I'm familiar with will deplete calcium.

Perhaps you could perform partial drain/refills?
 
HAH! I have already been doing that, trying to get rid of the suspended calcium.

A lot of it is suspended calcium, but I have learned that the beginnings of algae can cause cloudiness as well. It's really difficult to tell, because the water was clear, but with huge deposits of stuff on the walls and bottom. Not scale so much as just stuck dust. I clouded it all up again by stirring the water, then keep filtering. But I am only getting an hour out of the filter before it goes into the red and I have to backwash.

The stuff that was there before settled pretty quick, so it may be algae. I am going to shock with liquid chlorine and see what happens.

I guess the thing to do is drain half, then just treat that, saving chemicals. Whether I refill or not is in the lap of the gods right now. Toss a coin. :(
 
You could get a "SlimeBag" to attach to a backwash hose to put the water back into the pool. That's what I'm going to do as soon as finances allow. Money, now, being used on new much bigger filter and flex hoses and fittings. I have to backwash, typically, every 2-3 days, because my old filter is so way undersized. And using cellulose, that filters so well, the filter fills up much faster than with DE and requires more backwash time to clean out filter.

The bag will pay for itself pretty quickly especially if your cost of water is high.

http://www.cleanerpools.net/

gg=alice
 
OK. I am assuming that the stuff that is deposited on the pool is calcium. I am going to shock the pool to see if any of the cloudiness is the beginnings of other stuff.

To avoid dumping so much water, does anyone know the dangers of having a high calcium level? My plan is to shock, floc, and then vacuum straight to waste because I have to dump water, and this will not keep blocking the filter every 5 minutes while at least achieving removal of the settled grit. So I will be dumping quite a bit of water (unknown of course), But what happens if the salt and calcium are say 1.5 times too high? If I can clear the pool and get the CYA, chlorine and TA levels and PH OK, but a bit too salty and with high CH, what dangers should I be looking at?

Also, does anyone have a rough "formula" for using alum to flocculate?
 

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OldNick said:
OK. I am assuming that the stuff that is deposited on the pool is calcium. I am going to shock the pool to see if any of the cloudiness is the beginnings of other stuff.

To avoid dumping so much water, does anyone know the dangers of having a high calcium level? My plan is to shock, floc, and then vacuum straight to waste because I have to dump water, and this will not keep blocking the filter every 5 minutes while at least achieving removal of the settled grit. So I will be dumping quite a bit of water (unknown of course), But what happens if the salt and calcium are say 1.5 times too high? If I can clear the pool and get the CYA, chlorine and TA levels and PH OK, but a bit too salty and with high CH, what dangers should I be looking at?

Also, does anyone have a rough "formula" for using alum to flocculate?
Click to expand...
High Calcium Hardness (CH) affects water balance and can lead to calcium deposits on walls, equipment and tile. You can get a good idea of the water balance by entering test results and pool size into the Pool Calculator. A high salt level is potentially corrosive to metals it comes into contact with: pool equipment (including heaters & ladders), concrete and plaster, and coping.

Sorry, I don't know of a formula for using alum as flocculate nor of its advisability.


CH - Calcium Hardness

Calcium hardness indicates the amount of calcium in the water. Over time, water with low calcium levels will tend to dissolve calcium out of plaster, pebble, tile, stone, concrete, and to some extent fiberglass surfaces. You can prevent this from happening by keeping the water saturated with calcium.

A plaster pool should have CH levels between 250 and 350 if possible. CH contributes to the CSI which indicates the tendency for paster [sic] damage or calcium scaling. You lower calcium by replacing water.
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I figure the way this pool has been treated, I can't do too much harm with a few weeks of gradual lowering of the salt and calcium by natural attrition.

So. Flocculate and vacuum.CYA then shock. I am not going to throw away water. If it goes pear-shaped then so be it.
 
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