Too much Chlorine with generator OFF !

[DFarnesi]

Dear All -

I have had this pool for 1 1/2 years. When it was brand new I was running the pumps 6 hrs / day and the Intellichlor generator at 60% to get enough cholorination and was even adding a tablespoon or two per week of ChlorBrite from Leslie Pools. I test the water with test strips and at the store once a month. And I still had trouble getting the Chlorine level up above 0.5 to 1.

For some reason, now, the past 3 months, it has been OVER- chlorinated - running at 10 or above at the highest end of the test strips. I have progressively turned down the chlorinator and the pump run time to now about an hour per day and for the past 4 weeks shut the IC20 down to 0% and it's still at > 10 ! It's SUPER -chlorinated and I don't know what else to do !

Alkalinity, Cyanuric Acid, etc are all good. Calcium hardness is a little bit high but they told me at the store not enough to worry about. It was at 500 6 months ago but I drained it partially and now it's lower.

Here's the printout and what the intellichlor looks like now when running at 0% on the program. Attachments.



If anyone has any suggestions as to why I'm over-chlorinated now I would really appreciate it ! We have not added any chlorine powder or tablets in 4 months now. And this thing has been shut off at least a month now!

Thank you !

 

[Texas Splash]

Hi Darren, and welcome to TFP! So, let me give it to you straight .. :blah: :blah: ….. you're not testing your water properly and I suspect the results are misleading you. There, I said it. Here's what we do … coach you through better pool care by owner-user home testing …. the right way. Strips are horrible, plain & simple. Pool store testing is often flawed and backed-up by over-priced products you normally don't need. I would suggest you do the following right away:
1. Obtain either a TF-100 (link below) or Taylor K-2006C test kit for your own. They are the only two kits we recommend that are easy and accurate. VERY accurate. Home testing is easy. You also should consider a good salt test kit from TFTestkits.net as well (TF-100 link below).
2. Read our ABCs of Pool Water Chemistry page and make sure to read/save all those Vital Links below in my signature.

With that as a starting point, I'll give you a few other things to ponder:
- Don't add anything else to your water right now. Especially no pool store products.
- The FC should begin to drop unless the % is too high and/or the pump run time is excessive. Since you appear to have reduced those previously, it's possible something is faulty. This is where a "proper" test kit and good salt test kit of your own would be beneficial to confirm. FC will not climb or stay the same unless chlorine is being added or produced.
- If you look at our [FC/CYA][/FC/CYA], your FC is on the high side, but not so extreme that any damage is being done. However that bubble cover may be impeding some of the oxidation and FC burn-off. You might consider pulling it back for a couple hours each day to let the water breath and oxidized products dissipate.

Darren, we can't emphasize enough about the proper test kit. We've all been there which is why we are at TFP now. Once you take that step, you'll wonder why you never did it before. Take a look at everything and let us know if you have any more questions.

 

[DFarnesi]

OK thank you very much for your advice. I'm ordering the TF-100 kit now. However, I'm a little surprised that you have such a low opinion of water testing at stores. Incidentally because the test strips and the store testing have always been fairly similar I've never questioned its accuracy. But in their defense I will say that they recommended no new products for this chlorine problem. And in fact invited me back with my salt generator to have them test it if just shutting it off didn't work. I'm going to leave it off for another two weeks and see where I end up. By then I'll have the new test kit. But my gut feeling tells me something else is wrong. I've been reducing the cholrinator output and run time for months now and for at least 4 weeks now it's been at 0%. It just doesn't make sense !

 

[JamesW]

Definitely get the TF-100. You need to test frequently (daily, until you get the chlorine dialed in). The fasdpd test kit can test well above 10 ppm. Your chlorine is probably way higher than 10 ppm. You need to know exactly how high it is.

 

[duraleigh]

As you are getting this sorted out, keep this in the back of all your thinking.......chlorine can NEVER increase in a pool unless you put more in there. Left alone, chlorine can ONLY go down......not even stay the same but go down. It is constantly being consumed and will not stop being consumed until it is depleted.

I'm a little surprised that you have such a low opinion of water testing at stores.

Continue to read on this forum and you will see 12+ years of misleading and inaccurate pool store testing. I used to give them the benefit of the doubt but no longer.

Most of us that have been on the forum a while simply ignore any pool store test results.....it is that bad

 

[DFarnesi]

wow - good to know! Thank you! Yeah I really DO know this about Chlorine, that is why I'm so baffled. I even asked my neighbor if she was surreptitiously lobbing chlorine tablets over the fence - ha, ha ! But she wasn't....