First of all let me say thanks to a great site and all the great advice and tools. I found this site a couple of years ago after becoming very frustrated with taking care of my second pool and having it turn green far too often. Our first above ground 24ftx4ft pool was green once or twice in the 10 years that we had it is all I can remember. Our second pool however, has been green sooo many times it ain't funny. Our first pool dealer was out of business when we bought the second pool so I went with another company. With the first one, they never changed products and each year I got my kit was was pretty good to go for the summer. This other company they change brands and recommendations and young people so I became so frustrated with always having a green pool I surfed. I found this site and got that green pool under control. I followed the 'swamp' article and was good to go. Bought a better Taylor kit and had a good two seasons. Then last year had to do alot of travel and working toooo many hours and just lost my mind and lost this site so we sorta reverted back and lost track. Now after trying to get the swamp under control for a month and not being able to find this site I went through 2 rounds of Yellow Out, shock, granular chlorine and flock. Twice I got it clear, vaccummed it all to waste and thought it was ready. Turned the pump onto filter and it turned green again. During all those chemicals I never filtered, just recirculate, backwash, rinse, waste.
So it turned green and then a hose busted while I was at work this past Thursday. Came home to find the pool drained below the skimmer. Since we got home after the pool stores were closed had to wait til Friday to get new hoses and start refilling the pool. Meantime Thursday and Friday evening I surfed and FINALLY found this site again. Which is now on the desktops of several computers bookmarked! So Saturday morning I was ready to begin the process of turning my swamp back. Pump is back working and water level up. Pump turned on filter and running. First order of business of getting a better test kit and getting bleach. The best kit I would find was the Total Poolcare DPD test kit from Leslie's. They were out of the one on here that is the service one. So I'm ordering the Chlorine only test kit from tfkits tonight. But I need some help now.
Pool: Above Ground 30ft x 4.5 ft deep, vinyl liner, hayward 1.5hp sand filter
On Saturday 11:30 with my new test kit my numbers were:
FC .5
TC .5
CC 0
ph 6.8
TA 50
CH 60
CYA 30
I put 6 jugs - 96oz in the pool I thought from running through the pool calculator and the shock chart on here that my target shock number was 12. I had to run an errand that took a little over an hour so hubby wasn't sure how much needed to be added while I was gone so he added another 2 jugs of 96 oz. When I got back at 1:30 and tested FC was back at .5 6 jugs added.
2:40 FC 1 - 6 jugs added
3:15 FC 5 - 4 jugs added
3:50 FC 6 maybe more pink that 3:15 - 4 jugs
4:15 FC same as above - 3 jugs
4:50 FC looked same as above 4 jugs
5:30 (didn't write it down on my notes but added 6 jugs
6:45 it was magneta decided to see if this was the color in the AM.
Backwashed / rinsed the filter several times during the day for good measure. (My guage has been messed up for awhile so usually I can tell it needs it and I just do it often.)
On Sunday morning
FC wasn't as magenta as it was the night before and the pool still green just not as green as Saturday. So I continued adding bleach every hour. Midmorning, we also brushed everything and decided to remove the wedding cake steps from the pool. When we did we found the cesspool that was hidding under the steps. I was able later to very easily vaccum this stuff out on waste. There's not any big leaves or piles of junk in the pool now. The water color late yesterday afternoon seemed to be a yellow-green. The yellow pollen ring around the water level is now a white powder but the pool is still green. This morning when I tested before leaving for work the pool was down to 1 which is not where I left it last night so I understand that means I still have algae. How I don't know because since Saturday, I've put 52 96oz jugs of bleach in, 10 of the 192oz jugs & 17 of the 128oz jugs .
I can't even get a TA reading. I put the 5 drops that are supposed to turn it green and it turns it aqua blue. I start putting the other drops in and it turns it a yellowish color like bleach.
The FC is more magenta than the PH.
This morning I thought well maybe it's just still stirred up and maybe it really is dead so I'll turn the filter off and let it settle to the bottom then I'll vaccum to waste. Well that didn't help it's still green but I can see the bottom very well. Our eye on the ball was broken so while hubby went to get that I had him have them test the water to see what they tested the water at. He told me they used a strip so I don't know if I believe their test but here's what they said:
CYA 300
TA 40
PH extremely high
FC 10
I have bleach, muratic acid, borax and baking soda on hand. We've got the return 'bubbling' the water now.
Do I need to add the muratic acid to bring the ph down? do I add more bleach tonight and in the morning before work? Once I ever get this pool back clear it will be BBB for me and no more hockey pucks. Sorry for the long book but I figured getting most of the picture might help you help me from here.
Thanks,
cindy
So it turned green and then a hose busted while I was at work this past Thursday. Came home to find the pool drained below the skimmer. Since we got home after the pool stores were closed had to wait til Friday to get new hoses and start refilling the pool. Meantime Thursday and Friday evening I surfed and FINALLY found this site again. Which is now on the desktops of several computers bookmarked! So Saturday morning I was ready to begin the process of turning my swamp back. Pump is back working and water level up. Pump turned on filter and running. First order of business of getting a better test kit and getting bleach. The best kit I would find was the Total Poolcare DPD test kit from Leslie's. They were out of the one on here that is the service one. So I'm ordering the Chlorine only test kit from tfkits tonight. But I need some help now.
Pool: Above Ground 30ft x 4.5 ft deep, vinyl liner, hayward 1.5hp sand filter
On Saturday 11:30 with my new test kit my numbers were:
FC .5
TC .5
CC 0
ph 6.8
TA 50
CH 60
CYA 30
I put 6 jugs - 96oz in the pool I thought from running through the pool calculator and the shock chart on here that my target shock number was 12. I had to run an errand that took a little over an hour so hubby wasn't sure how much needed to be added while I was gone so he added another 2 jugs of 96 oz. When I got back at 1:30 and tested FC was back at .5 6 jugs added.
2:40 FC 1 - 6 jugs added
3:15 FC 5 - 4 jugs added
3:50 FC 6 maybe more pink that 3:15 - 4 jugs
4:15 FC same as above - 3 jugs
4:50 FC looked same as above 4 jugs
5:30 (didn't write it down on my notes but added 6 jugs
6:45 it was magneta decided to see if this was the color in the AM.
Backwashed / rinsed the filter several times during the day for good measure. (My guage has been messed up for awhile so usually I can tell it needs it and I just do it often.)
On Sunday morning
FC wasn't as magenta as it was the night before and the pool still green just not as green as Saturday. So I continued adding bleach every hour. Midmorning, we also brushed everything and decided to remove the wedding cake steps from the pool. When we did we found the cesspool that was hidding under the steps. I was able later to very easily vaccum this stuff out on waste. There's not any big leaves or piles of junk in the pool now. The water color late yesterday afternoon seemed to be a yellow-green. The yellow pollen ring around the water level is now a white powder but the pool is still green. This morning when I tested before leaving for work the pool was down to 1 which is not where I left it last night so I understand that means I still have algae. How I don't know because since Saturday, I've put 52 96oz jugs of bleach in, 10 of the 192oz jugs & 17 of the 128oz jugs .
I can't even get a TA reading. I put the 5 drops that are supposed to turn it green and it turns it aqua blue. I start putting the other drops in and it turns it a yellowish color like bleach.
The FC is more magenta than the PH.
This morning I thought well maybe it's just still stirred up and maybe it really is dead so I'll turn the filter off and let it settle to the bottom then I'll vaccum to waste. Well that didn't help it's still green but I can see the bottom very well. Our eye on the ball was broken so while hubby went to get that I had him have them test the water to see what they tested the water at. He told me they used a strip so I don't know if I believe their test but here's what they said:
CYA 300
TA 40
PH extremely high
FC 10
I have bleach, muratic acid, borax and baking soda on hand. We've got the return 'bubbling' the water now.
Do I need to add the muratic acid to bring the ph down? do I add more bleach tonight and in the morning before work? Once I ever get this pool back clear it will be BBB for me and no more hockey pucks. Sorry for the long book but I figured getting most of the picture might help you help me from here.
Thanks,
cindy