Cloudy with a chance of birds

[thewags]

Hi! I have a new 15' x 48" Intex frame pool. We have had a 12' ring pool for 5 years and just upgraded to the biggest our little lot and city regs will allow. All was going swimmingly (sorry) until two weeks ago when I tore a tendon in my arm. Nightly skimming and bleach toting became difficult. We started getting cloudy, algae bloomish water three days ago. I was tossing in bleach, 1/2 gal at a time (4000gal) and it is gone by morning. Despite great success with bleach in the past, I weakened and bought some powdered HTH stuff from Walmart Friday. I bought a 1lb bag of shock and some 1" dual tablets (currently no Cya in pool).

According to the directions on the shock, for my 4000 gallon pool I needed 1/5lb. That got me to 2ppm. So I added another 1/5 which brought me to 5ppm. Two hours later (early evening) it was down to .5ppm. I added another 1/5. All in all I used the whole lb in 12 hours and still have dropping readings and a cloudy pool. I've disolved two 1" tablets in two days, but get nothing reading on a Cya test. I am concerned that the chemical set may be too old.

So while I am battling this chlorine eating monster, a bird decides to commit suicide in the pool (between 12pm and 5pm)

At 6pm I dumped a gallon of 5.25% bleach in. FC tested over 5, which was enough for me (need to dilute for higher readings). At 9pm it was still over 5ppm. How long do I need to keep the levels high? I have an old drop test 6 way kit, with new ph and cl solutions. Those are really the only ones I trust. PH was 7.2 this morning, above 7.8 now. Do I need to be concerned with this now, or can I wait and settle that after I stablize the CL levels? I haven't dealt with a dead critter previously, and am concerned this happened when the CL was nil.

Thanks for any help!

Tracy

 

[thewags]

FC is now 3ppm, I will add two cups of bleach in before calling it quits for the night.

 

[crek31]

Double check, but I think your gallons are more like 5300 not 4000.

 

[crek31]

I just read your post more carefully. It seems to me like you are not using enough bleach due to underestimating your volume, and thus you have algae. You need to shock it with chlorine bleach (can anyone else lug the jugs?) and keep it at shock level until:
You lose less than 1 FC overnight;
You CC of .5 or less; AND
Your water is clear

This will be hard to do without an FAS-DPD test kit like is sold at TFtestkits. I can tell you that once you have one of these you will never want to guess at your numbers again -- the absolute best pool accessory in my opinion. Apparently you made it five seasons without it, but perhaps you never got to the point of needing to shock before? Anyway, if possible get a test kit (at least the FAS-DPD if you don't want the full set) and regardless, get a bunch more bleach in the pool. My guess is ignore the bird issue -- you need to get to shock level to kill the algae and that will take care of any bird issue (I'm assuming he's out of the pool now?)

Hopefully an actual pro will offer some help soon, but I think you need to get your CYA to 30 or so (I'd use stabilizer or dichlor) and get your FC to shock level asap. You can go to the Pool Calculator and plug in the diameter and actual water depth to figure your gallons. Then plug that into the Pool Calculator to figure out how much bleach to add. Hope the arm feels better soon.

 

[Bama Rambler]

The problem with having zero CYA in a outdoor pool, is that if it gets any sun at all your FC will be gone in short order.

Bring your CYA up to 30. You can use the pool calc to figure where you are now by going to the effects of adding chems and putting what you've added already in there and adding them together.

The 6-way is an ok kit for what it is, but if your's is old I'd suggest you invest in at least the TF-50. It gives you the FAS-DPD and will last you a long time.

I calculated your pool at about 4500 gallons and Intex lists it as 4440 on their website. I'd start using 4400 in the pool calc from now on.

 

[thewags]

Thank you for the correction on my pool volume. I am a little underfilled but based on test readings it makes sense that it's higher than 4000.

How many 1" pucks of HTH dual would it take to raise CYA to 30-40? (I need to order new CYA tests). Do I need to buy separate stablizer? I thought I was being clever...

(Trichloro-s-Triazinetrione 93.5%
Copper Sulfate Pentahydrate 1.5%)

 

[Terry]

Since you need to shock, and you need CYA, I would use dichlor. Two 16 oz bags should raise your cya to 28. I don't believe walmart carries dichlor so you will need to go to a pool store- or maybe HD or Lowes. The cya in the dichlor will dissolve quicker than the granular cya.

Since you have minimal cya in the pool currently, you should not put the full 1 lb bag in the pool at once. I would not put any more than 1/2 the bag, maybe a little less (assuming you currently have very little to no chlorine in the pool). Keep watch on the chlorine level and when it drops add more. Pool calc says 1 lb will add 15 ppm to your pool- add more accordingly. You will probably go through both bags in short order, once you do, switch to chlorine if you need to continue shocking.

With a cya of ~30 you can continue using your pucks while your arm heals. Just keep an eye on the cya level. Leslie's will sell you a large jug of cya reagent for about 20.00. Eventually you are going to need to abandon the pucks, OR be willing to replace some water. It's possible that with splashout the water replacement will occur naturally. However, this takes a close watch on the cya levels. Oh, and the HTH pucks have copper in them. Copper levels will build in your pool over time. You can get 99% trichlor pucks with no copper- though probably not at walmart.

 

[Bama Rambler]

From my calcs you've added 1 lb of shock and some trichlor. So you already have some CYA in there. What's the ingredients on the bag of shock? Tell us that and how much trichlor you've added and we can tell you about how much CYA you should have already and how much you need to add.

Don't use the trichlor with copper. I agree with Terry that using dichlor would be better.

 

[thewags]

1lb HTH Shock:
Calcium Hypochlorite 47.6%
Other Ingredients 52.4%
Minimum Available Chlorine 45%

3 1" pucks of HTH Dual action
(Trichloro-s-Triazinetrione 93.5%
Copper Sulfate Pentahydrate 1.5%)

I am guessing maybe a ~12-18 on CYA? (6ppm per dose? I read that somewhere but can't find a good source for it)


Check the FC at lunctime, down to 2, bumped it back up to 10.

 

[zea3]

The HTH shock you used is cal-hypo, no CYA in that. Maybe CYA 18 based on your puck use. The copper will stain the pool eventually so don't use that anymore either.

 

[Bama Rambler]

Since you've only used 1" pucks you haven't added very much at all. I'm calculating about 3ppm. So lets call it zero.

I'll stick by the Dichlor recommendation for adding CYA. 2lbs will raise your CYA by 27ppm and 3lbs will raise it by 41. I'd start with 2 lbs and see how it affects your FC usage.

 

[thewags]

Aye aye. Off to the stores. Thanks!