My Black Pool is now Green and holding

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moneytastesbad

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Jun 16, 2009
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Due to not getting my cover on last fall until late October, combined with the giant Oak and Tulip Poplar trees within 15 feet of my pool, when I uncovered this spring (sometime around April 20) it was totally black. It looked like a freakin' mirror it was so black.

Using my TF test kit and following the directions on the post about clearing up a swamp, I managed to get it from black to green within a few days. However, it has been several weeks and there has not been much progress since then. I am able to clearly see about a foot or so down in the pool (along the sides), and I can see a dark spot in the shallow end when I use the net/vacuum/brush, but the change over the past few weeks has been minimal.

I would estimate there were about 8 inches of leaves in the pool when I opened, but I have gotten most of them out. I know there are still some leaves in the deep end, but because I can't see them, it is very difficult to retrieve them.

My test results today were:

FC - 4
CC - .5
TA - 70
PH - 7.4ish (I'm not a good judge of color on the PH test)

I didn't test the CYA, but it has been holding steady at around 30-40.

Backwashing:

I was backwashing several times a day, but due to a lack of rain and my home water source being a well, my water level is pretty low so after reading on this site that you only need to backwash when the pressure reaches 6-10 psi above normal, I have reduced the frequency. The crazy thing is, my normal psi last year was around 20-22 (with the heater connected) and when I first started this spring it was at about the same psi (without the heater), however over the past two weeks the average psi has dropped to about 15?!?!

Anyway, does anyone have any advice?


Thanks,

Travis
 
When the filter pressure goes down like that it is usually caused by some kind of suction side blockage, perhaps some leaves stuck in the pipe from the skimmer, or blocking the main drain (if you have one). What kind of water flow are you getting out of the returns?

Getting as much of the solid material as you possibly can out is crucial. If you can run a leaf rake across the bottom of the deep end and it comes up with more than two or three leaves then you need to keep doing that as much as you possibly can.

The other question is how methodical have you been about keeping the FC level up around 20? How many times per day have you been raising FC up? A related question is how much FC loss do you have overnight?
 
JasonLion said:
When the filter pressure goes down like that it is usually caused by some kind of suction side blockage, perhaps some leaves stuck in the pipe from the skimmer, or blocking the main drain (if you have one). What kind of water flow are you getting out of the returns?
Click to expand...

I do have a main drain and I try to brush it daily to keep debris off of it.

The return flow seem the same as I remember it from the past.


JasonLion said:
Getting as much of the solid material as you possibly can out is crucial. If you can run a leaf rake across the bottom of the deep end and it comes up with more than two or three leaves then you need to keep doing that as much as you possibly can.
Click to expand...

Uuuuggghhhh!!! :x

JasonLion said:
The other question is how methodical have you been about keeping the FC level up around 20? How many times per day have you been raising FC up? A related question is how much FC loss do you have overnight?
Click to expand...

For the first week and a half I was very diligent about keeping it up. After that I have been slacking. To be honest I hadn't even tested in about 6 days until today. With that said, it is holding FC pretty well. When I last tested (about 6 or so days ago) it was at 10. I added 2 gal of Liquid Chlorine, and it was at 4 today, and this is after several days of 80+ degree weather.

I have never done a Overnight FC test, mainly because my mornings are so hectic that I dont have time until late morning after the sunshine has been on the pool for a few hours. I will try to make test it tonight.

Also, FYI, after getting my results today I addes 10 (96 oz) jugs of bleach and 13.5 lbs of Baking Soda in hopes of raising my FC to 20 and my TA to 100.



PS Thanks so much to all the contributors on this site. You are an invaluable source and I try to spread the gospel of TFP everywhere. I have even convinced one of the local pool stores to start checking out and recommending this site.
 
madwil said:
first, your FC is low for shocking... if your CYA is 30-40, 4ppm FC is good maintainance level, but not shock level; need to get to 12-16 for shocking, and the green should disappear soon and the clouds will filter out!

turning-your-green-swamp-back-into-a-sparking-oasis-t4147.html

Once again, Jason is the quicker typist!
Click to expand...


I guess I left some info out of my original post, but I was keeping FC around 20 until this past week when I started slacking a little. So even at that level, which I pretty much maintained for 2 weeks, it was not clearing up as quick as I expected.

So far I have added 12 gals of Liquid Chlorine, about 85 (96 oz) jugs of bleach and 22 (1.42 gal) jugs of bleach.
 
JasonLion said:
When the filter pressure goes down like that it is usually caused by some kind of suction side blockage, perhaps some leaves stuck in the pipe from the skimmer, or blocking the main drain (if you have one). What kind of water flow are you getting out of the returns?
Click to expand...


You helped me solve this problem. I just checked the filter basket in pump and, although I couldn't see it through the cover, when I went to pull it out, it held water like a bucket. There was a ton of tiny Crud that had completely blocked the basket.

After spraying it out and restarting the pump, pressure went back up to 22 psi.


THANKS!!!
 
I'd be very interested to know the results of an overnight FC loss test.

From what you said, you can't be losing chlorine too quickly, or you would have gone to FC of zero some time ago. That suggests that there is very little still alive in the water, it just isn't clearing up completely. If I'm reading everything correctly, now would be a good time to try using some DE in the filter or possibly some clarifier and see if either of those help.
 
I will do the Overnight test tonight and post the results in the morning.

Also, as far as backwashing, should I wait till the psi raises or what?

And lastly, I know nothing at all about using DE. Can you point me to a link where I can learn more about it?
 

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So, my test this morning showed I have a FC of 11, so I had an overnight loss of 2. However, it is quite possible that we had some rain last night.

Also, will solids in the pool effect the FC loss? Like I said, I know there are more leaves in there. I keep trying to get them with the net, but I know I don't have them all out yet. Not to mention, I think the storm last evening blew some more stuff in because there were lots of small leaves and petals in my chairs which are only about 15 feet or so away from the pool.
 
I actually asked if rain would effect FC last night, and was told that it would:

http://www.troublefreepool.com/overnight-fc-test-in-the-rain-t31324.html

I assumed that it would based on the logic that any time you add non chlorinated water to chlorinated water it would dilute the strength of the chlorine.


For example, if you have 1,000,000 widgets and 10 of them are black, you have 10 ppm black widgets. If you add 100,000 more widgets and none of them are black, you now have a lower ppm black widgets.

Add to this logic the fact that rain is not 100% H2O, and that you are adding things to the water that the chlorine will go after, it will reduce the FC level even more.

Does this make sense? Am I on the right track here?
 
It is more than rain usually means wind and both rain and win bring organic debris along with them. It is the organic debris, more than the water that causes FC to fall. Rain won't always lower the FC level, but occasionally a storm will lower FC quite a bit. Thus you can't count on the overnight test, even though you might be alright.
 
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