Hello,
I am new to Pool Caring.. I own a 15'(Round) X 4' (Height) Intex swimming pool (Metal Support) that I bought for my girlfriend last year but she is away from home at this time of the year and she will return back to home very soon so I am trying to get pool ready for her. Of course, it was very green and full of algae to start with. Before I proceed to the treatment, I never knew this forum exist and kinda probably a little too late so hope you can still help me??
I should mention I never knew about any chemical stuff or testing kit. I just thought that all I need to do is throw in chlorine(it was shock stuff my girlfriend's sister bought last year) and that is it. OOPS! :-( It seems to work OK last year when I sprinkled it in once every week. Anyway, here it goes.. I sprinkled in half bag of Shock on Thursday for the first time and I used old filter (cleaned it because I am penny pincher and didn't really want to put new filter in until it clears up some). Let the pump run constantly. I started to net some leaves out and I think I did pretty good for Thursday working at it about two hours and got sunburn. Periodically, I check on pump and change filter every few hours. While a "cleaned" filter is in the pump, I clean algae off the other filter so it would be ready to go when I change filter.
Friday morning, I woke up and checked the pool, it was still green. I ran over to Wal-Mart to buy new box of Shock (Aqua Chem) and two new filters then when I got home, I sprinkled one full bag of Shock and replaced the filter with new one. About one hour later, the top surface (about 1 feet) start to clear up but still light green from that point to bottom. Net more leaves out and bugs are starting to surface.. lot of spiders on water too.. got them out. Still have backswimmers(LOT!) and some beetles? Sprinkled another bag of Shock again and changed filter. The first new filter was stuffed with algae and some bugs so I cleaned it out.. Oh yea, I also sprinkled the Shock into the pump when I put filter in both time. In the afternoon (I didn't know sun burns chlorine until I read this forum last night) I came back to the pool and it was Milky looking. At this point, I see the progress so I try to net more leaves but it is scattered all over and I can see many algae divided up into pieces.. Net them out as much as I could.. now I see some tiny tadpole and a lot of "swimming worm"? It seems to move in Figure 8 method so I changed my mind about stepping into the pool to clean. Note: I didn't really scrub(brush) the algae that good compared to Thursday.
At this point, I am not sure if I should throw in Algaecide or maybe get Flocculant and try to vacuum it out? I should mention that my hose is real limited if I am to connect it to the pump but it will suck water/stuff out of the pool if I hook water hose to it. It is cloudy today and rained some but supposed to have cloudy, sunny, and rain today.. I know I will plan on scrub the pool real good trying to keep Algae from growing so I am gonna do that now while I wait for a reply, hopefully!
I know you probably will advise me to get the test kit not from Wal-Mart but the problem is that it is probably too late to order the Testing Kit online as I need to keep hammering the algae before it grows back. Probably get a cheap testing kit at Wal-Mart for time being just to see if I can get the milky down..
Thanks in advance for answering..
I am new to Pool Caring.. I own a 15'(Round) X 4' (Height) Intex swimming pool (Metal Support) that I bought for my girlfriend last year but she is away from home at this time of the year and she will return back to home very soon so I am trying to get pool ready for her. Of course, it was very green and full of algae to start with. Before I proceed to the treatment, I never knew this forum exist and kinda probably a little too late so hope you can still help me??
I should mention I never knew about any chemical stuff or testing kit. I just thought that all I need to do is throw in chlorine(it was shock stuff my girlfriend's sister bought last year) and that is it. OOPS! :-( It seems to work OK last year when I sprinkled it in once every week. Anyway, here it goes.. I sprinkled in half bag of Shock on Thursday for the first time and I used old filter (cleaned it because I am penny pincher and didn't really want to put new filter in until it clears up some). Let the pump run constantly. I started to net some leaves out and I think I did pretty good for Thursday working at it about two hours and got sunburn. Periodically, I check on pump and change filter every few hours. While a "cleaned" filter is in the pump, I clean algae off the other filter so it would be ready to go when I change filter.
Friday morning, I woke up and checked the pool, it was still green. I ran over to Wal-Mart to buy new box of Shock (Aqua Chem) and two new filters then when I got home, I sprinkled one full bag of Shock and replaced the filter with new one. About one hour later, the top surface (about 1 feet) start to clear up but still light green from that point to bottom. Net more leaves out and bugs are starting to surface.. lot of spiders on water too.. got them out. Still have backswimmers(LOT!) and some beetles? Sprinkled another bag of Shock again and changed filter. The first new filter was stuffed with algae and some bugs so I cleaned it out.. Oh yea, I also sprinkled the Shock into the pump when I put filter in both time. In the afternoon (I didn't know sun burns chlorine until I read this forum last night) I came back to the pool and it was Milky looking. At this point, I see the progress so I try to net more leaves but it is scattered all over and I can see many algae divided up into pieces.. Net them out as much as I could.. now I see some tiny tadpole and a lot of "swimming worm"? It seems to move in Figure 8 method so I changed my mind about stepping into the pool to clean. Note: I didn't really scrub(brush) the algae that good compared to Thursday.
At this point, I am not sure if I should throw in Algaecide or maybe get Flocculant and try to vacuum it out? I should mention that my hose is real limited if I am to connect it to the pump but it will suck water/stuff out of the pool if I hook water hose to it. It is cloudy today and rained some but supposed to have cloudy, sunny, and rain today.. I know I will plan on scrub the pool real good trying to keep Algae from growing so I am gonna do that now while I wait for a reply, hopefully!
I know you probably will advise me to get the test kit not from Wal-Mart but the problem is that it is probably too late to order the Testing Kit online as I need to keep hammering the algae before it grows back. Probably get a cheap testing kit at Wal-Mart for time being just to see if I can get the milky down..
Thanks in advance for answering..
