Salt did something to chlorine...

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frogabog

frogabog

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Jul 16, 2010
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Portland, Oregon
Last night my son and I dosed the pool from 3.5ppm to 7.5ppm with accuracy, we planned for a sunny swim day with an extra .5ppm. We were having a bleach:ppm lesson, so I am 100% certain of the dosage. About 3 hours later H and I added the salt in preparation for the SWG install. We added 110 pounds of salt, brushed, and let it filter (as always).

I did not run a morning test today, for two reasons: 1) I rarely do morning testing after dosing at night, and 2) most of my day was spent looking for and posting flyers for our missing kitty.

I lost some water today while working on the pump lines and had to refill but I also refilled yesterday the same amount. Would have been nice if the kid told me the water was actually pouring out on the ground when he mentioned the pump was apart and I told him "yes, I did that don't worry".

Yesterday people swam a lot, I refilled, and still ended the day at 3.5ppm.

Today, 1 short swim right before I tested, salt ~3000ppm, and a refill just like yesterday.

End result at about 7pm... NO CHLORINE. Sample never turned pink after powder. I did not make a mistake, I always dose like this and I am positive about amounts added. I've never lost this much chlorine in one day. I do not know how long it was at 0 but I did notice earlier today that the pool didn't smell fresh like it usually does. It smelled... dull and weird which I chalked up to the salt (which the kids don't like the taste of BTW).

FWIW... I thought I saw a funny tint to it in the sun this afternoon as well. I'm not going to say green because it wasn't really green... but it wasn't what I'm used to seeing and wasn't cloudiness. It was a slight tint of color and the only reason I noticed it is because there is usually no tint at all.

I dosed the pool up to 7.5ppm and will go now to test for CC. Filters were again plugged, so another double filter cleaning was in order. This time I just put the old dryer sheet filters back in because I needed the bleach to mix up fast at that point. I'd rather have fines in the bottom than algae thank you very much.

I'm sure there's no reason to think the salt did this but I'm very sure about my methods, dosing, and pool behavior. This does NOT happen.

Last night's tests:
FC - 3.5
TC - 3.5 (dosed to 7.5)
PH - 7.5
TA - 90
CH - 30-40 (old 3 reagent alk says 40, HTH says 30)
CYA - 40
Borates - 50

I will come back and update w/new results in a bit.
****************
9:50pm
FC - 4
TC - 4.5
CC - .5 (slight tint)

I just dosed to 8ppm. Will test in half an hour. This is weird... Glad I didn't raise CYA yet.

***************
10:40pm
FC - 8 (or 8.5, a double drop may have landed)
TC - 8.5
CC - .5
(I did add a little over half a cup extra bleach at 10pm as a tip for the pool gods)

I will probably test in an hour or so and see if it's fallen. H is convinced he "sees" algae since I said I thought I saw green earlier. It's not green at all. Far from it. He's not to be trusted, he just arrived on scene, lol.
 
Salt is inert and shouldn't change your FC one iota. Likely, the pool was trying to get an algae bloom started. I'd shock and then recheck.
 
I agree, it shouldn't.

But it did.

I have only ever seen trace CC in my testing (about 3 times this whole summer, normally CC is 0), the pool behaves just as it should day to day without hiccup, and no other changed conditions applied other than the salt. What irritates me is that I know everything was just as it should be before the salt, yet it sent the pool into a tailspin with no good reasoning behind it.

I did bring it to shock level very early this morning after loosing 2ppm in the dark (OCLT at 3am) and will be doing another OCLT tonight. I am again second guessing my decision to switch to the SWG, and very sure the whole concept has added more pool stress than I wanted. Dosing nightly is just fine w/me. But now I have a pool full of salt water, conditions I have never experienced since starting BBB last spring, and questions/issues I should not have to bother with.

Plus the cat is still missing. 4 days now. I miss her.
 
Thanks, I can only hope...

But, she's settled into her routine of sleeping all day on my bed now for 4+ years and she's very sure of the location of her food. She is slight, and kind of a scaredy cat like unless she's beating up on her son or a mouse. I really see no reason she would wander but I do think I remember her doing it once when she was younger. I think someone took her or a dog ate her actually (some dog tore up one of our cats once, inside our yard - gate got left open. Found the cat within minutes... dog nowhere to be seen).

It'd be nice if it wasn't legal to double bag and toss dead cats into the garbage. If people had to report dead cats they find, lots of us might know what happened when they disappear.
 
Water softener salt. Morton Solar Salt.

H did the buying. There are a few things I don't question him on and salt purity is one of them. For brine tanks on salt water and mixed oxidant systems the salt has to be the purest possible and this would be something he's discussed with me frequently. Well before pools ever came into our lives much less SWG pools. Even if the pool didn't need the purest salt, he would use it anyway given his knowledge on the subject. He spent at least 6 years representing MIOX systems (out of a 22 year hydronics career), writing specifications with/for mechanical engineers and municipal installations on drinking water all over the PNW. He knows more about salt water chlorine generation and water treatment than I care to quantify.

Just so you know why I didn't insist on pool salt specifically. I've got 28 years of data on this guy. There are some battles I choose not to engage in.
 
Only 2 things will cause your FC to drop. Organics and the sun. The variables of salt and small water loss have nothing to due with your algea bloom.

More likely with the small volume of water a heavy organic load was placed on the FC. Maybe kids P in the pool.

This would have happened without the swcg issue, your conversion has seemed more difficult than mine and I could see how you want to blame it on something but it is not the Salt.

Chalk it up as a reason to keep a good test kit. Without your TF100 you would be in full bloom by now.

Take a breath, give the SWCG a try this season. To each thier own but I don't see how you could dislike it.

The taste is different but the kids will get use to it quick. 3000 ppm salt level is much more natural for us to smim it. We are walking bags of saline.
 
Yes, I'm aware of the conditions that consume chlorine. Combo of both yesterday apparently.

Apparently one of the bags was old, maybe a year old. Unopened. But something could have crept in while in storage I suppose. Organics are simply anything that is, or was once living. Lotta choices out there that can be called organic. It could be anything.

While that really shouldn't make a difference, it's the only thing I can see as a variable. Algae salt.

Whatever... ugh, I've resorted to putting a 3" tablet in a floater cuz I'm running out of bleach. Need to raise CYA anyway.
 

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I could be wrong but I don't think any algea or bacteria feed off of salt. That is why they packed meat in it before the days of refrigeration.

After you get your water ballanced and hook up the SWCG there will be no need to lug jugs of bleach around anymore.
 
BBBliever said:
The variables of salt and small water loss have nothing to due with your algea bloom.
Click to expand...

One thing I've come to accept is that my fill water is actually rife with algae. Every pool we've filled turned green by the time ~4" is in it. My water pressure is about 95psi or better. I can fill the pool w/2 hoses in about 3 hours. At 4" of water it's been out of the pipes a whole 20 minutes and turns green. EVERY time. If you refer to my first posts ever last year I discuss it and the water source. The water is clean enough to drink, but not clean enough to prevent a bloom once the sun hits it. Algae is food to some people I suppose.

I always loose an extra bit of chlorine if I refill, half a ppm or so.

Unfortunately I'll never know if yesterday was going to be the D Day with or without the salt addition. Coincidence perhaps, but it still seems odd. I learned the hard way that coincidences rarely occur, if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck... it's very likely a duck.

It was over a week ago that I found it at 1.5ppm at midnight and promptly dosed to 9ppm. That's the only time it's fallen below minimum yet. Although according to the rules, minimum is minimum and 1.5ppm qualifies as a fail. The occasional fail like that however really shouldn't send a pool into such a tailspin a week later. Right?? This isn't rocket science here... and isn't the reserve chlorine there for such occasions? I can see being at 0 yesterday caused a larger issue, and perhaps the fail was the root cause. Or maybe the salt had junk in it.

I found the pool at 0ppm at 6:30pm yesterday which is early in regards to when I usually test (11pm-midnight'ish average). Who knows how long it had been at zero. If it was an already on the way bloom due to that one day below minimum, it sure caught me off guard a week later after all those normal days.

Latest tests show 0CC, FC 10.5 and I'm letting my daughter swim the last two hours of sun. After shade occurs and bleach arrives, I will dose back to shock level and watch it every hour see what happens. Wish my truck didn't have radiator flush (acid) in it.
 
OCLT pass this am.

Last night:
FC/TC - 16ppm

This morning 8:20am (sun was peeking through the branches of the trees onto the pool)
FC/TC - 15.5ppm

So the shocking is done IMO. CC came and went all day yesterday, never above .5ppm however. Gonna let it fall today and then check PH.

Had to put one of the walmart cartridges back into the pump, left skimmer pump w/dryer sheet cartridge so it would work for more than 20 hours. Pool was again all cloudy looking from swimmers but cleared right up after I put the other cartridge in. Those cartridges just suck. Glad I had them around though because the water movement is better, prolly cuz they let everything pass through, lol.

Juicy is also still here, wearing her pink collar w/bell and lazing around on my bed again. Her meow was raspy when she got back, we are now assuming she got caught in someone's garage or shed and meowed so much that her voice gave in. Meow is back to normal now and everyone is happy. Never been so willing to let her groom my fingers as last night. Fine cat... groom away.

And that's my happy ending for today. I've decided I don't really enjoy shocking. What a PITA.
 
frogabog said:
Juicy is also still here, wearing her pink collar w/bell and lazing around on my bed again. Her meow was raspy when she got back, we are now assuming she got caught in someone's garage or shed and meowed so much that her voice gave in. Meow is back to normal now and everyone is happy. Never been so willing to let her groom my fingers as last night. Fine cat... groom away.
Click to expand...

So glad to hear your kitty came home and is alright :) Maybe kitty needs to become an indoor only kitty? I know where we live, cats that go outdoors don't last long, unfortunately.
 
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