Baquacil Conversion

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illpwr

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Aug 3, 2012
24
Almost ready. My test kit is in the mail. I have a car load of bleach.

Background:
I bought a house with pool in 2009 with no previous experience caring for a pool. It's been on baquacil since well before my time. It's been a very frustrating and expensive 3 years.

I had the local pool store come open the pool this year in June, and they told me that the filter was broken. That'll be $1500 please. Not really trusting them, or wanting to spend that amount of money, I decided to see for myself. So, I've disassembled and reassembled the filter, replacing the sand in the process. There were was a small crack on the manifold, but some glue fixed that. I started everything up yesterday, and it seems to be running fine.

So, It's been 8-9 mo. since there's been any baqucail added. The filter is working (as far as I am able to tell. If you've got any advice, I'm listening.), and I'm ready to start this conversion.

Here's what the water looks like now. This is the shallow end.
http://i.imgur.com/nP2aK.jpg

[attachment=0:1zy8vc6f]small_baqshallowend_beforeconversion.jpg[/attachment:1zy8vc6f]

Pool details:
~20000 gallon, vinyl liner, Jacuzzi ST-24 sand filter
 

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Good for you for not dishing out $1500 for a new filter and looking at it yourself.

Glad to see you are making the conversion... it will take lots of patience, but you will come to love pool maintenance when you are using chlorine!!

Would love to see pictures of your progress! :)
 
Here's how we're doing so far:
6pm (start) Ph=7.2, TA=80, CH=120 (4 X 182oz 6% bleach)
8pm FC=2, CC=14.5
9pm FC=12, CC=16
7am FC=3.5, CC=13
After each measurement, I've added enough bleach to bring the FC back to 15. I should be able to check on things again over lunch today. The pool started off a very turbid blue, and turned green when we added the bleach last night. This morning, it was pretty much the same color green as it was last night, but it did seem slightly less turbid. However, I am still unable to see the bottom at the shallow end.
 
Looks like you are doing great, and the way you are staying on top of the fc levels will help the process go quicker. Remember to brush the walls thoroughly and frequently, as well as the ladders with a strong bleach solution ( inside and out)

You're well on your way to a clean, clear pool! After my conversion, I've never looked back, I love my pool and the tfp method and board has shown me how much fun a pool can be!
 
radefeld said:
Looks like you are doing great, and the way you are staying on top of the fc levels will help the process go quicker. Remember to brush the walls thoroughly and frequently, as well as the ladders with a strong bleach solution ( inside and out)

You're well on your way to a clean, clear pool! After my conversion, I've never looked back, I love my pool and the tfp method and board has shown me how much fun a pool can be!
Click to expand...

Thanks for the support. I tested again at lunch and found FC=4, so I added 2.5 jugs (182 oz) of bleach to bring it back to 15. I also did a little bit of cleaning and brought out a couple of hand fulls of leaves. It's tough when you can't see the bottom. The water looked the same as it did this morning: cloudy and green.
 
The best part is when you see it slowly turning from a green/brown to a blue. Then, it keeps getting more blue until you have a sparkling oasis! From what you said (minimal baquacil has been added for some time) the conversion should go relatively quickly. I would expect by Sunday things should be significantly better. This makes me think, were you using regular baquacil or the cdx variant?
 
Well, I got home from work and checked the levels around 5:30pm. I found FC=1.5, so I added 4 more jugs of bleach (182 oz, 6%). When my wife tested again at 6:30, we had an FC of 20 -- Guess I over did it a little bit. So, we backwashed the filter and added a little hose water to replace the loss. I have noticed that there is some foaming when adding water from the hose. Is this a problem? I've noticed that the water feels a little soapy too.

On a hopefully unrelated note, my filter pressure gauge appears to be broken. It was reading between 40 and 50 psi, which seemed a little high. When the pump was turned off, it read around 40 psi. If I unscrew it from the filter completely, it reads around 35 psi. Do you think this needs to be replaced?

I've only been using baquacil sanitizer and oxidizer, so I don't think I've been using CDX.

The pool color and clarity have improved slightly. The water is more blue, and it is now possible to make out a brush on the bottom of the shallow end.

Pool at 6:30pm day 2: http://i.imgur.com/bUqmg.jpg
Foaming from adding hose water: http://i.imgur.com/oXSuL.jpg
 

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The gauge does sound broke. They're a simple replace, and dirt cheap. The foaming is very normal, and will go away as you continue to shock. I do however notice some ladders in the background. Make sure you scrub the heck out of them, as algae tends to enjoy hanging out around them. Using a cup of bleach in a 5 gallon bucket of water is how I cleaned mine. A few minutes and now they look as good as new. :D
 
You're right about the ladders. I took them out before starting this process. I've bought a couple of scrub brushes for the ladder. Any tips for the concentration of bleach to use while cleaning them?

My wife just tested the FC at 13.5, so we added a small amount of bleach.

End of day 2 pool light: http://imgur.com/6d97v
 
I myself just used one cup in 5 gallon bucket. Didn't feel like measuring. :D

Just looked however......it took the water to a FC level of 722. That should kill stuff! Maybe a 1/2 a cup would work too.......
 
My wife took care of the bleach this morning. The test gave FC=4. I took a quick look this morning before I left for work and I can now make out the liner pattern on the shallow end of the pool.
 
Had an FC of 7.5 at lunch time (cloudy day). The pool is definitely starting to clear up. It's not perfectly clear, but the bottom is visible in the shallow end. Basically, this is about as good as it got on baqua****. It's hard to believe that baquacil is actually safe when the water never looks clean. As an aside, I've noticed a chlorine is referred to as a disinfectant while baquacil is called a sanitizer. I'm not sure about the technical reasons for the difference in terminology, but let me know if you happen to know.

I could see some brown gunk on the bottom of the pool, so I spent a while brushing and stirred up a lot of white and brown gunk. I can't see the bottom of the deep end at all yet, but hopefully that will change soon.

So far, I think it's going well, and I finally feel like I have some control. Before starting this process, I was ready to have this pool filled in. I was getting bids to have it done. Cheers to science over marketing.
 
illpwr said:
Cheers to science over marketing.
Click to expand...
:cheers:

illpwr said:
As an aside, I've noticed a chlorine is referred to as a disinfectant while baquacil is called a sanitizer. I'm not sure about the technical reasons for the difference in terminology, but let me know if you happen to know.
Click to expand...
I am not sure of the the technical differences between the terms, but on here we consider both as sanitizers (along with bromine).
 
After we got home from work, we brushed, vacumed, and brought the FC levels back up from FC=1, CC=3.5. There's a fair amount of sand in the pool. I think that this is older sand (not from the sand I put in Sunday) because it is white. The Menards pool sand I put in was brown in appearance. If I start seeing brown sand, then I'll start to worry.

Since, I'm thinking about it, I do have a question about filter construction. I took my filter apart to try to find the problem that the pool people said they found. I didn't really find anything wrong except for a crack in the mainifold that the laterals screw into, which I pacthed up with expoxy. The other part I wasn't sure about was the bottom of the standpipe. It was an open hole, which didn't make sense to me. It seems like sand could easily get in the standpipe this way, so I dry fit a PVC cap at the bottom of the standpipe.

Photos from today:
Shallow end: http://i.imgur.com/oveN6.jpg
Over view: http://i.imgur.com/SeDI9.jpg
 
This morning we had FC 14, CC 4. The pool is continuing to clear. We can see the main drain at the bottom of the deep end, which is better than we've ever done using baquacil. There was a fairly intense but brief storm that passed through last night. So we picked out some branches and leaves that blew in. We also brushed some white water mold off the sides, and did our best to stir up the murky part at the bottom. I vacuumed over lunch, but the fitting on the hose was cracked when I tried to vacuum again in the evening. The main thing that I'm worried about right now is getting the sand out of the pool.
 

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