my pool is a hot green mess

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cardiacmommy

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May 7, 2010
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We let our pool go over the winter. Finally got it filtering a few days ago. Have done several jugs of bleach and scooped the big stuff out.now the chlorine is back down to pretty much nothing. So I tested everything today and this is where I stand:

Cya is barely registering so I know I need stabilizer.

pH high 8.2
TA low 30
Salt low 570.

I know I need stabilizer first so my chlorine doesnt evaporate. And then bleach. ..lots of bleach. And I need salt so eventually I can use my swg.


I'm confused on the ta and ph. I know adding baking soda week raise ta. But will also raise the pH. I know chlorine lowers pH. So not sure if I should add baking soda? acid? both? Neither?

Advice please!
 
I'd just lower the PH to 7.2 and raise the CYA to 30 for now and start the shocking process at that level. TA can be fixed afterwards since you might do a lot of backwashing between now and then.
 
Chlorine doesn't lower pH. Chlorine above 10ppm will cause a temporary rise in pH. You don't say what your FC level is at this time. Add enough CYA to reach 20-30 ppm, lower the pH to 7.2 and complete the shock process. Then you can worry about adjusting any other levels if needed.
 
Well I have some progress. I can see about half way down the water but not the bottom yet. I've gone from green Swamp to dark blue cloudy.

I got the ph a bit too low. Around 7.0. Tonight I added a little Borax and some baking soda to raise the Ta.

I added stabilizer and did not back wash for a week. I got up to what I thought was 45 but tested again today and only got slight less than 30.

I've been working really hard since Wednesday on this. Taught my daughter to test fc and use the pool calculator so her and hubby could keep the fc up while I was at work. We've tried to keep it above 16 which is probably higher than needed since I retested the cya.

Ive been brushing, skimming, and vacuuming every night. I have lots of that slimy dead algae which I have mostly filtered out. I have my filter running 24/7.

I think my biggest culprit to clearing this is Pine needles. I think I've found all the leaf piles but lordy these Pine needles! I don't think they rise up very easy with just brushing. They seem to lay in clumps. When I vacuum I get my skimmer PACKED with these stupid things. We don't even have Pine trees on our property. .only on our neighbors. .sigh.

I'm worn out vacuuming so much and I'm still vacuuming blindly since I can't see the bottom to see where they are hiding. I think I'm making progress but I'm beginning to wonder if I'm ever going to get this pool clear.
 

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Do you own a leaf rake? That might be the best tool for the pine needles.

Casey-LeafRake.jpg
 
I do have one. I'll get hubby to scoop around today. I wish we could see them. . It's a lot of ground to cover blindly. I know clarifiers are typically frowned on here but might that help clear the water to see the bottom better?
 

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Well we scooped and couldn't find anything. So we came up with a vacuuming system. Hubby vacuumed while I watched the skimmer. I let him know when I saw debris so he would focus on that area. There way less stuff than yday so I hope we have about found it all. I think we are getting close. I tested tonight and only had 0.5 cc after having 1-2 in prior days. So I'm going to do the overnight test and see how it looks in the morning.
 
cardiacmommy said:
Well we scooped and couldn't find anything. So we came up with a vacuuming system. Hubby vacuumed while I watched the skimmer. I let him know when I saw debris so he would focus on that area. There way less stuff than yday so I hope we have about found it all. I think we are getting close. I tested tonight and only had 0.5 cc after having 1-2 in prior days. So I'm going to do the overnight test and see how it looks in the morning.
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Sleep in. You still haven't passed the visual check, so it's a moot point if the overnight test passes.
 
Happy to report my pool is all clear. I did end up using a small amount of clarifier because it was still cloudy despite all my best efforts. I applied the clarifier and the next day I was able to see the last remaining areas that needed vacuumed. Now I just need to add a little more salt and stabilizer so that my swg can take over. I also had to add some baking soda and borax to tweak the levels. It looks great. Used it for the first time today!
 

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Aqua chem super water clarifier purchased at my local walmart. It really did a fantastic job! It was around $12 for the bottle (and I only had to use a small portion.) Well worth it to me to finally clear the pool. I may have been able to do it by adding De to my filter, but that would be a lot of work for me to do by myself being a woman. This was simple. My pool looks even more sparkly today. The pH and TA are perfect with my latest additions. I gave it one more good vacuum and skimming since we had a storm today. My husband added 80 more pounds of salt and I added stabilizer via a sock tied to an empty bleach jug. So I should be in excellent shape. Now I just have to tweak how long to run the filter and swg each day!
 

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