New pool/Fill water ?'s.

[Ryno98]

First post! - after lurking on here for several hours or possibly days... This will be my first-ever pool to own. It is currently finished to gunite/tile/coping stage now, but lots of work remains with drains, outdoor bathroom, decks, gunite "boulders", etc still to come. I found this site after the PB had already ordered my trichlor chlorinator and Nature2 and now feel a little dumb for that, but I plan to use it at first to get CYA up, monitor my levels, and take the Nature2 canister out after a couple of months. Then I will switch to 12.5% LC for my chlorination except when on vacation.

I live in an area with a community water provider that is largely well based. We have known problems with killing every plant known to man mainly due to salinity issues. I ordered the TF test kit + sodium test and ran test on my fill water:
pH - 8.2
TA - 450
CH - 75
Na - 600 ppm (still better than the 1000 ppm from my well on my property I use for irrigation!)

I already expect my pool to have huge acid requirements initially, considering multiple waterfalls, new plaster, and my fill water pH/TA. At this point I'm looking at running the waterfalls most of the time and just sucking it up and dumping whatever acid is called for into the pool until the TA presumably lowers itself to a reasonable level (since I'm basically doing what is outlined in Pool School to lower TA). I also expect to have to add some Calcium to help keep the CSI in appropriate range with the new plaster.

Anyone have any specific insight/recommendations/criticism regarding my plan? (FWIW pool size is ~35-40,000 gallons by my estimate. Forgot to put that in my sig)

 

[JohnT]

Welcome to TFP!

It sounds like you have a pretty good handle on things, though I'd just forget the Nature 2 mineral cartridge right from the start. You'll want to check with your water provider or have the water tested yourself for metals. Iron, copper and manganese are all troublesome in pool water.

The salt won't be an issue, though it could eventually build up to a level where people can taste it. Salt-free water is hard on your eyes, so many people add some to their pool for comfort.

 

[Ryno98]

My water provider lists copper at 1.3 ppm, which is apparently right at the "EPA action level for drinking water", whatever that means... Does this mean I should use a sequestrant upon filling my pool? The other metals (except manganese which wasn't listed) were OK.

 

[JohnT]

With copper at 1.3ppm, you'd be much better off finding another source for your fill water. That's almost certain to cause staining.

 

[Ryno98]

So I had my water tested independently for metals with a little different results than the water company website suggested:

Copper: 8.3 ppb
Manganese 13.3 ppb

I guess I feel a little better about my fill water at this point. At least its deficiencies are correctable.

Now if we can just get the pool finished... Progress has been generally steady but no work has been done for the past 2 weeks b/c of the holidays, and the weather has been challenging to say the least with huge rains, flooding, drainage problems, etc making the backyard a mud pit for the ages. Still have to finish gunite in the pool (currently a "thin shell" to keep things OK through rain/2 weeks of no work), gunite boulders/grotto/slide, bathroom, decks, french drain/downspouts, plaster, outdoor kitchen, trenching the water line around the house and under the driveway... Really seems like a lot now that I type it all. Thanks for the help so far. This site is great!