MA usage

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martinspool

martinspool

0
Dec 12, 2013
58
Houston, TX
I use 31.45% MA to keep my pH between 7.5 & 7.8. I find that I have to add approx. 14oz. or so every other day to maintain these levels. I also have a little high CH (350-400) so I really try to keep my pH at the lower levels.

I added Borates about 6 weeks ago and the water feels & looks great but it has NOT reduced my MA usage one bit. With Borates or without Borates my MA is the same.

My question is, it seems to me I sure use a lot of MA. I'm like…after a while I'm swimming in MA with a little water added....LOL. But seriously, is adding 14oz of MA every other day about normal to maintain these pH levels? I am also running my SWG @ 65% which I know causes some aeration which raises my pH some too and may be contributing to me having to add more MA during the summer.

Also, I was wondering what happens to all this MA. Does it evaporate with the water or does it keep accumulating in the pool?

Your thoughts?

thx
 
Borates never reduce acid usage by themselves, they just allow you to add acid less frequently.

Lowering TA is almost always the correct path to reducing acid usage. If you post a full set of water test results we can give you more specific advice.

Muriatic acid effectively turns into water and salt after it is used.
 
Overall your numbers look good. I wouldn't worry too much about CH, it can run much higher and not cause issues. Have you checked out pool math? http://www.troublefreepool.com/calc.html

Put you numbers in and check out CSI index. I always run negative and haven't had a problem with cell scaling or waterline scaling.

Try lowering you TA to 65 or 60 and see if that slows the PH from rising as quick. You'll see it drives CSI down, but it can be increased with CH. I'd try lowering TA first, see if that works for the long term, if it does then, increase CH.
 
What's the pH of your fill water? (it plays a role...not as big as some others. but my fill water is out of the reading range of Phenol red...that's why I ask.) I'm in process of dropping my TA as well.
 
My numbers are good. There always good. I watch them everyday.

I wasn't asking anything about CH or Borates. Just put that in there FYI...

So can somebody please just answer my basic question:

Is using 14oz. of MA every other day to maintain proper pH common or unusual?
 
martinspool said:
My numbers are good. There always good. I watch them everyday.

I wasn't asking anything about CH or Borates. Just put that in there FYI...

So can somebody please just answer my basic question:

Is using 14oz. of MA every other day to maintain proper pH common or unusual?
Click to expand...
It sounds high to me. But if the fill water has high pH and/or high TA, it's going to constantly drive pH up. Do you have an autofill? Maybe it's always running or something.
 
Needing to adjust PH that frequently is a sign of your levels being out of balance. If you are following our recommendations, the only time you need that much PH adjustment is when you have fresh plaster, a negative edge pool, or very high TA fill water.
 

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Been following TFP recommendations to the letter since Dec. 2013, or I wouldn't have the numbers I do now. Watch and maintain my pool like a hawk now. So I don't know what you mean by following our recommendations.

No I don't have auto fill and my plaster isn't new.

My fill water is captured rain water. I keep about 1,700 gallons on hand. I add it manually when the pool needs it and has readings of FCI-0.0, PH-5.0, TA-10, CH-25 so I know that isn't the problem. I used to use my house water which has a higher TA but over all still not very high numbers.

I thought maybe since it's summer time and I'm running my SWG at a higher % and longer run times TFP says that SWG's can cause some aeration which can drive up pH so maybe that was driving up my pH.

But no matter how you look at if I don't add some MA every other day or so my pH continues to rise.

I guess I will try TA down to 50 as suggested since I have Borates and see what happens. But as I said before, I had this problem before Borates also.

So I guess it is what it is.

thx
 
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