About to be first time (new to me) pool owner

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jet black

jet black

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Jun 17, 2014
10
Katy (Houston), TX
Howdy y'all.

First let me say that this site is great. I've been reading everything I can for a week or two, and feel like I'm ready for this pool maintenance stuff.

I close on a house with a pool July 22. I've already ordered the TF100 XL with the speedstir, so I should be good to go straight away.

About the only things I know about the pool from a 5 minute conversation with the owner, it has a cartridge filter, tablet chlorinator and a gas heater. I don't know size of pool or pumps.

Since he's using pucks, can I assume that the CYA is going to be super high? I'm guessing it's likely I'll be doing a partial drain/refill straight away followed by a SLAM just to get started on the right foot? The water looks pretty good, but I guess I won't know until I do the first set of tests.

There is a big rust stain on one of the stairs, what is the best way to remove that? Also, the tile appears to have calcium deposits, how can I remove that and get it all cleaned up?

Anything else I should be thinking about ahead of time?

Thanks
 
Welcome!

You're on the right track. Good work on reading and buying the test kit first.

While unsightly, staining and calcium don't pose a problem, per se. I would worry first, foremost, and only about performing your first set of tests, then go from there to get the water balanced. You may or may not have to SLAM, but spend some time learning your pool first. Once you really understand it, then tackle the staining. It will be much easier than trying to fix multiple things at once.
 
Ok, here's what I've got.

14,000 gal

FC - 0.5
CC - 0
PH - 7.8
CH - 500
TA - 130
CYA - 200+ (I diluted by half, and then by 75%)

My plan of action is to dump a jug of bleach into the pool to get close to the minimum FC level. Then drain as much water as I can and refill. Then retest and go from there.

Thoughts?
 
Is this a plaster pool? If so, go out and spray the plaster walls with the hose; keep the plaster damp while it's re-filling. You don't want it to get too dry or hot or it may form cracks.
 

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I added acid and calcium chloride and got the following results.

8/3
PH - 7
FC - 1.5
CC - 0
CH - 225
TA - 140

Looks like they worked, but why is my FC dropping so fast? I added more bleach and brought FC back to 6 and started aerating to bring ph back up.

Tested again this morning.

8/4 - 4:15am
PH - 7.3
FC - 1.5

So the aerating is working, but once again my FC is plummeting. I've never gotten a CC above zero since the drain/refill. Thoughts?
 
Yay! on the manageable CYA level.

That large a drop in FC with CYA at 50 seems really strange. I would SLAM; the chlorine is reacting with something. Is CC at 0 first thing in the morning before the sun hits the water?
 
Look around for places algae or other biologicals may be hiding.
May not apply to you, but l recently bought a house with pool, finally got around to tracking down a random disconnected pipe that comes up near my pump/filter... turns out that it runs strait into the pool. Seems to be an abandoned connection for some sort of cleaner. Problem is since the previous owner abandoned it in place, it gets zero circulation and who knows what nasties are growing in there. I've taken to dumping diluted bleach directly in it every couple days. First couple days I flushed out a lot of crud.

-Denny
 
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