Discovered this forum too late. Can't get chlorine to stay in pool and need some help

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T

Tastybread

0
Jul 1, 2015
19
AZ
Hi everyone. I've been spending the better part of the day trying to get my pool to hold chlorine and nothing seems to be working. I've spent a ton of time and money today at Leslie's and its achieved nothing. I can't be spending money this way on the pool and searched online for a solution and found this forum. Can you guys help me? I don't have a recommended test kit yet but I can give you the numbers that Leslie's Pools sent me home with.

16000 gallon pebble tech pool in direct Arizona sun.
Fc 0
tac 0
ch 250
cya 60
ta 90
ph 6.8
tds 1400

Ive poured 6 gallons of liquid chlorine into the pool as well as soda ash based on their recommendation and I still have zero chlorine. I appreciate any insight you guys can give me. I'm getting frustrated with this pool.
 
Welcome to TFP!

You need more chlorine and you need to add it more often. Hourly tests and additions aren't too much at first. Check out the SLAMing Your Pool process, follow it and you should well on your way
 
Thanks for the welcome! I've been adding a gallon every hour. Is there any way to calculate how much chlorine total I'll need? Is this something I can do with the information I have, or do I need to get my test kit asap? I don't want to add more chemicals if it's not going to do anything. Thanks for replying btw.
 
Follow the SLAM, you need to keep adding chlorine/bleach until you kill whatever is consuming it and the pool holds chlorine level again. The more often you test and add chlorine the faster it will go. Every 1-2 hours is best.
 
Tasty I am in the middle of my first SLAM/adventure in pool ownership, I will say the chlorine use is very front loaded in the SLAM, I am sure there are going to be a few people to direct you to PoolSchool and the pool calculator. I STRONGLY suggest you take some time to read the articles that are relevant to your situation. It has helped me a lot also, bleach price calc, will help you figure out if you have a good deal on the bleach you are buying. I found that link somewhere on this forum also thank you to whoever set that up!
 
oddthorn said:
Tasty I am in the middle of my first SLAM/adventure in pool ownership, I will say the chlorine use is very front loaded in the SLAM, I am sure there are going to be a few people to direct you to PoolSchool and the pool calculator. I STRONGLY suggest you take some time to read the articles that are relevant to your situation. It has helped me a lot also, bleach price calc, will help you figure out if you have a good deal on the bleach you are buying. I found that link somewhere on this forum also thank you to whoever set that up!
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That's encouraging. I'm looking at all the empty jugs of chlorine in my backyard and it's a scary thought that all of it did nothing. I've been pouring over all the schools. It's a lot of information to take in all at once but I'll figure it out. I'll keep adding chlorine in the meantime. Thanks for your help.
 
:wave: Welcome to TFP!!!

Really getting a FAS-DPD test is of the highest priority. Right now you are kind of throwing money away since you have not be sure you are maintaining the correct shock FC level. Do you have ANY chlorine test? Like the yellow color matching OTO test? If you did, you could keep adding chlorine and testing every 30-60 minutes until you started to hold a FC level. After that though, you will need the FAS-DPD to correctly follow the ShockLevelAndMAINTAIN Process.

You should not keep blindly adding chlorine though if you have no method of testing.
 
It's very important to know what kind of testing you have personally available. There are some types of chlorine tests that Bleach out at high chlorine levels and end up showing 0 chlorine when you have a whole lot which would lead you to add more and possibly go way over what is safe for your pool.

+1 get a kit on order asap.

I use and recommend the tf-100. :)

You really need to be able to get some accurate test results so you won't waste time or money or risk damaging any equipment.

We'll help you figure this thing out!

Welcome to TFP!
 

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Beens said:
It's very important to know what kind of testing you have personally available. There are some types of chlorine tests that Bleach out at high chlorine levels and end up showing 0 chlorine when you have a whole lot which would lead you to add more and possibly go way over what is safe for your pool.

+1 get a kit on order asap.

I use and recommend the tf-100. :)

You really need to be able to get some accurate test results so you won't waste time or money or risk damaging any equipment.

We'll help you figure this thing out!

Welcome to TFP!
Click to expand...
I just ordered the Tf-100. I've been skeptical but I bought those test strips to test my levels which Leslie's constantly told me was an accurate way to test the water, but it never seemed that useful to me. I'm going to hold off on adding more chemicals until the test kit arrives.

Do do you guys still use tablets? Or can I completely abandon those?
 
abandon the tablets for now. if your CYA is low, you can use them up to raise your CYA, but if its high you need to toss them. CYA is the most critical missing piece of info right now. it is critical. it determines your shock level for the SLAM, but then also determines your FC levels for day to day maintenance. without you are shooting in the dark, basically like going to a pool store for advice :)
 
There are many of us here with pools in the direct AZ sun all day. Commit yourself to the week or two of attacking the pool everyday through this SLAM process and with the knowledge you've gained, you'll spend 5 minutes and $2 a day keeping your pool awesome.
 
Test strips are one of the things that bleaches out at high levels and shows like there is 0 chlorine. The other one I think is the pink color matching dpd chlorine test.

You just ordered the best kit! It will have the fas/dpd chlorine test which uses a powder and drops and no color matching guessing. That's the best there is!

If you have tabs hold on to them. They sometimes come in handy if you're going on vacation and your pool can handle a little more CYA. :) Just don't use any until you know exactly what you're levels are.
 
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