and then it happened... (green pool)

[rd3500]

sooo...

I bought a home in vegas 3 years ago with a pool and zero pool experience. Thanks to you in a couple of months I fired the pool guy (that was using the pucks) and managed the pool myself initially with liquid chlorine and MA and then adding a SWG. Never had major problems and everything was running very smoothly a part for calcium that I knew was accumulating over time, last time I checked it (over a year ago) it was around 450 so I knew eventually I was going to change the water or part of it.

Then I left town for a few weeks with the neighbor was stopping by about once a week to clean pump and skimmer.

Well, I came back yesterday to a green pool, somehow the pump was turned off... so no filter and no chlorine... my guess is that it happened about a week ago, the water is not too bad I think although I have no experience with algae.

Now, the reason I am writing is this: I read the articles here about SLAM and how to clear the water with no need to changed it,.

My CYA is at 20 right now BUT the calcium is so high that I thought the test was broken... it took 36 drops with a 10ml samples so we are talking about 25*36=900....

So, I am draining the pool as much as I can, I don't want to add chemicals to a water that needs to be changed anyway and I have a few questions:

- am I correct in thinking that I might as well change the water now to bring the hardness to acceptable levels before slamming? My understanding is that vegas water by itself is at 280 hardness, so basically I need to change the entire pool if I want to bring it down and be ok for a while (or at least change 75% of the water)

- when I refill the water, is there a way to do it to clear the algae at the same time?

PS: funny enough I am not upset about what happened, instead I am looking forward to the learning. When I got here 3 years ago I thought running a pool was extremely hard and time consuming but thanks to you I got it down to checking chlorine levels once a week and ph once every 2-3 weeks making small adjustments to the swg or the ph with MA. And I very well know that's a result of the way of doing things that is explained here, so thanks a lot because it has been amazing.

Here is a picture from a few minutes ago, I have already started to drain it and I cleaned the surface as much as I could.

 

[ajw22]

Drain the pool, refill with fresh water, lower pH to 7.4, add 30ppm of stabilizer/CYA and simultaneously raise the FC to 12 and follow the SLAM Process

It should be a quick process to get rid of any lingering algae.

 

[Rancho Cost-a-Lotta]

If draining the entire pool, it's a good opportunity to get a good estimate of the pool volume if you have any doubts. Take before and after photos of the water meter for the calculation. Limit water use during the fill time.

Consider connecting your pool fill water line to a water softener. If you don't have one for the home, consider a standalone unit for pool. You'll likely never to need to drain again.

 

[rd3500]

thanks a lot, will follow instructions and report back

 

[rd3500]

here is the situation as of now: CYA at 30, FC at 12 to 14 and CC at 0. I will do the overnight test tonight if it passes, I will consider slam done and will raise CYA to 70, put salt in and turn on SWG. Thanks a lot as always, genius idea to take pictures of the water meter, pool has 9000 gallons, not 11k as I thought