Just added about 1.5 pounds of granular CYA in a sock. I wanted to be conservative on the first addition. When should I check the CYA level again? 24 hours after completely dissolved?
Brand New Pool Owner with cloudy water
- Thread starter andrewholtmd
- Start date
TexEdmond
Gold Supporter
- Jun 16, 2021
- 661
- Pool Size
- 25500
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
SHEEEEEEEEEWWWWT, YOU GOT THIS THING MEMORIZED ALREADY?!
Great job on the slam. Don't look now but that MA you were using to drop your pH also dropped your alkalinity. This means your pool water will be even clearer because your water won't create so many microbubbles of CO2 that also look like cloudy water. As you continue to bring that down you'll also notice your pH doesn't want to drift up as quickly.
Well done, good job, have a frosty beverage at the pool party. You earned it!
It's great that you're encouraging the OP but what is this all about? Never heard this.
What do you think @mknauss, @zea3, @JoyfulNoise?
TexEdmond
Gold Supporter
- Jun 16, 2021
- 661
- Pool Size
- 25500
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
My wife pointed it out on our great trek from TA 190+ to TA 70... "The cloudiness in the pool is actually just little bubbles, I like to watch them float to the top and pop." Especially in the spa, sitting for any length of time tiny bubbles would attach themselves to swimsuits, hair, skin. It's my understanding that TA numbers are largely carbonate alkalinity. Carbonate becomes carbonic acid, which is literally the same thing that makes soda fizzy, except they make it go the other way. Carbon dioxide dissolved in water is carbonic acid. As there is an overload of carbonate alkalinity in the pool, small bubbles of CO2 come out of solution and that mechanism of removing carbonic acid from the pool is what causes pH to rise. For the same reason I've heard those same experts we both trust say: CO2 injection isn't recommended for many pool owners because it lowers pH without fixing the underlying TA problem.
It doesn't happen nearly at all anymore. I assume that's because the pool is closer to being balanced without being wildly overloaded with TA.
I dunno. Maybe I'm wrong. I'm just learning about it as I go, and I know that carbonate alkalinity gets converted to carbonic acid, which offgasses as CO2. My water is way clearer because there's fewer bubbles in my water. Source: I'm an audio engineer that's worked more concerts than I can remember, and the one thing they say about concert lighting is, "You can't see the lights moving around until you put some haze in the venue." I can't "see" my pool lights shining thru the water as much anymore, and the principle is the same, just different phases of material.
See the angle of the dispersion of the lens? No fair criticizing the specks, the yard guy was here a few hours ago and it's been really windy. Before lowering TA this was a wide angle fuzzy looking wedge and it was very homogeneous. Looked just like haze at a rock concert, either created by machine, or the audience. EDIT: Hrm. Seems like i'm having trouble uploading a photo.
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TexEdmond
Gold Supporter
- Jun 16, 2021
- 661
- Pool Size
- 25500
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-60
Hi, Marianne- I think I found a way to add links to photos relatively anonymously. Here's what I was trying to upload the other day.
The larger flecks are windblown grass debris from the yard guy coming earlier that day. See the "cone" of bubbles outlined by the light? Second photo is filtered for blues and I highlighted by drawing on the photo the angle. Those are tiny bubbles that I suspect are CO2. When there's a lot of them, the water looks cloudy.
photos.app.goo.gl
photos.app.goo.gl
I got lucky and noticed last night that the spa still does cloud up with those same teeny bubbles when the heater first runs to bring it up to temp. It clears very quickly. Today the wife was in the spa and I was using the "hose trick" to try to track down this ongoing suction side air leak. Somewhere in my spraying of water the prime in the basket improved and immediately my wife mentioned the water clouded up. I suspect this is because high TA water is getting sucked through the leak and immediately offgassing to try to restore equilibrium. The only thing I can think of when I noticed it last night would be the rapid pressure / temp change of the water spinning through a hot heat exchanger. These are different size bubbles from the normal "air leak" large bubbles and they happen everywhere at once in the water and dissipate quickly.
This is the water before, heater and pump are running, but not yet up to temp. Probably below 90 degree water here. Notice a few very small bubbles made visible by the light.
photos.app.goo.gl
Then as the water increases in temperature, very rapidly, the water gets very cloudy. This was not just bubbles spewing from the returns, it happened all at once. They stick to and grow on swimsuits, hairs, skin, everywhere. When they're knocked loose, more bubbles immediately start forming where the old ones were.
photos.app.goo.gl
photos.app.goo.gl
And then, as the temp continued to climb, the water quickly cleared back out and back to "TFP clear", but there were still bubbles visible in front of the light. Bubbles quit forming on swimsuit and hairs.
photos.app.goo.gl
There's no evidence I had algae growing in my pool when I first came to TFP and started this method, but my water was cloudy. I didn't have to SLAM my pool to clear the water. I never did an OCLT, and I don't recall having had CC above 0.5 (or much change at all ) on any DPD test. As soon as I put the first few gallons of MA in my pool, the water immediately cleared and has only improved as I've continued to lower TA. My conclusion is that the cloudiness was a combination of CO2 and calcium dust from the Cal-Hypo I was using up before switching to liquid.
The larger flecks are windblown grass debris from the yard guy coming earlier that day. See the "cone" of bubbles outlined by the light? Second photo is filtered for blues and I highlighted by drawing on the photo the angle. Those are tiny bubbles that I suspect are CO2. When there's a lot of them, the water looks cloudy.
New item by emcee gee
photos.app.goo.gl
New item by emcee gee
photos.app.goo.gl
I got lucky and noticed last night that the spa still does cloud up with those same teeny bubbles when the heater first runs to bring it up to temp. It clears very quickly. Today the wife was in the spa and I was using the "hose trick" to try to track down this ongoing suction side air leak. Somewhere in my spraying of water the prime in the basket improved and immediately my wife mentioned the water clouded up. I suspect this is because high TA water is getting sucked through the leak and immediately offgassing to try to restore equilibrium. The only thing I can think of when I noticed it last night would be the rapid pressure / temp change of the water spinning through a hot heat exchanger. These are different size bubbles from the normal "air leak" large bubbles and they happen everywhere at once in the water and dissipate quickly.
This is the water before, heater and pump are running, but not yet up to temp. Probably below 90 degree water here. Notice a few very small bubbles made visible by the light.
New video by emcee gee
photos.app.goo.gl
Then as the water increases in temperature, very rapidly, the water gets very cloudy. This was not just bubbles spewing from the returns, it happened all at once. They stick to and grow on swimsuits, hairs, skin, everywhere. When they're knocked loose, more bubbles immediately start forming where the old ones were.
New item by emcee gee
photos.app.goo.gl
New video by emcee gee
photos.app.goo.gl
And then, as the temp continued to climb, the water quickly cleared back out and back to "TFP clear", but there were still bubbles visible in front of the light. Bubbles quit forming on swimsuit and hairs.
New item by emcee gee
photos.app.goo.gl
There's no evidence I had algae growing in my pool when I first came to TFP and started this method, but my water was cloudy. I didn't have to SLAM my pool to clear the water. I never did an OCLT, and I don't recall having had CC above 0.5 (or much change at all ) on any DPD test. As soon as I put the first few gallons of MA in my pool, the water immediately cleared and has only improved as I've continued to lower TA. My conclusion is that the cloudiness was a combination of CO2 and calcium dust from the Cal-Hypo I was using up before switching to liquid.
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Very interesting. Thanks for the thorough explanation.
Glad it has nothing to do with algae or high calcium levels.
Glad it has nothing to do with algae or high calcium levels.