Calcium scale and negative CSI in fiberglass pools

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Hi seribus,
This looks exactly like my pool. I see the whiter areas around the darker blue, with streaking from where the robot passes through. I tried the scrub pad and got the same blue you are seeing on your magic eraser. I had an issue with phosphates last year when I was doing all of that testing and introducing so many different chemicals. I had to increase my SWG and even then it couldn't keep up. As soon as I got the phosphates back to normal, my SWG kept up again. I just tested my phosphates and they are at 0. Since we're both having the issue and my phosphates are 0, I don't think that's the problem. My pH has been steady at 7.2 as well. I haven't called EcoFinish but that's my next step. I'm getting ready to go on vacation and didn't want to get in the middle of that mess, so I'm planning to wait until I come back. I was told we have a 10 year warranty so hopefully they'll honor it. If you call them you are welcome to mention that I'm also having problems (strength in numbers) and I will be calling them later this month.
 
drseuss said:
Hi seribus,
This looks exactly like my pool. I see the whiter areas around the darker blue, with streaking from where the robot passes through. I tried the scrub pad and got the same blue you are seeing on your magic eraser. I had an issue with phosphates last year when I was doing all of that testing and introducing so many different chemicals. I had to increase my SWG and even then it couldn't keep up. As soon as I got the phosphates back to normal, my SWG kept up again. I just tested my phosphates and they are at 0. Since we're both having the issue and my phosphates are 0, I don't think that's the problem. My pH has been steady at 7.2 as well. I haven't called EcoFinish but that's my next step. I'm getting ready to go on vacation and didn't want to get in the middle of that mess, so I'm planning to wait until I come back. I was told we have a 10 year warranty so hopefully they'll honor it. If you call them you are welcome to mention that I'm also having problems (strength in numbers) and I will be calling them later this month.
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Will do. I will call EcoFinish this week and get the ball rolling and update you on what I hear. I figured phosphates wasn't issue but figured I would mention it. Not much I can do about phosphates since I am getting them from tap water. I've had no issues with SWG lately. On this residue I'm concerned they will tell us its something else but due to us getting color coming off it sure seems to me like oxidation type issue again. Since opening the pool I have't kept chlorine too high and have really only shocked pool once or twice. I think during shock I got FC up around 19 and let it drift back down. I turned swg up while I went on vacation and FC was up 10-13 range for a few days. Typically I was running around 5-7. Wonder if chlorine levels being high could do this? I would hope not.
 
Suess,

Ecofinish guys came out today. Looked at surface and tried some things. They ended up draining the pool and first just heated the surface to see how it would react. It helped but didn't eliminate the fade residue look. Next they pressure washed it and sprayed another coat In. Looks good again. No answer as to what happened or why yet. Some thoughts is chlorine too high too long. I went back in my notes and shocked it in June and highest level was 12. I don't shocks that much. Beginning of season and if needed when I can't keep chlorine up with seg. I ran it higher than 1-3ppm like in 5-7 range with some spikes to 9 here and there. Never kept it that high and let it drift back down by adjusting swg. I sure hope it's not that sensitive to chlorine and sun. I guess I will be a stickler about keeping it between 1-3ppm going forward but makes me hesitate to shock.

Not sure if my chlorine maintenance habits are similar to you but I'd like to hear what you do. Also if you see this today I'd get in touch with with ecofinish while they are in the area and maybe get yours corrected too. I mentioned you a few times today and even suggested they contact to you. I'm not sure they knew exactly who I was talking about but seemed to remember.
 
Hi seribus,
Sorry it's been awhile. Got back from vacation and got busy. Wasn't looking forward to dealing with this pool issue again. Thought we had it behind us, but no such luck. I finally called Ecofinish and talked to the regional rep. I guess I should really be talking to the installer, but didn't know, so I talked to Rich from the regional office. He has asked me to get a water chemistry report. He says he knows this area quite well and the water is pretty bad from Burlington down to Wilmington where you and I are. Not surprised there though. I'll do that on Thursday when I go to Cary, so we'll see if there's anything unusual. I also contacted Tony from Paradyme Coatings. He says it might be a chlorine issue and he wants me to send photos. I told him we just use salt and shock about one a week with Chlorox Xtra Blue. We don't keep the chlorine too high though, so I don't think it's that. I could see that it could be the metals in the water. Rich seems to think we might need to use a sequestering agent if it's a metal problem. I'll let you know as soon as I get the report.
 
Uh, @drseuss ? ... please don't use Clorox XtraBlue products. They contain copper which is a huge problem for fiberglass pools. They seem to have an affinity for copper staining.

Do you understand the TFP method of pool care? There is no need to "shock" weekly as long as you are maintaining your FC level as you should be with your SWG.

Maddie :flower:
 
Hi seribus,
I hope you are doing well and staying safe. Being retired, it's not too much of a change for us. I wanted to check in and see how your pool is doing? We were never able to get Ecofinish to come back out. At the beginning of February he said they'd be out the next week. Now I can't get him to answer me. I'm assuming they are impacted by the pandemic and I'm not in a hurry so I'll contact him in a few months if I don't hear from him. Is your pool still good or has it started hazing again? We're switching over from tablets to SWG now in anticipation of getting in the pool in the next few weeks. Fingers crossed.
 
Hi! Doing good and glad you are. So far so good on pool. I'm using only non chlorine shock potassium monopersulfate and using trichloro-s-triazinetrione tablets in chlorinator. Been keeping FC levels between 1-3 ppm so far. Actually, I followed the ecofinish levels they gave me. Evidently, using the cal-hypo shock and having high level of FC caused my problem last year. Trying to stay lower and thinking about skipping salt this year. We'll see how it goes once it warms. Kinda nervous about shocking levels if it's that easy to fade. Can you think of anything that you think caused it?

 
Hi seribus,
This is the first I'm seeing the recommendations from Ecofinish. In fact, the guys doing the refinishing said I didn't need to do anything special for this finish. I've never used cal-hypo. I was testing my levels with the Taylor test kit last year and nothing seemed out of the ordinary. I did take in a sample for a test like they asked me and all the levels came back fine, except the FC was a little high at that point because we were switching over to the trichlor tablets for winter and forgot to turn off the SWG. That had only been that way for a week though. We just turned everything off and let it drift back down to normal. In fact, once we get our levels stabilized at the beginning of the season we typically don't have to do much else throughout the season except play around with the SWG if the levels get off. So I'm not quite sure what's causing it. We just switched back over to salt and turned on the SWG. The pH and alkalinity are a bit low so we're working on that, but otherwise everything else is OK. I don't think they really know what's causing it. I told them I wasn't in a hurry to get it refinished and that I wanted to figure out what is causing this before we do. I was willing to try some things with them, but they didn't take me up on it. The regional sales manager was talking to me for a little while, but then just stopped taking my calls. So, Tony is my only contact now. I'll try him again in another month or so and just see if I can get them to come back out and do what they did to your pool.
 
This is the first I'm seeing the recommendations from Ecofinish.
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They are bogus. Those numbers (carelessly "copied" from some other source) are so old school I would completely disregard them. Use the suggested values found here at TFP if you want to keep your pool properly.
 

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So far this year all I have done since it was a new fill back in Oct/Nov is I dialed in TA, now pH is bout 7.8 and shocked about three different times using that potassium monopersulfate shock. FC is is about 2.6 right now and using trichloro tablets in chlorintor. I ran my tests for CYA and CH and both are low as I expected and I haven't hurried to bring either up. I figured trichloro tbs would add CYA and wondering if I need to worry with CH? I have added CH in years past. I guess I will go back and check out TFP levels for fiber again.
 
seribus said:
So far this year all I have done since it was a new fill back in Oct/Nov is I dialed in TA, now pH is bout 7.8 and shocked about three different times using that potassium monopersulfate shock. FC is is about 2.6 right now and using trichloro tablets in chlorintor. I ran my tests for CYA and CH and both are low as I expected and I haven't hurried to bring either up. I figured trichloro tbs would add CYA and wondering if I need to worry with CH? I have added CH in years past. I guess I will go back and check out TFP levels for fiber again.
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My CH tends to go down to 100 ppm during the winter, but I bring it up around 200 ppm during the summer.
 
Hi seribus, I wanted to check and see if you were still having success with your pool. I finally got Tony to respond to me yesterday and found out that you can't use chlorine in the pool with the ecoFINISH product. That was the first I had heard that. I did look at the link you shared on 4/19/2020 and Tony also sent it to me. I guess I also didn't know about having to use these other McGrayel products. I was never given this literature and I would think it would be very important if you have to use a specific brand. Tony said it was Tallman Pool's responsibility to notify me which they never did. I now have a call into Tallman Pool's. You would think that would be something easy enough that they would have mentioned it when they were here redoing the finish just to have the bases covered. My husband even asked them if there was anything special we needed to do and they said no. So, as it stands now, I would have to pay $1K to have the surface redone. We'll see what happens when I can talk to Tallman Pool's. It doesn't seem like I should pay for something that I didn't know anything about. I mean that's a pretty big thing to not be able to use any chlorine in your pool. Tony did say that salt is OK but to keep it no more than 60% output. That's not in the literature. This has been a 4 year nightmare that I just want to go away!!
 
Dr Suess, you do know how ridiculous that claim by "Tony" is.....right? Chlorine is chlorine, whether from a bottle or a puck or a Salt Water Chlorine Generator. The finish of the pool doesn't know where that chlorine came from. Nor does it care how high or low you keep the percentage on the cell.

If anyone ever said that to me I'd have to distrust almost anything else they claimed to know about pools.

Maddie :flower:
 
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Hi Suess,

I didn't get any word about don't use chlorine. I talked to Tony this week to ensure I was doing what is suggested. I was told to stay away from cal-hypo specifically and definitely not toss shock or floating feeders with it in and let it set on surface. I have trichloro tablets in inline feeder and running between 1-4 ppm and my cya is at 55. I have TA up to 140 and just didn't mess with calcium hardness. It's low but I haven't brought it up. When I do shock which hasn't been but about 4 times this year (twice at open and just recently with heat), I use the oxi or chlorine free shock. My reason for calling Tony was thoughts of going back to salt but I stayed off this year to ensure it was staining of causing me extra issues. I'll take a picture but in summary my takeaway was stay away from cal-hypo because it's a bit more aggressive or unstablized? Don't have huge spikes in chlorine and leave it there for a prolonged time. Use the oxi type shocks and get TA, and pH in spec. I do use algaecide preventative just recently and been using clarifier as needed. I can't really see or notice much fading or issues so far. I imagine there may be some due to the pool takes direct sun all day. I plan on going back on salt next year but I just stayed off because in my head I thought maybe salt was giving me some kind of staining...lol. I'll post a pic shortly. Hope that helps. I didn't use any sequestering products. Maybe I should?
 
A couple pics from April and May. I will try to get something today for a comparison. I will add that EcoFinish isn't as shiny and deep pacific blue as the original gelcoat but I knew that. I also knew it would have a feel of a tangerine type surface. The original was almost the color of a budlight can. Also, the color isn't as uniform in appearance and you can see areas where its sprayed. Slightly darker in places and maybe more white specs in other areas. Almost like spry strokes but I saw that early on. More textured. Not the car like uniform finish of the original. I guess its hard to make it perfectly uniform across the whole surface in how they spray it in and torch it. I am not seeing those bands like you posted in the other post (yet). With Chlorine too high or if you leave shock laying on it you'll see a faded bleaching affect. It's definitely not tolerate to very high chlorine levels for extended periods of time. I stay on top chlorine ppm levels now. Don't mind the coping. I didn't hit it with sealant this year. Doing it every other year.

--- Early April

DJI_0053.jpg

--- Late May

DJI_0080.jpg
 
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