Hi all, I am a relatively new pool owner and I'm having some real struggles with cloudy water this year. Everything was fine (water was super clear) until I followed the pool store's advice and treated for phosphates (I have since read here and other places that phosphates aren't that big of a deal if your Cl is fine).
The treatment turned the water a cloudy blue and it has not cleared up in almost 2 months now. Every test I have taken since shows proper chemistry (albeit with elevated phosphates), but I cannot get the cloudiness to go away!
I run my pump 24/7 on the following schedule, calculated to move ~60k gal. in 24 hrs.
60gpm x 6 hrs
40gpm x 3 hrs
35gpm x 15 hrs
Last test results:
FC - 2.4
TC - 2.6
pH - 7.7
CH - 320
TA - 140
CYA - 60
NaCl - 3000
Phosphates ~ 1000 (Taylor phosphate test kit, similar to what pool store test shows)
Things I have done:
Following pool store recommendations, treated 4k phosphates with Pool Juice Zero phosphate remover (turned pool from clear and nice to cloudy)
Following pool store recommendations, after 2 days circulating phosphate remover through filter, backwashed and treated with Pool Juice 911 (told it would clear the cloudiness)
1 week later, retest water at pool store, phosphates dropped to about 1.4k - told to basically repeat steps 1 and 2 above, which I did.
Another week passed, no clearing of the water, phosphates down to about 1k.
Overnight chlorine loss tests show 0.5 to 1ppm loss
Tried adding flocculant to settle the suspended particles, after two doses and waiting 48 hours with pump off, no settling occurred, no clearing happened.
Did a major deep clean of the filter using HTH sand cleaner (2 bottles added directly to filter sand, soaked overnight), then backwashed and then performed deep cleaning of sand using garden hose and really moving my arm through the sand to get all the dirt up and out.
Added a bit of DE to my skimmer basket per instructions on this site, opened filter later and observed DE atop sand bed.
Ran for another week or two, no change in water clarity. Was told by pool guy that I should continue to treat the phosphates, added another 4 oz of phosphate remover, waited, no change in clarity, phosphates still just under 1k.
Because the equipment was put in place in 2008, decided maybe filter sand was super old and should be replaced. Removed all filter sand and replaced with bed of pea gravel and 450lbs of new #20 silica sand, ran for 2 days, no changes. (I should note that the pressure and flow really didn't change from the sand change out, so I'm assuming my sand was mostly OK still)
I'm at a loss at what to do next aside from draining the pool. I've read about the SLAM process, and I'd like to try that, but I'm super concerned about the very high levels of Cl going through my heater, which specifically says high Cl over 5ppm will damage it and void the warranty.
The pool is covered almost all the time with an autocover. The dolphin pulls up small bits of calcium flakes ejected from the SWG, some bugs, and some small amounts of plant debris that falls in at the end of the cover, but that's it.
After the suggestion to raise FCL to 5ppm here I've put the SWG back into superboost mode and will test again tomorrow
The treatment turned the water a cloudy blue and it has not cleared up in almost 2 months now. Every test I have taken since shows proper chemistry (albeit with elevated phosphates), but I cannot get the cloudiness to go away!
I run my pump 24/7 on the following schedule, calculated to move ~60k gal. in 24 hrs.
60gpm x 6 hrs
40gpm x 3 hrs
35gpm x 15 hrs
Last test results:
FC - 2.4
TC - 2.6
pH - 7.7
CH - 320
TA - 140
CYA - 60
NaCl - 3000
Phosphates ~ 1000 (Taylor phosphate test kit, similar to what pool store test shows)
Things I have done:
Following pool store recommendations, treated 4k phosphates with Pool Juice Zero phosphate remover (turned pool from clear and nice to cloudy)
Following pool store recommendations, after 2 days circulating phosphate remover through filter, backwashed and treated with Pool Juice 911 (told it would clear the cloudiness)
1 week later, retest water at pool store, phosphates dropped to about 1.4k - told to basically repeat steps 1 and 2 above, which I did.
Another week passed, no clearing of the water, phosphates down to about 1k.
Overnight chlorine loss tests show 0.5 to 1ppm loss
Tried adding flocculant to settle the suspended particles, after two doses and waiting 48 hours with pump off, no settling occurred, no clearing happened.
Did a major deep clean of the filter using HTH sand cleaner (2 bottles added directly to filter sand, soaked overnight), then backwashed and then performed deep cleaning of sand using garden hose and really moving my arm through the sand to get all the dirt up and out.
Added a bit of DE to my skimmer basket per instructions on this site, opened filter later and observed DE atop sand bed.
Ran for another week or two, no change in water clarity. Was told by pool guy that I should continue to treat the phosphates, added another 4 oz of phosphate remover, waited, no change in clarity, phosphates still just under 1k.
Because the equipment was put in place in 2008, decided maybe filter sand was super old and should be replaced. Removed all filter sand and replaced with bed of pea gravel and 450lbs of new #20 silica sand, ran for 2 days, no changes. (I should note that the pressure and flow really didn't change from the sand change out, so I'm assuming my sand was mostly OK still)
I'm at a loss at what to do next aside from draining the pool. I've read about the SLAM process, and I'd like to try that, but I'm super concerned about the very high levels of Cl going through my heater, which specifically says high Cl over 5ppm will damage it and void the warranty.
The pool is covered almost all the time with an autocover. The dolphin pulls up small bits of calcium flakes ejected from the SWG, some bugs, and some small amounts of plant debris that falls in at the end of the cover, but that's it.
After the suggestion to raise FCL to 5ppm here I've put the SWG back into superboost mode and will test again tomorrow
You seem to have a K-2006, so step #1 would be to stay far away from the pool store. We know phosphate removes can sometimes cause cloudiness, but your water has been cloudy for much too long. You mentioned doing an OCLT previously. How long ago was that? Did you follow the 
