Controlling The PH

[epechart]

Hello....here I am again this year, struggling with controlling the PH.
Here are my numbers:
FC: 5
TC: 6
CC: 1
CH: 300
TA: 110
CYA: 35
Chlorine (Bleach) 3
PH: 8.2 (I just topped off the water with city water, however, the PH rises rather quickly even without topping it off.)
I have been using muriatic acid to keep the PH within the acceptable range, but will continued use of muriatic acid be harmful to the pool?

 

[Texas Splash]

but will continued use of muriatic acid be harmful to the pool?

Not at all, as long as the pH doens't go really low which obviously not a problem for you. Just stick with it. Each time you apply MA to lower the pH, it should also lower the TA. Your TA can afford to come down a bit more which should help to slow the rise of pH and keep it more steady. As long as there are no other sources of aeration to increase pH, the continued use of acid should help.

By the way, you probably know your CC is elevated. Keep an eye on that for the next day or two. Maybe give your water an extra kick in the shorts wiht some bleach (7-9 ppm) and let the sun oxidize it today. See if that helps. If not, you may want to do an Overnight Chlorine Loss Test.

 

[Richard320]

I'd expect the pH to be a royal Pain with the high TA you have.

I finally got sick of constant acid additions, plus my CH is really high, so I spend a day lowering TA. The aeration part was easy for me --- just run the spa full tilt and let it spill over. You may have to get more creative. Now that TA is generally in the 60-70 range, I only need to add acid when I top off water.

The high CC might be from the tap water you added. Lots of water systems use chloramines. Sunlight should clear it out.

 

[epechart]

Thanks for both of your replies....I've been making a mistake by not being concerned with the TA. For some reason I was using a range of 110-120??? I'm not sure where I got those figures. Now looking at the pool math chart I see it says 70-90+ (not sure what the plus means).

I'll work on lowering the TA....perhaps that's been a lot of my problem.
Thanks again.

 

[mknauss]

The chart does say 90+. That means if other factors do not require it, TA above 90 is no issue. But, you have rising pH that you do not like, so a lower TA is applicable. Same if you are monitoring CSI, a lower TA can be advantageous.

 

[Texas Splash]

70-90+ (not sure what the plus means).

Just means that your TA could be in that 70-90 range, but above it may be okay as well ....... IF ... it's not influencing other things like a pH rise. Next time use enough acid to lower the pH to about 7.0-7.2 and it should suck the TA down a bit quicker. Once you get the TA to the 70-80 range watch the pH and see if that helped.

 

[epechart]

Thanks again for both of your replies....I didn't understand the 90+ but that makes sense with my PH problem. I see pool math has a range of 70-90+ but the instructions in my test kit says 100-120. I thought I was ok at 110. I'll definitely work on the TA. Thanks again. I also have to read up on CSI....I'm not clear on that.