Day 5 of SLAM - CC fluctuating from 0 back up- why? Losing steam here....

[LgHorn]

I'm in Austin too and just went through a SLAM. Having just completed your pool last month and that you had no visible signs of algae, I can't foresee you'd have anything of substance growing behind your lights. I pulled out our lights (IntelliBrites) the other day and vacuumed and scrubbed them and the housings, but our pool is 1.5 years old and had some visible algae on the walls prior to SLAMming. Should have one screw on the top and the whole fixture comes out. The fixture is sealed, but water is behind the light and you will get algae growth in the housing if it gets the chance to take hold. My opinion: I'd do what you can to keep chlorine levels high until you get more reagent. Higher is better than lower and you probably don't want to loose all the ground you made and have to start over. I went through 20 gal of 10% the FIRST DAY, so it can definitely be both expensive and grueling. My recycle bin is overflowing with bleach bottles.

Even though I passed OLTC and CC Thu morning and then ran up to mustard algae levels to Fri, my FC level dropped rapidly afterward to 2.5 yesterday. I added enough bleach last night to get it up near 6.5 (didn't confirm because I was exhausted and crawled in bed), and when I checked mid-morning today it was 4.5. Today I'm going to vacuum the floor to waste, completely clean and recharge my DE filter, adjust PH (7.8 now) and get FC up to 6-7 tonight and hope it holds overnight. Believe my CYA was around 60 when I started (it's the hardest test to gauge) so I'll double check today too since this will be the 3rd time I've vacuumed to waste in a week and probably replaced 10% of the water. My TA is 130. No SWG, but I do have salt in my pool.

I really hope I don't have to SLAM again, and neither will you, so stay the course! I'd also suggest adding borates once you get everything balanced. It will really help with stabilizing things and reducing chlorine demand while deterring algae growth. I had 50 ppm last summer and it worked well. I just made the poor choice to get lazy half way through the summer and relied on pucks, my CYA went up around 120 and had to drain half the pool last fall. I have 55 lbs of boric acid on the way ($72 shipped) that I'll be adding once it arrives.

Beautiful pool, btw. What's your coping stone?

 

[LgHorn]

....

 

[TXSlater]

Well the drops just arrived. I probably jinxing myself, but I think we are good for now. The last time I tested on Friday (around noon), we were at 12 or 13 (ran out right as it was turning clear). We used the regular chlorine test right away to get a baseline color and it was dark yellow. We then cranked on the SWG at 80% 24/7 and retested after a few hours and the color was orange. We turned it down to 40% for the rest of the weekend and kept testing and getting the dark orange color, so assumed we were above 10. We easily got 4 inches of rain last night. Just tested and we are at 15 for chlorine and no CC. Turning the SWG off now to get chlorine below 10 and then hone in our percentages for the SWGW and get our pH in check. We will continue to test daily and if we see a drop in chlorine and rise in CC, will SLAM immediately to hopefully have a short SLAM.

Re: the gully washer we had last night, found out our overflow isn't working. The water is touching the coping. They are going to take a look at it this week. Good think he hasn't come by for his last payment . I have an idea how to autofill works, but not the overflow (Poolmiser) - seems counter intuitive for the water to go vertical up the pipe to the drain, which is above the water level.

Thanks for the compliment on the coping, LgHorn - it is an eased edge concrete coping in light grey. Very minimal. Hope you are done SLAMing, as well. No fun. I wouldn't have been so peeved if it were the beginning of the season or we had caused it due to neglect. I'm just convinced the pool service company either didn't know how to start a SW pool, or didn't care enough to do a good job (I'm assuming most pools they start up are standard chlorine that have the automatic puck injectors).

Thanks to everyone for all the tips. Really hope I don't have another SLAM question in the near future.

 

[LgHorn]

Yes, we did have a deluge! I, too, was wondering how all that rain water would effect my levels. Water level was up to our coping as well. Not unexpectedly, it threw the PH off, but easily adjusted with a little MA. I was pleasantly surprised to find TC was still at 5 and only had to add a bit to get it up to 7 where I'd like to keep it until my bottle of CYA reagent comes in later this week. So far, so good.

I think one of the main culprits of the high Cl demand, in addition to the algae, was my filter. I cleaned it before the summer season started and have backwashed a few times since due to all the organics we have around the pool (10 crape myrtles that drop tons of petals, leaves and seed pods in the pool) and our dog swimming for hours every day. Each time I recharged with DE at approx 80% volume as I have in the past. When I took the top off my filter I was shocked. The psi had barely moved since the last backwash (was only around 20 psi), but it was severely caked with DE, what I presume was dead algae (looked like sand), and small blobs of white slimy stuff that could have been mold...not sure. After vacuuming to waste again, I spent 2 hrs cleaning all parts of the filter well, reassembling, recharged and let the filter run and fill water run (I lost a few inches again from vacuuming). Had I known the amount of rain coming I could have just not filled! After sunset I tested and found TC was way low (under 1), so per Pool Math I added 1.5 jugs of 8.25% targeting TC of 7. Re-tested an hour later an got a TC of 12, nearly double my target. Not sure if the first test was off somehow as I don't think my pool volume is closer to 10k. So, after the 3-4" rain overnight, most of the afternoon in sun, and a handful of bathers in the afternoon (the human form; dog swimming most of the day), 24 hours later TC was still 5. If I was still fighting a pending algae bloom and the yuck that was in my filter, I'm pretty sure TC would've been closer to 0 after all that based on the plummets I saw in just an hour or two on SLAM day #1. I'll keep testing and adjusting daily, and if I only have to add in 1/2 jug or less of bleach daily, then that's acceptable. 1+ jugs becomes expensive, at least here where you can't find quality bleach for under $2.98/gal for 8.25%, or $3.22/gal for 10%. I'm debating whether to go with a Stenner injection system (if my Cl demand remains on the low end, say 1-2 ppm/day), or a SWG. I already have salt in my pool, maybe 2k ppm, but my only hesitancy is possible erosion of my flagstone coping. Anyway, that's another topic.

Your Poolmiser should have a drain line that's actually below your normal pool water level. The fill line may be at or just below your normal water level, but the drain line should be lower. It should drain out somewhere to return your level to norm and prevent an overflow of the pool. While we did get a LOT of rain and over many hours, I'd think the Poolmiser drain should've been able to keep up. We have a simple pipe drain from the pool wall under the deck and below ground under our yard; however, it will only drain to a certain point based on the saturation of the yard. In this case, almost nothing was draining until later in the day and even last night the water level was still mid-drain. It does sound like your PB needs to check your drain line and where it's emptying. If it's emptying underground, then the ground's saturation point will effect the drainage.

PB's know a lot more about building pools than maintaining them. Like pool stores, they try to sell you stuff you don't need (UV or ozone "sanitization" systems), etc. Our PB didn't even add any stabilizer/CYA to our pool on start up, just filled the inline feeder with pucks. Similar to you, we couldn't keep a Cl level. Thankfully, it was February and the water temps helped prevent a major problem until I tested the CYA level which was nada.

Good luck & enjoy your new pool!