Excellent. Post up your test results when you start and provided you’re going to proceed to slam and not drain, just do a quick check to test the FC holding as follows to save yourself any headaches/lack of progress later on.
Though we refer to this as the ammonia test, it’s actually not really much different than a normal slam except you test and add chlorine a lot during your first hour to see rate of loss. The important thing to note is that you aren’t bombing the pool, just bring it up to level, then again, then again...feeding the chlorine this way if there is ammonia just helps clear the ammonia without dosing your FC so high that it would damage the liner.
But make sure your filter is running to do this so the chlorine mixes in. At the start of the slam you’ll need to watch the pressure on your filter and backwash it every so often.
Normally you backwash any time the filter is 25% above its clean pressure but you’ll have no way of knowing what that is so let’s just say arbitrarily to backwash it at 20 psi.
If the pressure drops a lot check your pump basket for debris, the Re-prime and restart pump. Sometimes crud gets in the pump basket. If you need more deets, let us know
With mine, we kept the drain line 3/4 closed in the beginning to avoid clogs, but left the skimmer line wide open.
At any rate, here’s the ammonia check startup.
Have lots of plain, unscented, no additives bleach on hand. Bleach mfgs add so much stuff to their bleach now days I’m tempted to tell you to get trade pool bleach/liquid chlorine from a pool store...higher percentage too. It’s up to you but just read the label carefully - no additives or they’ll foam and muck up your water.
Ammonia steps record
Diagnosing:
1. Test CYA level and record result
2. With pump running, dose FC to Shock
SLAM Process per level per Pool School - [fc/CYA][/fc/cya] then retest FC after 10 minutes. If FC level drops by more than 50%, then proceed with treatment for ammonia.
Treatment for Ammonia:
1. Begin a SLAM and dose FC up to SLAM level. Do not add additional CYA at this point.
2. Retest FC at 10-minute intervals.
a. If FC loss is greater than 50%, add FC to bring back up to SLAM level and continue retesting FC @ 10-minute intervals.
b. IF FC loss is 50% or less, add FC to bring back up to SLAM level. Go to Step 3.
3. If CYA is below 30 ppm, add enough CYA to bring level up to 30 ppm.
4. Continue SLAM as directed in the SLAM article until the SLAM Criteria of Done are met. Test as directed in the SLAM article - no longer need to test FC at 10 minute increments at this point