First Timer

[chadly08]

Hello all:

I was lucky enough to move into a new home in the greater St. Louis area last Sept and it happened to have a pool! It’s 20k gallon vinyl with SWG. We kept it open through Sept and Oct and utilized the pool store for our testing and chemical guidance.

The pool has been close the last 5 months and I’ve been doing a bunch of research to try and eliminate the pool store from my maintenance routine. We actually experienced great water the two months we had it in the late summer, it just seemed costly and a burden to be driving to the pool store every week.

Through some research I stumbled upon this site and have been reading a bunch of the articles and old archived threads. Well I’m excited as this week our pool will be opened and I’ll begin the journey of maintaining it without the pool store.

I got a Taylor 2006 test kit and performed my first test to get an idea of what I’ll be working with once this thing is open. Here are my results:
FC: 0.5
CC: 0.5
Ph: 7.4
TA: 80
CH: 130
CYA: 50
Salt: 2400
Temp: 56*F

The water is clear so I’m thinking I’m not going to have too much trouble getting this balanced. It seems to me the most immediate need is salt. Is this something I can dump in before the pool company comes to open everything up? Obviously it’s going to get even more diluted once the guy adds fill water so salt is going to be needed. Will it dissolve completely in cold water that isn’t being circulated?

The other immediate need seems like it’s the FC. Is this something I can let the SWG do it’s thing on once everything is up and running or am I going to need to poor some bleach in?

My guess is the pool company is going to drop dry shock in when he gets everything opened up. With where my CYA is at is that such a bad thing?

Thanks I’m advance for your experience and guidance. This site has me excited about taking care of my pool this summer.


Best,
Chad

 

[YippeeSkippy]

Hi there Chad, welcome and congrats on the new home

You sound like you have a good grasp on what to do for opening. If the pool guys use powdered chlorine to open that's fine.. You can handle a bit more CYA as you say. But it might instead contain calcium which you could take or not, vinyl doesn't need it.
Do a CYA test of your water after you take the sample in the house and let it warm up. I may be different from previous result if that was done with cold water.

Go ahead and dump the salt in. Use Pool Math but only put in about 3/4 of what is recommended. You don't want to overshoot. Mix it up, give it a day to dissolve with the pump on, then re-test.

ALWAYS bring your FC up to goal level with Liquid Chlorine, then let the SWG maintain it. A SWG works too slowly to build up your FC before algae has a chance to take hold.

Maddie