First water test with TF Test Kit

[carzt95525]

After already spending hundreds of dollars opening my pool and using the water testing and recommended chemicals from my local pool store, my pool is green and looks worse than when I started. That is when I found Trouble Free Pool. I received the new test kit today and here are my current results:
FC 5
CC 1.5
CH 200
TA 70
CYA 80
CL 5
PH 6.8
Br 10

I put these numbers into the pool math chart and it recommends that I add soda ash and baking soda. I read in a thread that you can add PH up (sodium carbonate) and that will take care of both issues. Am I understanding that correctly? If so, how much should I add? Is there anything else I should be doing? Thank you so much for your assistance!

 

[mknauss]

Welcome! If your pool is green, you need to adjust pH to 7.2 with washing soda. However, before that, with a CYA of 80, we would recommend draining at least half of your water to reduce the CYA to one more manageable for a bleach chlorinated pool. Be careful how you do that with a vinyl pool. Do not want the liner to shift.

See pool school -- lots of great info. After you get your CYA down, you will need to SLAM -- Pool School - SLAM - Shock Level And Maintain

I am sure others will be joining in! Take care.

 

[waskydiver]

Your CYA is high... but not obscene.

Two choices: Drain 1/2 your water and refill and get it to a lower CYA. Or significantly increase your chlorine targets.

You need to get the chlorine level up to shock level and then hold it there. if you don't drain and refill, you are going to want to get it up to 31.

Use liquid chlorine (bleach) only. Get rid of all pucks and "shock" you may have gotten from the pool store.

I would probably just add some baking soda to increase your TA up to about 100. That should make your pH drift up. I'm not a big fan of chasing numbers for the sake of getting all the numbers right. You end up playing whack a mole.

I'm thinking if you just get your TA up... and get your pool to shock level (with or without draining), things should start to stabilize.

 

[carzt95525]

Thank you both for your quick replies! I am taking this all in and am very grateful for the assistance!