Hello from Middle Tennessee about 25 miles southeast of Nashville. This is a historical record of my Pool Store Schooling. We purchased a new pool in 2011 and we’re told the glories of the Perma Salt system, add one bag of this every two weeks and one bottle of this every week check the water with these test strips and that’s the only maintenance required for this system. I had never owned or maintained a pool before so this sounded perfect. In hindsight TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE and everyone knows what that means. The first season the pool water appeared to be crystal clear and I loved the low maintenance routine of checking the water once a week and dumping the bottle after checking. Set the reminder on the phone to remind me every two weeks to dump the bag of magic powder and we we’re in bliss. Of course the copper and Perma Salt system was not making my daughters blonde hair turn a shade of light green it must be the neighbor’s chlorine pool doing that. We closed the pool that fall following the pool store system and when we pulled the cover off in the spring I was amazed that we had an above ground cow cooling pond. The only thing missing were frogs and lily pads. The pool store said I waited to open the pool too late and the abundance of early rain was the problem so after a bottle of algaecide and several trips to the pool store for chemicals and advice, several weeks later the pool finally cleared up but never had the same crystal 
clear look as the year before and always seemed to have little spots of algae reappearing almost immediately after I vacuumed the pool and the bottom of the pool had a slippery texture it did not have the year before. I now know why. We repeated the same cycle in the fall and spring with the same summer results. I know the definition of insanity right but it still had to be the neighbor’s pool turning my daughter’s hair green and now causing her swimmers ear infections because I replace the copper cartridge every year and follow the “System” for maintaining the pool chemical levels. The next fall I decided not to cover the pool and opening the pool was easier but soon after we discovered we had occupants in our pool called backswimmers. You guessed it they enjoyed the pool much more than we did all summer. I went on backswimmer hunting expeditions daily and the only advice I got from the pool store was I need to add more algaecide (which they were happy to keep selling me) to kill the algae because that’s what these critters feed on. Needless to say the only thing that got rid of them was Mother Nature and something called winter. Now we are caught up to the day earlier this year when I was searching the web for Perma Salt system chemicals and stumbled upon the holy trinity for pool owners, This Web Site. After reading thread upon thread I felt like I had to stand up and admit “Hello my name is Scott and I have been Pool Schooled”. I must admit after taking several days to read through the Pool School steps I was convinced and made the leap of faith to convert to the TFP method of pool maintenance. I began this process in mid-April and purchased the Taylor TF-100 Test Kit and got to work. I can’t believe the difference and now know one other thing that takes care of backswimmers. I’ve made some mistakes in the process, for one thinking my initial SLAM was complete before I passed the overnight loss test. I am currently in my second SLAM effort but am fully confident I will be successful this time. Before I began this 2nd attempt all my readings we’re holding steady except my FC which was dropping like a rock which lead me do the overnight loss test every night to determine what was going on. I was dropping 6-10 ppm on consecutive nights thus my 2nd SLAM attempt. First night loss this week was 8ppm, second night loss 4ppm, last night loss 1.5 ppm so I now know patience is a virtue and I think I’m one night away from success.
Last readings this morning at 7:00am were:
FC – 19.5 shooting for 20 for my shock level. 22ppm last night at 9:00pm
PH – 7.5
TA – 110
CH – 75
CYA – 50
CC – 0
Copper < 0.3 using the strips provided by the store at the time we purchased the pool.
Thus concludes my journey to a trouble free pool and I will keep you updated on true pool bliss this summer. A couple of pictures are attached. Thank you for one great informational web site.
clear look as the year before and always seemed to have little spots of algae reappearing almost immediately after I vacuumed the pool and the bottom of the pool had a slippery texture it did not have the year before. I now know why. We repeated the same cycle in the fall and spring with the same summer results. I know the definition of insanity right but it still had to be the neighbor’s pool turning my daughter’s hair green and now causing her swimmers ear infections because I replace the copper cartridge every year and follow the “System” for maintaining the pool chemical levels. The next fall I decided not to cover the pool and opening the pool was easier but soon after we discovered we had occupants in our pool called backswimmers. You guessed it they enjoyed the pool much more than we did all summer. I went on backswimmer hunting expeditions daily and the only advice I got from the pool store was I need to add more algaecide (which they were happy to keep selling me) to kill the algae because that’s what these critters feed on. Needless to say the only thing that got rid of them was Mother Nature and something called winter. Now we are caught up to the day earlier this year when I was searching the web for Perma Salt system chemicals and stumbled upon the holy trinity for pool owners, This Web Site. After reading thread upon thread I felt like I had to stand up and admit “Hello my name is Scott and I have been Pool Schooled”. I must admit after taking several days to read through the Pool School steps I was convinced and made the leap of faith to convert to the TFP method of pool maintenance. I began this process in mid-April and purchased the Taylor TF-100 Test Kit and got to work. I can’t believe the difference and now know one other thing that takes care of backswimmers. I’ve made some mistakes in the process, for one thinking my initial SLAM was complete before I passed the overnight loss test. I am currently in my second SLAM effort but am fully confident I will be successful this time. Before I began this 2nd attempt all my readings we’re holding steady except my FC which was dropping like a rock which lead me do the overnight loss test every night to determine what was going on. I was dropping 6-10 ppm on consecutive nights thus my 2nd SLAM attempt. First night loss this week was 8ppm, second night loss 4ppm, last night loss 1.5 ppm so I now know patience is a virtue and I think I’m one night away from success. Last readings this morning at 7:00am were:
FC – 19.5 shooting for 20 for my shock level. 22ppm last night at 9:00pm
PH – 7.5
TA – 110
CH – 75
CYA – 50
CC – 0
Copper < 0.3 using the strips provided by the store at the time we purchased the pool.
Thus concludes my journey to a trouble free pool and I will keep you updated on true pool bliss this summer. A couple of pictures are attached. Thank you for one great informational web site.
