Having more difficult time slamming than normal

[Zindar]

So part of it is when I took of my pool cover the stuff on top of it accidentally fell in to the pool... normally I try to prevent that. (I had the pool shut down for the winter.)

I did what I was supposed to... put the PH in range (I think it was 7.5 if I remember), and I saw my CYA was zero. It's odd that I typically lose CYA like that, while others have a problem with high CYA. Maybe with all the heavy rains we had, it took out the CYA. So I raised it up to 40 and then started SLAMming. It seems like it's been more than a week. Now admittedly I hadn't vacuumed it, so I'm guessing that's my problem. I tried going in there today, but the water is just too cold for me to want to go in there. I can't see the bottom as it's too murky, so I don't know what's on the bottom.

I tried running a leaf eater through there, and a bunch of dirt came up, so I think I could have dirt in the bottom. Then the net fell off, and since I can't see through the water, I don't know where the net is. Then I tried using my brush to just mix up the bottom, and the whole pool got noticably browner, and then I saw brown water coming out the jet.

So I figured maybe it needs to be backwashed, though I have been regularly backwashing. I did so, but the water coming out of the backwash didn't seem particularly brown... I hope the filter is working okay. (I have a sand filter.) Maybe it's just that with that much stuff in my water it can't all get caught be the filter so it comes out again in the eyejet? At this point I just mixed up the water as best I could in hopes that the pumping action will run it into my skimmer, and hopefully as long as I regularly backwash the water will get purer? I hope so. I just expected to see dirtier water coming out when I backwashed.

 

[Texas Splash]

Well my TFP neighbor to the north, it sounds like (for now) your biggest issue is that you're really not following all the SLAM Process instructions to the letter. That will certainly prolong things. Of course you do need to brush frequently and certainly vacuum the crud off the floor. If it's real bad, you can vacuum to waste for a short bit, but one way or the other it all has to get picked-up.

Then there's the testing. It would be nice to see a full set of tests from you - probably tomorrow since we just lost our light. The one thing that has me concerned is that you had no CYA at opening. So before doing anything else tomorrow, I would post a full set of results so we can get an idea of what's happening. Don't add much of anything right now except perhaps for some regular bleach.

If it turns out your water needs a lot of love, you may opt to replace a good bit of it, but we'll come back to that tomorrow. Also, next time you backwash, make note of the clean pressure for us. Have a good evening.

 

[Divin Dave]

If the water is that dirty, it will take forever for only the filter to clean it out. Manual vacuum will be your friend.

 

[Casey]

You can make leaps and bounds by slowly vacuuming to waste and getting as much leafy debris out of the pool as possible. I know how hard this can be but you'll blow through your SLAM by diligently removing everything you can before you start. It took me 2 days of vacuuming to waste and refilling before I started mine.

 

[Mendy48]

You need to vacuum, brush, brush, vacuum and vacuum (etc). Scoop out as much junk on the surface as well as on the bottom. I don't know your current pool chemistry, so if you could post your results for FC, CC, CYA, pH and TA that would be great. Continue to add chlorine/bleach to your pool. Continue vacuuming and brushing your pool. However, lets get an understanding of your current pool chemistry, so please post your results here and we'll take it from there for sure.