Hello from Long Island, NY

[jojocommi]

Hi Guys,

I am new to this forum and to pools in general. I recently moved to Long Island in a 50+ year old house with an inground pool that severly required maintenance.

The pool was apparently closed for about 2-3 years and when I opened it up sometime in May, it was a pit of liquid darkness with a smell of death. I had a pool contractor give me options on what could be done, apparently all that was required was a new liner and a second drain to be installed.



Fast forward to now and the pool looks great:

I took a sample of the water to my local pool guy and buddy and these are the results:

FC: 0
PH: 7.2
TA: 90
CA: 100
CYA: 0
Salt: 300

Not sure what to make of it myself, but I was told to add shock if anyone were to go swimming (no one has yet). So far the pool has only had 4 chlorine tablets but I just had an SWG system installed and the salt was added yesterday.

Apparently my pools fills up with about 30,000 gallons of water and I was told to add 10-13 40lbs bags of pool salt. Since this is the first time using the SWG system, according to instructions, I am supposed to run the pool pump 24hrs without the SWG on and then turn on the SWG and run the pump another 24 hours.

I will be testing tomorrow when the SWG has had enough time to run and determine a proper salt ppm.

If anyone has any suggestions, or can correct me on what I am doing incorrectly then please feel free to share your thoughts of just say hi.

Thank you

 

[jblizzle]

Welcome to TFP!!!

Step 1: Invest in one of the Recommended Test Kits so you KNOW the actual levels. You may want to add a test for the salt as well. I recommend the TF-100 as the better value.

Step 2: Get some chlorine in the pool!!! Add at least 2ppm using bleach and maintain the FC level with bleach until your SWG takes over.

Step 3: You need to get some stabilizer in the pool. For a SWG you will want 70-80ppm. Do it is 2 steps though. Add 40-50ppm in a sock, wait a week and test. Then add the rest. Realize that the tablets are adding CYA in addition to the FC ... but they are very slow.

Use PoolMath to calculate dosages for you.

How much Pool School have you read? Start with these:
ABCs of Water Chemistry
Recommended Pool Chemicals
How to Chlorinate Your Pool

 

[jojocommi]

Welcome to TFP!!!

Step 1: Invest in one of the Recommended Test Kits so you KNOW the actual levels. You may want to add a test for the salt as well. I recommend the TF-100 as the better value.

Step 3: You need to get some stabilizer in the pool. For a SWG you will want 70-80ppm. Do it is 2 steps though. Add 40-50ppm in a sock, wait a week and test. Then add the rest. Realize that the tablets are adding CYA in addition to the FC ... but they are very slow.

Thank you for your reply and for your suggestions. I've only read the Read this BEFORE and the ABC's of water, will look at the pump/filter maintenance and the basic pool care sections soon.

Step 2 done, step 1: where do I get these kits? Locally I have Leslie Pool Store and one general mom & pops pools store. Online, I am usually an Amazon buyer but I mostly see pool supply store website come up more often. If you could provide links or local store names that I could search around my area, I would really appreciate that.

Step3 a sock? Is this in the pool school section? Any videos on this procedure since it is the first I ever heard of doing it this way.

Thanks for all the help and suggestions, I will do my best to learn, absorb and share what I learn.

 

[jblizzle]

The recommended test kits are very rarely found locally (only if you have a commercial supply shop). The recommended TF-100 is only sold by www.tftestkits.net ... the owner, Dave, also owns this forum ... but it is the superior test kit regardless of affiliation.

Any old sock or t-shirt. Either put the sock in the skimmer or tie it so it hangs in front of the return jet. The idea being you want to know when it is dissolved and not just dump it into the skimmer & filter and then have to worry about losing it if you need to clean the filter.

 

[Casey]

Get the TF100 at tftestkits.net and dump the CYA in a sock and knot it to keep the contents in the sock and throw it in the skimmer (keep pump running) or hang over the return.

You do not want to let the pool go. It looks so nice! Keep reading and learning so you can keep the pool looking as beautiful as it does now!

 

[jojocommi]

Bought the test kit and it will prob take 2 days to get to me so in the mean time I will have to do with what came in the aqua rite box.

I am thinking of purchasing the liquid stabilizers for now just to get the pool at the levels it has to be. I would have purchased the required chemicals by now but the pool store closed by the time I was able to get there.

I checked the Aqua Rite SWG system and took down these numbers:

1. Poll temp 82 F
2. 31.7 V
3. 0.00 Amps
4. 68 P (desired output)
5. - 0
6. AL-0 (Aqua Rite)
7. r1. 1.59 (version)
8. t-15 cell type

The SWG system was installed by a pool contractor and the salt was recently added (yesterday), when I look at the panel it says 1100 and the check salt, inspect cell lights are lit. I am not sure why there is no current and why the generating process is not kicking but I will see what I get when I add the required chemicals. In the meantime could you briefly explain what I should be looking for in a 28800 gallons pool. I read on the pool school section of SWG that the cell may not be doing its job b/c of the lack of CYA.

- - - Updated - - -

Get the TF100 at tftestkits.net and dump the CYA in a sock and knot it to keep the contents in the sock and throw it in the skimmer (keep pump running) or hang over the return.

You do not want to let the pool go. It looks so nice! Keep reading and learning so you can keep the pool looking as beautiful as it does now!

Thank you! I will get the CYA first thing in the morning, sadly not that easy in my area even though most houses have pools.

 

[jojocommi]

Hi Guys,

Just letting you know that I added the CYA today via the sock method, 4lbs currently in the pool, 4lbs more tomorrow.

Problem that will not go away is that the SWG system has the following lights on;
Check Salt, No Flow, Inspect Cell.

The salt level is currently at 2900 (will wait one more day to see if more salt is being dissolved otherwise I will add another 2-3 bags).

I inspected the cell and gave it a quick rinse but it was not needed since it was clean (the SWG is new so cleaning is not required yet).

Any ideas on what I can do? Should I make a new thread on SWG section?