How low should I get my TA before adding borates?

[eneka]

Drained, acid washed, and filled the cracks in our pool with some epoxy last week and I've been working on adjusting the water after we refilled it (no longer leaks yay!, the pool was a total disaster this summer and eventually turned into a pond with all the new fill water wreaking havoc with the chemical balance, leaking DE powder, high water temperatures.)

All parameters are almost in check and I'm planning on adding borax+muratic acid once the TA is "good".

It's at around 90ppm right now and should be around 75ppm by later tonight after adding 1 gal of muratic acid and a full day of aeration.

My questions is, how low should I bring my TA to before I start the borates processes? I've read that it'll be harder to adjust once borates are in the pool and I see recommended levels for TA are 70-90+...should I lower it to maybe 60 because I'm doing borates? Will the borax+muratic acid increase the TA significantly?

I've bought 108 pounds of borax that's ready to be dumped in to bring it to around 50ppm, I'll need to pickup some more acid to go with it... Our local pool store is getting worried about how much acid I've been buying! hah


Current pool readings:

FC 5.5
CC 0
TA 90
CH 250
CYA 35
PH 7.0 (currently aerating to lower TA)

Plaster/28k gallons/DE filter/Bleach/SoCal

Our fill water has a TA of around 150, high pH (don't remember how much 7.8+?), and CH of ~250.

 

[ping]

Drop the TA down to 60 to 70 and then add borates. You will have to keep an eye on the TA level since you have fairly high TA and pH fill water. The best thing you could do might be to add a cover so you do lose that much water to evaporation.

The borates might give you a little time between acid additions but not on the overall amount of acid that will be needed to control the pH.

Adding borax will raise the pH and TA but that is why you need to add acid to control both of those parameters. If done right, the TA and pH should return to the starting point before adding borax.

Why do you want to add borates?

 

[eneka]

Why do you want to add borates?

mainly for the "better" feeling water, and slight algecedic properties. had some bad black algae issues before and hopefully having borates would keep the water chemistry more stable

 

[Uncle Salty]

I took my TA down to 60 before adding Borates, BTW, Boric Acid would've made the application process a little easier. It does make the water look and feel a little better IMO, and also aided in PH control which is what I was mainly after.

Salty