Iron stains - an $850+ adventure (so far...) - Need help

[reggiehammond]

As for the 10% walmart - this may be coincidence but the walmart Chlorine was not as effective (e.g., not clearing the water as quick or at all) and yes, cost-effective using 12.5% unless 10% is on same (I bought them on sale in the past but ended up spending more to get the 12.5% instead ). For example, 1 or 2 gallons of 12.5% worked beautifully but when I poured in 10% (a bit more obviously and based on pool math app), nothing happened. And some of the dates of the walmart (at least around here in NJ) chlorine seemed "old" whereas the pool store gets basically weekly (at least) delivery. Again, my "bad experience" may have been just coincidental (e.g., other chemicals not balancing). I am willing to try again.

I would just mentioned that the Pool Essentials brand is one of the most common sources, sold at Walmart, Home Depot, Hardware stores, etc. It's not a suspect source, provided it's not long-aged or heat damaged. The same can be said for 12.5% too - it actually degrades faster.

But - if 12.5% is available from an easy source at a good price, then heck yes, that's great. Less jugs is a definite benefit.

 

[cledee]

Are you allowed to fully drain a concrete pool? I know you have to watch the ground water level otherwise it can push your pool out of the ground.
I would do an AA treatment but I would not add any metal sequestrant and completely drain the pool if you are allowed to do it. Again I'm not sure, I know you can run into issues if your ground water is high.
Then I would refill back up and add a metal sequestrant.

As for the 10% walmart - this may be coincidence but the walmart Chlorine was not as effective (e.g., not clearing the water as quick or at all) and yes, cost-effective using 12.5% unless 10% is on same (I bought them on sale in the past but ended up spending more to get the 12.5% instead ). For example, 1 or 2 gallons of 12.5% worked beautifully but when I poured in 10% (a bit more obviously and based on pool math app), nothing happened. And some of the dates of the walmart (at least around here in NJ) chlorine seemed "old" whereas the pool store gets basically weekly (at least) delivery. Again, my "bad experience" may have been just coincidental (e.g., other chemicals not balancing). I am willing to try again.

As for the ascrobic acid, my pool improved a bit with more doses of sequestrant (used GLB this time but i typically use Jack's Purple) - mine is definitely iron. I thought I learned a lot over the years here but I didn't realize / recognize that ascorbic acid DOES NOT eliminate iron / rust stain at all and will eventually come back (hence using sequestrants to "bind" iron.

You have to check the dates since anything older than 1 month will degrade, so the 10% from Walmart could be 8% or even 6% by the time you buy them. But you can verify this by adding chlorine at night and testing it in the morning. If I'm adding 12.5% LC and I only add half a gallon, I should expect to add 3.5 ppm of Chlorine in my 18K gallon pool, but if it's lower than that, and I have no CC, then obviously the product has degraded a little.