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Hello Everyone,
Thank you for helping me address the problems my pool water is having.
I have ordered the TEST KIT... it will be here in four days. Until then, the vinyl pool has been drained below the returns and I've scrubbed the white slime away from the lights and returns.
I was thinking of putting 6 bags of calcium hypochlorite in the pool ( mixing it with water first) to the still drained pool (below the returns)and running the pool via just the main drain until the test kit gets here.
 
Cal-Hypo adds calcium that a vinyl pool doesn't need. Plain bleach (not Chlorox) or liquid pool shock is what you need. Liquid pool shock is just concentrated bleach. Please read the pool school section when you have a chance. Our advice will make more sense.

You have a big pool so draining below the returns isn't going to help much unless you intend to do it over and over again. Not what you wanted to hear I know. I didn't like it when I was told the same thing. I finally just drained the pool until the shallow end had 12"-18" of water left. This helps hold the liner in place while new water is added. My water is trucked in so this wasn't an easy decision but it had to be done.

The alternative is to put a pump in one end and a fill line in the other. As long as you don't mix the water too much you can balance water in with the water out. There is more to this but I won't go into details unless you ask.
 
Fun, don't try to do too much before your kit arrives. Wait until you can run your own tests. Otherwise, you may just end-up wasting chemicals. Just add about 1/2 gallon of regular bleach each evening to the water. That's all for now. Minimal costs and time just to try and keep things from getting worse. Once we see your own test numbers, you'll find out quickly how effective this can all be. In the meantime, read those links I gave you before and spend some time reviewing those references so that your brain isn't on overload four days from now. :crazy: It will make better sense to you. Good job on the test kit. Make sure to show which kit you ordered to your signature with all of your pool and equipment info.
 
Great news on the test kit! You're on the right track now.

Follow what Texas Splash told you, then when your kit comes test your water. Lower the CYA if you need to, then follow the cleanup method I outlined for you. You'll be mold-free before you know it! :hug:
 
Wobblerlorri said:
But to be helpful, if your CYA is 150, draining your pool halfway then refilling it will bring it to 75 ppm, 80 rounded up. If you have a SWCG that's a comfortable range. If you run just chlorine, you'll need to drain your pool by half again, then refill to bring your CYA to 40, which is prescribed for chlorine only pools. There is no chemical which will lower CYA.

We'd love to help you further! That means getting your own test kit and filling out your signature with your pool information: type of pool, size, equipment, and type of test kit. You can access your sig by clicking on your name in the upper right corner, then clicking
Click to expand...
Wobblerlorri said:
But to be helpful, if your CYA is 150, draining your pool halfway then refilling it will bring it to 75 ppm, 80 rounded up. If you have a SWCG that's a comfortable range. If you run just chlorine, you'll need to drain your pool by half again, then refill to bring your CYA to 40, which is prescribed for chlorine only pools. There is no chemical which will lower CYA.

We'd love to help you further! That means getting your own test kit and filling out your signature with your pool information: type of pool, size, equipment, and type of test kit. You can access your sig by clicking on your name in the upper right corner, then clicking Signature.
Click to expand...
Wobblerlorri said:
Great news on the test kit! You're on the right track now.

Follow what Texas Splash told you, then when your kit comes test your water. Lower the CYA if you need to, then follow the cleanup method I outlined for you. You'll be mold-free before you know it! :hug:
Click to expand...
Trying to find the signature section to fill out...but it doesnt look like I can do that from a smart phone.
 
Funinsun, I'm fairly new here myself. But what I can tell you is this. The best pieces of advice I received was to get a proper test kit (good job on that) and to switch to only liquid chlorine! You've said you have two pool stores, they should carry 1 gallon bottles of 12.5% strength liquid chlorine. You'll be glad you made the switch!!
 
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I have a few thoughts and questions.
I played with 2 red solo cups.. added fresh water to the exact amount of pool water...cya is still 100 ( so says the dip stick..waiting for my Taylor kit due Thursday b4 8 pm) so I then added another exact amount of fresh water to the mixed solo cup ...finally got a dip stick reading of 30-50. Yay sorta right..?. So in all my wisdom.. don't laugh too loud.. I am draining my 20 x 40 to only be a foot in the shallow end. Then plan on adding bleach to the remaining water & putting my good old dolphin cleaner in there to mix it. Then tomorrow start filling it with house water without the softener water.
Thought this might be a good idea because I can wade in the water and scrub the lights and returns and skimmers of the white mold.
Good or bad thought process?
Just have to have the pool ready by Sunday funday fathers day. No pressure right?!? Thanks a million for your input!
 

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If you decide to do a major exchaneg of water, the worse thing that can happen is you have the added expense of new water on next month's bill. Not the worse thing. Just be careful about how low you go since your water table may be slightly elevated from winter and rains. The last thing you want is for the pool supports or liner to move and come loose.

I would be careful about putting too much bleach in the standing water, even with the Dolphin. Unless you know the exact amount of gallons remaining, you don't want the FC too high on the liner. Scrubbing in advance is a good thing. Once your test kit gets here, post all those results and there will be no more guesswork.

HINT: Taylor kits typically show FC testing wth a 25ML sample size. Instead, use the 10 ML water sample size as follows ...
"10 ML water sample with one generous scoop or powder (from the FAS-DPD). Add R-0871 drops one at a time until clear and divide number in half. i.e. 8 drops equals an FC of 4."
 
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Bleach is fine to clean the fittings. Just watch the concentration. It should be mixed with water. Think of it as doing the laundry. You don't add much bleach to a load of laundry. Maybe a cup of bleach to several gallons of water? I don't really know. I'd clean it and rinse with water ASAP. You don't want to damage the liner.
 
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To disinfect you put 1 cup of household bleach in 5 gallons of water. Household bleach is generally about 6% bleach. So you will want to put 1/2 cup of 12.5% bleach in 5 gallons, or about 3/4 cup 10% in 5 gallons to get a disinfecting cleaner. Scrub on, let sit 2 min ( this is important to get through the slime layer), then rinse off.

it's a daunting task, but I think it's a good way to procees.
 
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My Taylor 2006C fas-dpd test arrived. Yay...sorta.
I can't tell what my chlorine is.. I filled the large side to the 25ml mark added two scoops of dpd powder. It turned a very pale pink. I added one drop of 0871 and it turned clear. I added 0003 five drops and it turned light pink again.
My pH was 7.4
TA was 22 drops of 009
Cal Hard 44 drops of 0012
CYA .... barely any and i lost sight of the black dot ( on the side it has a small marking of 18 if that helps.

Pool looks clear & sparkly.
I did drain it twice.. down to the the top of the lights once and filled to the bottom of the skimmer. Then drained again to the lights and filled just to the skimmer to work.
I've removed the tri chor tablets two days ago. Used calcium hypochlorite 6 bags at 75% at 2 hour intervals.. no chlorine showing today on test strip this morning.
Its a vinyl pool.. 20x40 deep end 9 1/2.

While pool was drained by main drain.. i went in and cleaned behind both lights and cleaned steps and returns and built in ladder with a tooth brush ..seriously a tooth brush. Because there was always a white mucus stuff growing around lights and the trim work of the ladder and returns.

Tested water just a few minutes ago with my new kit... so pool was always running with main drain and returns but only using the skimmers for about 20 mins before I did the testing.

I did take two samples to Leslie's and Arvdisons
First is leslie second is Arvdisons

FC 0. 0
TC 0. 0
CH 320. 253
TA. 130. 107
PH 7.5. 7.4
TDS 1200. 1400
 
First off- stop bothering to take samples to pool stores! You can clearly see how wrong they get it.
Start trusting your own testing.

-You have zipola on FC apparently, and <edited> high CYA. Without CYA in the water your FC gets burned off quickly by the sun.
-Stop using Cal-hypo bags- you're going to cause calcium build up problems if you continue using them.
-Use liquid chlorine or bleach (plain, unscented, non thickened, no gimmicky ingredients)
-Did you perform the CYA test outside, with your back to the sun and holding the tube waist high?? Get someone to help you by doing it with you....perhaps reading the instructions to you slowly as you perform the test and confirm what you see is what they see also?
-Keep your water moving so all the chlorine you add is being well circulated.

Thanks for keeping us updated.

Maddie :flower:
 
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I've recently opened a new AGP (2 weeks old) and here is what I did
  1. add liquid chlorine up to 6 ppm per PoolMath
  2. Add CYA per PoolMath
  3. Not worry about anything else until CYA and FC were within spec.
Now that I have FC holding steady at 6.0 ppm and CYA holding at 40 ppm, everything else has settled to the point I can measure and adjust.
  1. I don't care about CH because I have a vinyl pool
  2. pH is low at 7.4, will add Borax to raise it per PoolMath
  3. TA is high, aerating the pool should take care of that. I have a little solar powered fountain that will aerate quite nicely.
I test FA and CYA everyday just to make sure it's holding -- I'll move CYA testing to once a week here shortly and eventually to once a month.

Test everything for the first week or so to get it all in there, and so you learn to use your kit. Then as your pool gets dialed in, you'll be confident in your testing and can tweak things as you like. You'll also wonder why you trusted the PS with your testing when it's so easy to DIY!

To me, testing is part of the fun of having a pool, along with tweaking the chemistry. You also learn your pool -- for example, mine holds pretty nicely at FC of 6.0 to 6.5 and CC of 0.5 or less. CYA is happy at 40. Now I have to get pH and TA talking together. Fun!!

Give yourself time to learn to test. You'll love it after a while!
 
YippeeSkippy said:
First off- stop bothering to take samples to pool stores! You can clearly see how wrong they get it.
Start trusting your own testing.

-You have zipola on FC apparently, and low or non-existant CYA. Without CYA in the water your FC gets burned off quickly by the sun.
-Stop using Cal-hypo bags- you're going to cause calcium build up problems if you continue using them.
-Use liquid chlorine or bleach (plain, unscented, non thickened, no gimmicky ingredients)
-Did you perform the CYA test outside, with your back to the sun and holding the tube waist high?? Get someone to help you by doing it with you....perhaps reading the instructions to you slowly as you perform the test and confirm what you see is what they see also?
-Keep your water moving so all the chlorine you add is being well circulated.

Thanks for keeping us updated.

Maddie :flower:
Click to expand...
Hi Maddie
My CYA is apparently very high.. it only took a small amount of the mixed liquid to put into the small tube and I couldnt see the black dot. So it is past the 100ppm.
I only went to the stores to have them run testes because I wanted to compare with my new kit (which still wasnt here until early evening.)
Your very right as it was a waste of my time. Leslie said add 4 gallons of there chlorine. And Arvdisons said 30 bags of 75% calcuim hypochlorite.
BIG BIG difference.
My chlorine is zero..zip zlech. I cant keep it to register.
Why is the pool look so clear and clean?
 
Also the CYA at Leslie's was 190 and at Arvidsson it was 139
My kit couldnt read it because it only reads 100 ppm or less and my liquid fogged up the black spot before it ever came close to the 100 dash. Literally like ten drops of water and the spot disappeared.
 

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