New (and ambitious) pool owner looking for advice.
I finished construction of a pool a couple of months back (13K Gallon, IG plaster, Nature2 Trichlor, Cartridge Filter, Jandy VSP Main pump, Gas Heater, 3 additional water feature pumps) and decided to try out a pool service agreement with the pool company. The service is for 1 visit a week in which the pool technician will clean the skimmers, brush the pool and check and adjust the pool chemistry. They charge me around $200 dollars each month for this service. As an added "incentive" they will extend my pool warranty from 1-year to 3-years if I keep this service contract (is this actually worth it?).
Nevertheless I'm pretty unhappy with the maintenance the pool company is doing to the pool. Even after brushing the pool will still have stuff on the bottom, the skimmers don't get particularly full (and cleaning them is extremely easy) but most damning of all, they are doing a terrible job with pool chemistry. I've had to add MA to the pool myself to keep the pH at around 7.7 (pH has gone as high as 9), I've run out of chlorine during the week (and then they put 12 trichlor tabs on the Nature2), they are not keeping an eye on CH (which is too low already), nor CYA (which last week was 121 forcing me to dump a ton of water out of the pool. But after going through 12 trichlor tabs just in a week, what could I expect).
So, unsurprisingly, I've decided to take care of the pool myself. Since I have an interest in industrial control systems I came up with a plan on how to take over the maintenance that is slightly different from the recommendations here (in terms of mechanisms, not chemistry) and was looking for feedback from more knowledgeable people.
I finished construction of a pool a couple of months back (13K Gallon, IG plaster, Nature2 Trichlor, Cartridge Filter, Jandy VSP Main pump, Gas Heater, 3 additional water feature pumps) and decided to try out a pool service agreement with the pool company. The service is for 1 visit a week in which the pool technician will clean the skimmers, brush the pool and check and adjust the pool chemistry. They charge me around $200 dollars each month for this service. As an added "incentive" they will extend my pool warranty from 1-year to 3-years if I keep this service contract (is this actually worth it?).
Nevertheless I'm pretty unhappy with the maintenance the pool company is doing to the pool. Even after brushing the pool will still have stuff on the bottom, the skimmers don't get particularly full (and cleaning them is extremely easy) but most damning of all, they are doing a terrible job with pool chemistry. I've had to add MA to the pool myself to keep the pH at around 7.7 (pH has gone as high as 9), I've run out of chlorine during the week (and then they put 12 trichlor tabs on the Nature2), they are not keeping an eye on CH (which is too low already), nor CYA (which last week was 121 forcing me to dump a ton of water out of the pool. But after going through 12 trichlor tabs just in a week, what could I expect).
So, unsurprisingly, I've decided to take care of the pool myself. Since I have an interest in industrial control systems I came up with a plan on how to take over the maintenance that is slightly different from the recommendations here (in terms of mechanisms, not chemistry) and was looking for feedback from more knowledgeable people.
- Bring water chemistry to the recommended balance on TFP (pH: ~7.7, FC ~7, CYA: 45, CH: 450, TA: 70)
- Stop using Trichlor on the Nature2 (and remove the Mineral Cartridge)
- Move to using Liquid Chlorine for chlorination
- Add Borates to the pool (for the pH buffering effects)
- Get a Pool Robot to do the brushing and vacuuming of the pool.
- Use a pH probe to measure pH continuously (correcting for Temp).
- After it goes above the setpoint (7.75) dispense enough MA using a peristaltic pump to bring it down to 7.6 (taking into account the delay between dispensing the MA and the probe reading it). The injection point would be on the pool return, after pump, filter and heater, but before the Nature2 Chlorinator. Injection would only happen with the pump running on High and the pump would keep running for another hour after dispensing.
- Install a Peristaltic pump to dispense a fixed amount of Liquid Chlorine into the pool return (near the injection point for MA) every night at 10pm (after sun-down). I would calculate the amount based on how much ppm I lose every week (doing this calculation daily seems excessive). Same as above, dispensing LC would happen only with the pump running on high.
- Every week do basic tests (pH and FC) using a TF-Pro and confirm probe readings. Manually clean skimmers
- Every month do additional TA, Calcium and CYA tests.