Low Chlorine and high Ph in new saltwater pool

[Bennie]

Hey guys, I'm new to the site and my pool was built in February of this year. I have a 20,000-gallon saltwater pool with Pentair equipment which includes the IC40 chlorinator. The Chlorinator is running at 80% 16 hours a day running pump at 2100. The pool has a connected spa with run off that runs directly in the pool. I took a sample of my water to Leslie and they said everything is balanced correctly. The CYA, Total Hardness, Ph, free chlorine and phosperate is all balanced correctly. But I have to add liquid chlorine in my pool almost daily. My pool has direct sunlight at least half of the day with 100 degrees temperature living in Houston, Tx. No trees. The two-story house blocks the sun during the evenings. Also, my ph keeps rising and have to pour muriatic acid every 3 days to keep it below 7.8. A couple of weeks ago, I poured boric acid (50 stabilizer) to buffer my ph a little. but that seems to not work at the moment. I understand my graphite pool is still curing and maybe releasing ph into the water. I hope the ph will eventually slowdown from me pouring muriatic acid every 2 or 3 days. I have a Sutro pool monitor to check my chemistry plus the stirps. My ph and low chlorine needs to be addressed. Please, help me guys. Thanks...

 

[Texas Splash]

I took a sample of my water to Leslie and they said everything is balanced correctly.

That's the problem right there. Pool store testing is often way off the mark and their advice not much better. We highly recommend you test your own water. There are two kits we recommend, either a TF-100 (link in my signature) or Taylor K-2006C. Either one will work, but you must have one.

As soon as you can get one and post a full set of results, we can coach you from there. We can't guess on chemistry, so for now continue to add some liquid chlorine as needed to try and keep the FC in a reasonable range of about 5 ppm or so. We'll know more with good test results.

In the meantime, be sure to see our Pool Care Basics for lots of great info to include test kit comparisons.

Welcome to TFP!

 

[Jimrahbe]

I took a sample of my water to Leslie and they said everything is balanced correctly. The CYA, Total Hardness, Ph, free chlorine and phosperate is all balanced correctly.

Ben,

I highly doubt that anything is balanced the TFP way.

Tell us what the Pool $tore says your CYA is.. Without knowing your CYA level, there is no way to know if your FC is too high or too low.

If your cell is running 16 hours a day at 80% it should be adding about 4.5 ppm of FC to your water each day.

That should be more than enough so that you should not need to add any Liquid chlorine at all.

My guess is that you have almost zero CYA which is allowing the sun to quickly consume the chlorine that your cell is making..

Or, your water is cloudy or green, meaning you have algae... Algae will consume chlorine much faster than the cell can produce it.

Adding MA to your pool is an inconvenience when new, but it is not that big a deal. A pH of anything in the 7's is ok, so I would only add more acid when the pH is 8.0 or above. I don't see this as your most important issue right now.

What is tell you to "But I have to add liquid chlorine in my pool almost daily."... ???

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[Bennie]

Ben,

I highly doubt that anything is balanced the TFP way.

Tell us what the Pool $tore says your CYA is.. Without knowing your CYA level, there is no way to know if your FC is too high or too low.

If your cell is running 16 hours a day at 80% it should be adding about 4.5 ppm of FC to your water each day.

That should be more than enough so that you should not need to add any Liquid chlorine at all.

My guess is that you have almost zero CYA which is allowing the sun to quickly consume the chlorine that your cell is making..

Or, your water is cloudy or green, meaning you have algae... Algae will consume chlorine much faster than the cell can produce it.

Adding MA to your pool is an inconvenience when new, but it is not that big a deal. A pH of anything in the 7's is ok, so I would only add more acid when the pH is 8.0 or above. I don't see this as your most important issue right now.

What is tell you to "But I have to add liquid chlorine in my pool almost daily."... ???

Thanks,

Jim R.

Thabks

Ben,

I highly doubt that anything is balanced the TFP way.

Tell us what the Pool $tore says your CYA is.. Without knowing your CYA level, there is no way to know if your FC is too high or too low.

If your cell is running 16 hours a day at 80% it should be adding about 4.5 ppm of FC to your water each day.

That should be more than enough so that you should not need to add any Liquid chlorine at all.

My guess is that you have almost zero CYA which is allowing the sun to quickly consume the chlorine that your cell is making..

Or, your water is cloudy or green, meaning you have algae... Algae will consume chlorine much faster than the cell can produce it.

Adding MA to your pool is an inconvenience when new, but it is not that big a deal. A pH of anything in the 7's is ok, so I would only add more acid when the pH is 8.0 or above. I don't see this as your most important issue right now.

What is tell you to "But I have to add liquid chlorine in my pool almost daily."... ???

Thanks,

Jim R.

my last results from Leslie pool Supply:
Cya-55
Calcium H-275
PH-73
total alkalinity -90
Free chl-3.2
Phosperate-1003
total chlorine -2
copper-0
iron -0

 

[Bennie]

That's the problem right there. Pool store testing is often way off the mark and their advice not much better. We highly recommend you test your own water. There are two kits we recommend, either a TF-100 (link in my signature) or Taylor K-2006C. Either one will work, but you must have one.

As soon as you can get one and post a full set of results, we can coach you from there. We can't guess on chemistry, so for now continue to add some liquid chlorine as needed to try and keep the FC in a reasonable range of about 5 ppm or so. We'll know more with good test results.

In the meantime, be sure to see our Pool Care Basics for lots of great info to include test kit comparisons.

Welcome to TFP!

Ok. I'm gone to look into purchasing my own test kit. Taylor K -2006C. Thanks, and will test and upload my test results after receiving the kit.

 

[Bennie]

Ben,

I highly doubt that anything is balanced the TFP way.

Tell us what the Pool $tore says your CYA is.. Without knowing your CYA level, there is no way to know if your FC is too high or too low.

If your cell is running 16 hours a day at 80% it should be adding about 4.5 ppm of FC to your water each day.

That should be more than enough so that you should not need to add any Liquid chlorine at all.

My guess is that you have almost zero CYA which is allowing the sun to quickly consume the chlorine that your cell is making..

Or, your water is cloudy or green, meaning you have algae... Algae will consume chlorine much faster than the cell can produce it.

Adding MA to your pool is an inconvenience when new, but it is not that big a deal. A pH of anything in the 7's is ok, so I would only add more acid when the pH is 8.0 or above. I don't see this as your most important issue right now.

What is tell you to "But I have to add liquid chlorine in my pool almost daily."... ???

Thanks,

Jim R.

My water is very clear. Never cloudy so for! lol. Thanks for your help. I really appreciate it. that was my results from Leslie pool supply. don't know if the results are accurate because my pool is giving different feedback. Also, I cleaned the chlorinator, and it didn't have much calcium inside. Chlorinator is producing chlorine. also, Its very hot in Houston, the humidity is very high.

 

[Texas Splash]

Ok. I'm gone to look into purchasing my own test kit. Taylor K -2006C. Thanks, and will test and upload my test results after receiving the kit.

Perfect!

my last results from Leslie pool Supply:
Cya-55
Calcium H-275
PH-73
total alkalinity -90
Free chl-3.2
Phosperate-1003
total chlorine -2
copper-0
iron -0

Since you appear to have some CYA, we are concerned you have an algae issue in the making. Once you receive your test kit we can help you confirm. In the meantime, I would recommend adding about 5 ppm worth of liquid chlorine each day. The PoolMath APP can help you with the dosage amounts if you aren't sure. Look for the "Effects of Adding" section in that app.

Other than that, don't try to do too much until the kit arrives. We'll walk you through everything from there.

 

[Bennie]

Perfect!


Since you appear to have some CYA, we are concerned you have an algae issue in the making. Once you receive your test kit we can help you confirm. In the meantime, I would recommend adding about 5 ppm worth of liquid chlorine each day. The PoolMath APP can help you with the dosage amounts if you aren't sure. Look for the "Effects of Adding" section in that app.

Other than that, don't try to do too much until the kit arrives. We'll walk you through everything from there.

Ok . Thanks a lot . U guys a life saver …

 

[Jimrahbe]

Ben,

Here is a good example of Pool Store testing..

Total Chlorine (TC) = Free Chlorine (FC) + Combined Chlorine (CC)

The pool store tests shows that your Total Chlorine (TC) of 2 is less than your Free Chlorine (FC) which is 3.2, which is impossible.

About CYA.. With a CYA of 55 (Which we round up to 60) your Target FC should be about 6 with an absolute minimum of 3 ppm. So basically you have about half the amount of FC in your pool that you need to keep algae at bay.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[bligh]

Hi Ben .. Welcome to TFP
You have got some very good advice already, the only reason I'm posting is because we have similar situations.
I have a 20,000 gal salt water pool and run my saltwater generator @ 20% for 12hrs daily, and my pool stays crystal
clear with very good test results.

Pool stores are in business to make money (yours) & don't care about much else .. if they can sell you something for them it's a win.
one of the most horrible things they sell is bad information, that's expensive for you.

Get your test kit ... post your results everything will be OK in no time.

Thanks
W

 

[Bennie]

Ben,

Here is a good example of Pool Store testing..

Total Chlorine (TC) = Free Chlorine (FC) + Combined Chlorine (CC)

The pool store tests shows that your Total Chlorine (TC) of 2 is less than your Free Chlorine (FC) which is 3.2, which is impossible. How can 2 be less than 3.2?

About CYA.. With a CYA of 55 (Which we round up to 60) your Target FC should be about 6 with an absolute minimum of 3 ppm. So basically you have about half the amount of FC in your pool that you need to keep algae at bay.

Thanks,

Jim R.

Oh ok. U think I need to shock the pool? And do u recommend non chlorine shock?

 

[Bennie]

Hi Ben .. Welcome to TFP
You have got some very good advice already, the only reason I'm posting is because we have similar situations.
I have a 20,000 gal salt water pool and run my saltwater generator @ 20% for 12hrs daily, and my pool stays crystal
clear with very good test results.

Pool stores are in business to make money (yours) & don't care about much else .. if they can sell you something for them it's a win.
one of the most horrible things they sell is bad information, that's expensive for you.

Get your test kit ... post your results everything will be OK in no time.

Thanks
W

Thanks . I will keep you updated .

 

[Jimrahbe]

do u recommend non chlorine shock?

Ben,

No I don't...

If you want to quickly raise your FC just use Liquid Chlorine.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[MITBeta]

U think I need to shock the pool?

recommend adding about 5 ppm worth of liquid chlorine each day. The PoolMath APP can help you with the dosage amounts if you aren't sure.

 

[Bennie]

ok guys I tested my water.
New Saltwater pool -20000 gallons with attached spill over spa
Gunite concrete-plaster
swg Pentair I40
Total Chlorine - 3.14
Free Chlorine -3.14
Ph -7.1
TA-78 ppm
Cyanuric Acid-58
Calcium Hardness-247
Salt-3300
Phospates-1440
My Ph and TA changes by the hour and pouring half of bottle or more liquid chlorine daily. pool water is clear. No Aglae visible.