Lung damage from chlorine?

[TomAtlanta]

Is there much danger of lung damage from doing every day pool maintenance? If you use powder shock I know a little of the dust gets in the air. Is that enough to cause lung damage?

 

[Newdude]

The only two that you have to reasonably watch out for are the fumes from Muriatic Acid and D.E. If it’s disturbed and creates a dust cloud. The rest are easy enough to simply not huff them.

 

[red-beard]

Breathing the dust from cal-hypo is not fun and not good for you. HCL fumes are far worse. And DE is really bad, as the jagged edges stick in the lungs!

Everyone has a mask these days. Use it when you put cal-hypo into the pool.

 

[TomAtlanta]

What is DE?

 

[JamesW]

Is there much danger of lung damage from doing every day pool maintenance? If you use powder shock I know a little of the dust gets in the air. Is that enough to cause lung damage?

Don't breathe the dust and don't mix different types of chlorine in the same container.

Never mix chemicals.

Never mix different chemicals together. Mixing different chemicals can create very dangerous, toxic and explosive results. Mixing calcium hypochlorite with anything is one of the most dangerous types of mixtures. Finally, if the choice is to alternate between stabilized and unstabilized...

www.troublefreepool.com

 

[Orion7319]

I use an RZ dust mask to add DE to my sand filter, or cal hypo or any powdered chemicals to the pool. I also wear it when I cut the grass or blow off pollen with my leaf blower. I use a respirator that’s rated for gas, chemical splash goggles and PVC gloves to add MA. I measure what I need in a Pyrex measuring cup and add it to a bucket of water and then dump it in the pool. Sounds like a pain, but it’s not really that much of a hassle. In my younger days I didn’t really mess with respirators and safety gear that much, and now I figure it’s probably best to try and mitigate as much of the damage I’ve probably done to myself years ago.

 

[red-beard]

What is DE?

Diatomaceous Earth. Little fossil skeletons used to clean pool water. You do not have a DE filter

 

[JamesW]

I measure what I need in a Pyrex measuring cup and add it to a bucket of water and then dump it in the pool.

A good rule is no glass by the pool.

 

[Orion7319]

Diatomaceous Earth. Little fossil skeletons used to clean pool water. You do not have a DE filter

I don’t either, I have a sand filter and I add the predetermined amount every time I backwash. It along with running my VS pump 24/7 really has helped my sand filter tremendously.

 

[Orion7319]

A good rule is no glass by the pool.

I don’t have it by the pool. I add the MA to the bucket of water far away from it in the grass. Don’t want to break the glass or spill full strength acid on my painted concrete pool deck.

 

[red-beard]

I have a 1 gallon plastic Rubbermaid pitcher which I marked various liquid levels. No chance of breakage...

 

[Orion7319]

I have a 1 gallon plastic Rubbermaid pitcher which I marked various liquid levels. No chance of breakage...

Edited post:
That’s a good idea. I do want a larger measuring cup for the MA. You do have to be careful of what plastic you use with MA and I’m finding it a bit difficult to find measuring cups made from plastics that are safe to use with MA that have all the different measurements printed on it that I like. I’m going to get a larger glass measuring cup.

https://sitefiles.camlab.co.uk/RTP_instructions/Plasticomp.pdf

 

[jseyfert3]

I use a respirator that’s rated for gas, chemical splash goggles and PVC gloves to add MA.

WARNING! This does not sound like a good combination of PPE. I remember @JoyfulNoise warning about almost exactly this to someone. If you can't smell the MA fumes because of a half face respirator, then you can easily get eye damage that would have been avoided by you moving at the first whiff of smelling the fumes.

Post where someone got eye damage because they wore a half face gas respirator. Adding Acid - DON'T DO WHAT I DID! - Now I Am Off to the Doctor

And a quote about proper (and improper) PPE when handling MA from @JoyfulNoise from a different thread.

As others have stated, handling muriatic acid carefully is important but there is way too much fear surrounding the fumes and smell. First off, the odor threshold for MA is A LOT lower than any acute toxic inhalation threshold. The odor threshold of HCl is ~ 5ppm in air, the acute inhalation toxicity (LC50, or lethal concentration that kills 50% of a subject group) is over 3100ppm with a 1-hr exposure time in rats. So, you can see that any toxic effects require over 600 times the amount of HCl that you can smell and you need to inhale that level of HCl for over an hour. A simple whiff of the vapors will do no harm to you (but it might clear your sinuses on a bad pollen day....).

As for personal protective equipment (PPEs), here's what I learned in my many years of OSHA Industrial Hygiene & Safety training classes - it is better to wear no PPEs at all than to wear the wrong PPEs. You should NEVER wear any form of dust mask or mouth/nose covering with muriatic acid as you can actually make the exposure worse by trapping vapor in the mask and rebreathing them. The only suitable form of a mask for high concentration acid exposure is a full-face fitted SCBA mask (like the kind firefighters wear when going into a burning building). You are far better off wearing NO MASK AT ALL, then putting a dusk mask over your nose and mouth and potentially causing yourself more harm. The same goes for goggles - the correct eye protective wear are simple, splash resistant safety glasses. You want something over your eyes that allows vapors to harmlessly pass through them but that will protect your eyes against an inadvertent splash. Fully fitted lab googles are the wrong choice. As well, if you were ever to get an acid splash in your eye, the best thing to do is jump into the pool water and use your fingers to hold your eye lids open while under the water - your pool is like a giant eyewash fountain.

Edited post:
That’s a good idea. I do want a larger measuring cup for the MA. You do have to be careful of what plastic you use with MA and I’m finding it a bit difficult to find measuring cups made from plastics that are safe to use with MA that have all the different measurements printed on it that I like. I’m going to get a larger glass measuring cup.

https://sitefiles.camlab.co.uk/RTP_instructions/Plasticomp.pdf

Interesting. I checked and my graduated measuring cups I've been using for chlorine and acid for over a year now are PP. I don't see any signs of damage though. I'm guessing this is because I'm only briefly measuring and not storing acid in them.

 

[Orion7319]

WARNING! This does not sound like a good combination of PPE. I remember @JoyfulNoise warning about almost exactly this to someone. If you can't smell the MA fumes because of a half face respirator, then you can easily get eye damage that would have been avoided by you moving at the first whiff of smelling the fumes.

Post where someone got eye damage because they wore a half face gas respirator. Adding Acid - DON'T DO WHAT I DID! - Now I Am Off to the Doctor

And a quote about proper (and improper) PPE when handling MA from @JoyfulNoise from a different thread.



Interesting. I checked and my graduated measuring cups I've been using for chlorine and acid for over a year now are PP. I don't see any signs of damage though. I'm guessing this is because I'm only briefly measuring and not storing acid in them.

Thanks for the warning! Honestly that has me considering going back to using dry acid and risk trashing the salt cell. I used it for a year before I learned that it could damage my salt cell. I have a TCEll 940 which apparently is more robust then a standard T-15, it might hold up to sulfides much better then a standard cell, but I don’t know really. I did use it for an entire season with dry acid and it still works fine. I do wish that they made a cell that could handle dry acid. I don’t know how to gauge how much MA I have used by using the dip the bottle in the pool and pour method. I know that I can be 10ft away from a bottle of open MA and the fumes really burn my nose. Would a full face respirator be considered safe? Here is a video from a manufacturer and how they say to add MA. They do measure it, but they also aren’t wearing respirators or splash googles just safety ones. I use the splash goggles that completely seal the sides to prevent splashing from the sides. Yes the PP will slowly dissolve over time. Eventually they fail, but I have no idea how long that will take.

 

[Orion7319]

Would this be an appropriate mask to use? The price isn’t that bad considering the alternative if it’s safe to use.

Amazon.com: 3M Full Facepiece Reusable Respirator 6800, Paint Vapors, Dust, Mold, Chemicals, Medium : Tools & Home Improvement

Amazon.com: 3M Full Facepiece Reusable Respirator 6800, Paint Vapors, Dust, Mold, Chemicals, Medium : Tools & Home Improvement

www.amazon.com

I use these filters for my half mask and would just use them with the full mask.

3M P100 Respirator Cartridge/Filter 60928, 1 Pair, Helps Protect Against Organic Vapors, Chlorine, Hydrogen Chloride, Sulfur Dioxide, Hydrogen Sulfide, Hydrogen Fluoride and Particulates: Safety Respirator Cartridges And Filters: Amazon.com: Tools &

3M P100 Respirator Cartridge/Filter 60928, 1 Pair, Helps Protect Against Organic Vapors, Chlorine, Hydrogen Chloride, Sulfur Dioxide, Hydrogen Sulfide, Hydrogen Fluoride and Particulates: Safety Respirator Cartridges And Filters: Amazon.com: Tools & Home Improvement

www.amazon.com

 

[mknauss]

@Orion7319 I suggest you watch the Video of the Meet the Expert session from last weekend. See

. There is discussion about dry acid, muriatic acid, etc that starts about half way through.

 

[Bperry]

Measuring cups? Doesn’t anyone else eyeball this stuff? It’s supposed to be “trouble free”!

 

[Orion7319]

@Orion7319 I suggest you watch the Video of the Meet the Expert session from last weekend. See

. There is discussion about dry acid, muriatic acid, etc that starts about half way through.

So just eye protection is recommended then.

 

[mguzzy]

to add MA. I measure what I need in a Pyrex measuring cup and add it to a bucket of water and then dump it in the pool. Sounds like a pain, but it’s not really that much of a hassle.

That sounds like a lot of opportunity for spillage. That is four containers you are changing through (jug>measuring cup>bucket>pool) for the MA not including the effort to move the final container to dump it in the pool. Also you are dumping the MA into a smaller volume of water and hence less dilution. Just go straight from the jug to the pool. One container change and highest final dilution all in one step. If you are at arms length and up wind you are in no danger of getting "fumed". I mark the jug (while its closed) with the amount of MA I need to add.. it gives me a line to shoot for. Pore it slowly, in a pencil sized stream (that insures no splashing) in front of a jet. When I get to the line I'm Done! And adding MA is not analytical chemistry.. you don't need to measure to the bottom of the meniscus to the closest milli-liter. Unless you are adding to a much smaller body of water (ie a spa), you will never know the difference if you are off by a few ounces either way.

 

[Orion7319]

That sounds like a lot of opportunity for spillage. That is four containers you are changing through (jug>measuring cup>bucket>pool) for the MA not including the effort to move the final container to dump it in the pool. Also you are dumping the MA into a smaller volume of water and hence less dilution. Just go straight from the jug to the pool. One container change and highest final dilution all in one step. If you are at arms length and up wind you are in no danger of getting "fumed". I mark the jug (while its closed) with the amount of MA I need to add.. it gives me a line to shoot for. Pore it slowly, in a pencil sized stream (that insures no splashing) in front of a jet. When I get to the line I'm Done! And adding MA is not analytical chemistry.. you don't need to measure to the bottom of the meniscus to the closest milli-liter. Unless you are adding to a much smaller body of water (ie a spa), you will never know the difference if you are off by a few ounces either way.

I understand that you don’t need to be exact, but how exactly do you know where to mark the jug?