Need some basic advice -TA, pH, CH, FC all things chemical

[Newdude]

the pool would be a maintenance nightmare.

It more or less is.

We have (through science guided experience) found the way to reduce alot of headaches, but while there is some leeway to the program, it's still pretty strict.

Ignore any parameter of TFPC from the frequency of testing, the accuracy of the testing, the regular brushing or stray too far below the reccomended FC levels per CYA and you are on the bullet train to Swampville.

Doesn't that mean that SWG-pools get collateral "Mini-SLAMs" from time to time? Maybe not at full SLAM-FC, but probably for a couple of days somewhere between target-FC and SLAM-FC.

I caught mine running away in the high teens more times than I can count. 3 -4 cloudy days in a row was all it took sometimes.

Could any of those mini SLAMs have nipped something brewing in the bud ? Like Algae growing on the walls from forgetting to brush for 3 weeks ? It's very possible.

 

[SoDel]

That makes sense. I’m dialing mine in now and there are ebbs and flows depending on rain, sun, cloud. if that’s what’s happening, the danger might be somebody dialing it in after a few cloudy days and then getting a lot of rain dumping OM from the atmosphere, or full sun for several days. I guess that’s on them, as the advice seems to be check FC every day.

I still like my secondary sanitation theory. Everything blowing through a typical binary SWG cell gets a jolt of Cl. Kiils everything. Lower residual is not going to be noticed and is likely adequate for sanitation in a residential pool.

 

[Newdude]

I guess that’s on them, as the advice seems to be check FC every day.

Exactly. It's also on them for cutting things too close. I appreciate those who wish to watch it like a hawk near minimum. But I know my attention span and it's not hawk like at ALL. Or my side jobs as a Teen Uber / band conert goer / errand runner gets in the way, so I allow myself some wiggle room.

 

[SoDel]

It more or less is.

We have (through science guided experience) found the way to reduce alot of headaches, but while there is some leeway to the program, it's still pretty strict.

Ignore any parameter of TFPC from the frequency of testing, the accuracy of the testing, the regular brushing or stray too far below the reccomended FC levels per CYA and you are on the bullet train to Swampville.

I caught mine running away in the high teens more times than I can count. 3 -4 cloudy days in a row was all it took sometimes.

Could any of those mini SLAMs have nipped something brewing in the bud ? Like Algae growing on the walls from forgetting to brush for 3 weeks ? It's very possible.

That’s really what I’m “afraid” of. The bullet train. Once it starts, the descriptions read like grabbing a rope tied to a highway speed truck. You ain’t going to stop it.

FC in the teens seems ok to me (assuming presence of CYA). Plenty of headroom. FC at less than around 12% CYA with pH around 7.8+ (c’mon. Every SWG owner sees 7.8 to 8.0 routinely) is, IMHO, below the level that we “know” (do we know?) kills algae (0.05 ppm HOCL). Can we go lower — of course. Do we want to? I see risk.

 

[Newdude]

That’s really what I’m “afraid” of. The bullet train. Once it starts, the descriptions read like grabbing a rope tied to a highway speed truck. You ain’t going to stop it.

It doesn't take long to get away from you. But after a couple of months on the TFPC wagon, you are just at one with your pool. You still test but you know what's it's going to say. When there is an occasional surprise, you fix it uneventfully, long before it becomes an issue. You feel all important that day being needed for a change. The magic of the SWG is just how boring they are.

Can we go lower — of course. Do we want to? I see risk.

JG said it best

 

[SoDel]

Would be interesting to see if there is a correlation between algae outbreaks in SWG-pools and being too OCD about keeping FC always as low as possible (but still above SWG-min), and constantly re-adjusting the SWG.

This part didn’t quite register the first time I read it but this is a really good idea. @Bperry suggested a good approach to a “help, I have algae” member, i.e., if you want help, provide a succinct and accessible historical log of your test values so the root cause of the tale of woe can emerge and be corrected. If this were done in every case, especially in cases of repeat offender pools, a pattern might start to emerge.

In my case, I think what is going on in the back of my mind is like subconscious risk management. I don’t want to do what works for 99% of pools or even 99.9% of pools; I want to do what will make the bad outcome as impossible as practical unless there is a good reason not to.

Compared to the cost of the pool amortized over what life I have remaining, a SWG cell is peanuts, HCL is peanuts. I don’t want to lose pool season time to fighting algae or have to explain to my wife that she can’t swim because slamming, etc. Crank that SWG (within reason of course).

 

[mgtfp]

I don’t want to lose pool season time to fighting algae or have to explain to my wife that she can’t swim because slamming, etc

Exactly. If in doubt, stay on the high side. Much easier to learn all of your pool's quirks with some room for things turning out differently than expected without disaster. Once you know what to expect, like which percentage of your FC you'll lose on a sunny day, with bathers, kids not going to the bathroom, etc, then you can try to go a bit lower. If you want to.

 

[Newdude]

Compared to the cost of the pool amortized over what life I have remaining, a SWG cell is peanuts, HCL is peanuts. I don’t want to lose pool season time to fighting algae or have to explain to my wife that she can’t swim because slamming, etc. Crank that SWG (within reason of course).

We have a short season in the NorthEast and I watch friends have 3 week battles all the time. They think it's fixed and of course it isn't and it's back next month. I listened to so many people complain for so long that I was dead set against having those problems myself.

If I had a longer season, going through SWGs sooner would be proportionate to the amount of time we enjoyed the pool and I would still view it as a cost of doing business.

 

[Bperry]

This part didn’t quite register the first time I read it but this is a really good idea. @Bperry suggested a good approach to a “help, I have algae” member, i.e., if you want help, provide a succinct and accessible historical log of your test values so the root cause of the tale of woe can emerge and be corrected. If this were done in every case, especially in cases of repeat offender pools, a pattern might start to emerge.

In my case, I think what is going on in the back of my mind is like subconscious risk management. I don’t want to do what works for 99% of pools or even 99.9% of pools; I want to do what will make the bad outcome as impossible as practical unless there is a good reason not to.

Compared to the cost of the pool amortized over what life I have remaining, a SWG cell is peanuts, HCL is peanuts. I don’t want to lose pool season time to fighting algae or have to explain to my wife that she can’t swim because slamming, etc. Crank that SWG (within reason of course).

Risk management may not be the best way to look at it or at least you have to define what you mean. It’s a pool of water. Someone figured out if you add enough chlorine, stuff doesn’t grow in it. At some high level of chlorine, it’s very unpleasant to swim in and maybe poisonous. (Swimming in pure HCL…)

So find a happy medium that doesn’t break your wallet and go swimming. TFP has suggested a reasonably reliable medium on the chart. But it’s not zero risk.

 

[Orion7319]

This is a very interesting thread. This is only really my third season with a pool, so I’m still figuring things out. My pool is also weird due to all the trees and leaves and stuff that falls into it all the time. I have a salt cell, but it’s a deep diving pool and it doesn’t get direct sunlight all day. So far this season I haven’t bumped my CYA above 50 and I’m not losing much per day, so I’m just monitoring that right now. If I can get away with it at 50 I would prefer that. As of right now, I don’t have any difficulty maintaining the high end of my target, in fact it goes 1-2 ppm over quite frequently. Last season I kept getting algae in this one particular spot despite keeping my chlorine on the high side of target. I couldn’t figure it out at first. Eventually though I made two changes that seemed to work for me. First thing was I started running my VSP pump and salt cell 24/7 and the second thing I started doing was to start running my robot a lot more. I was only running it twice a week last season or when I had stuff at the bottom. This year I’m running it twice a night most nights. I’ve come to the conclusion that in cases like mine where leaves and dirt are constantly entering into the pool, running the cell 24/7 and frequency of cleaning really matters a great deal even when the chemistry seems good. I think my issue was that I really didn’t realize how important keeping up with the brushing (robot) really is. If you don’t brush it enough, algae seems to be able to grow even at higher levels of chlorine.

 

[SoDel]

This is a very interesting thread. This is only really my third season with a pool, so I’m still figuring things out. My pool is also weird due to all the trees and leaves and stuff that falls into it all the time. I have a salt cell, but it’s a deep diving pool and it doesn’t get direct sunlight all day. So far this season I haven’t bumped my CYA above 50 and I’m not losing much per day, so I’m just monitoring that right now. If I can get away with it at 50 I would prefer that. As of right now, I don’t have any difficulty maintaining the high end of my target, in fact it goes 1-2 ppm over quite frequently. Last season I kept getting algae in this one particular spot despite keeping my chlorine on the high side of target. I couldn’t figure it out at first. Eventually though I made two changes that seemed to work for me. First thing was I started running my VSP pump and salt cell 24/7 and the second thing I started doing was to start running my robot a lot more. I was only running it twice a week last season or when I had stuff at the bottom. This year I’m running it twice a night most nights. I’ve come to the conclusion that in cases like mine where leaves and dirt are constantly entering into the pool, running the cell 24/7 and frequency of cleaning really matters a great deal even when the chemistry seems good. I think my issue was that I really didn’t realize how important keeping up with the brushing (robot) really is. If you don’t brush it enough, algae seems to be able to grow even at higher levels of chlorine.

That is good info. I’ve been thinking about running my pump 24/7, just even slower at night (I have a neighbor who loves to complain about anything). I noticed some junk floating on the surface early this am before the pump started and figure maybe it’s time to go 24/7. Presently I run it at 65% for 12 hrs. My SWG needs about 75% in 12 hrs to do the business so added benefit of going to 24 hrs is the added headroom on what it can deliver in a day and as you highlight, keeping the Cl dosing consistent over a full 24 hrs. I have to figure out how low I can get the pump while still reliably overcoming the suction side head and I’m guessing the flow switch also has a minimum.

 

[Newdude]

I have to figure out how low I can get the pump while still reliably overcoming the suction side head and I’m guessing the flow switch

Finding the RPM which skims well will also activate the SWG. Or vice versa. That's your baseline which accomplishes everything you need to do. If the pool loses some sparkle and it's not chemistry related, you need more filter flow during the run time, or a longer runtime to also accomplish more filtering.

What nobody seem to ever factor about 24/7 low RPMs is that most of the crud that falls doesn't have 12(whatevs) hours to get waterlogged and sink. So you'll have way more crud in the skimmer baskets than on the floor of the pool.

It saves alot of robot runs and/or vacuuming and I never once had to adjust anything for filtering.

 

[Orion7319]

It saves alot of robot runs and/or vacuuming and I never once had to adjust anything for filtering.

Lol! Not when you have a large oak, 10 pine trees producing straw that people spend a lot of good money at the home center on and a large Mamosa tree dumping flowers that look like the flower from “Horton hears a who” all in your pool 24/7 (all but the oak are my neighbors).. oh and you only have one skimmer…. At that point it basically becomes mandatory to run the pump 24/7 and invest in a robot army…..

 

[SoDel]

Finding the RPM which skims well will also activate the SWG. Or vice versa. That's your baseline which accomplishes everything you need to do. If the pool loses some sparkle and it's not chemistry related, you need more filter flow during the run time, or a longer runtime to also accomplish more filtering.

What nobody seem to ever factor about 24/7 low RPMs is that most of the crud that falls doesn't have 12(whatevs) hours to get waterlogged and sink. So you'll have way more crud in the skimmer baskets than on the floor of the pool.

It saves alot of robot runs and/or vacuuming and I never once had to adjust anything for filtering.

I plan to stick with 65% for 10 hrs per day, then maybe 35% for the rest of the 14 (assuming 35% actually pumps anything). I’m reducing the 65% to 10 hrs / day so the changeover happens at 17:00 hrs — those Haywards sound like a T900 when they prime and 17:00 is still a reasonable time to make some noise.

[edit — actually it just occurred to me to make use of the hive mind here! How does one get omnilogic to switch pump speeds on a schedule without going through the prime thing — I will post a thread and see if there’s a way ]

 

[Newdude]

Had 160 oaks on an acre. Took down half over a decade as a one man logging operation. Gave up for 5 years. Decided it was easier to move than drop the rest of them.

Yeah. I know a thing or two about falling tree snots. And unless the wind was blowing to counteract the returns, the bulk of the crud made it to the skimmers. Or went right back to finding them the moment the wind died down, not waiting for the next pump runtime.

*acorns sank like bricks.

 

[SoDel]

Risk management may not be the best way to look at it or at least you have to define what you mean. It’s a pool of water. Someone figured out if you add enough chlorine, stuff doesn’t grow in it. At some high level of chlorine, it’s very unpleasant to swim in and maybe poisonous. (Swimming in pure HCL…)

So find a happy medium that doesn’t break your wallet and go swimming. TFP has suggested a reasonably reliable medium on the chart. But it’s not zero risk.

Agreed. I’m going with chem geek’s old equilibrium equations (apparently based on O’Brien from back in 1973) to maintain HOCL at about (but no less than) 0.05 ppm. At pH of 7.8 nominal, it works out to FC roughly 12% of CYA. Nothing crazy; just a little extra. The HOCL curve vs pH is flat enough (with CYA present) that even if pH dips, it doesn’t increase HOCL much so should remain very safe to swim in.

 

[Orion7319]

Had 160 oaks on an acre. Took down half over a decade as a one man logging operation. Gave up for 5 years. Decided it was easier to move than drop the rest of them.

Yeah. I know a thing or two about falling tree snots. And unless the wind was blowing to counteract the returns, the bulk of the crud made it to the skimmers. Or went right back to finding them the moment the wind died down, not waiting for the next pump runtime.

*acorns sank like bricks.

Lol, yeah they do sink like bricks! We just got a quote to take down our oak that’s close to the house and pool. $7,500. Yeah…we are just going to get it pruned instead, lol. I mean with all the other trees I can’t do anything about, and during the summer it’s not the main offender by a long shot, I’ll wait on that one till I hit the lotto. I still don’t know why some one would think it was a good idea to place one skimmer on a 38ft long pool on the opposite wall the wind blows…

 

[kimkats]

OUCH!! We go lucky to know a tree guy just starting out on his own when we moved it. He had worked under a guy many years so knew the tricks and had picked up the equipment as he could. We had an oak tree RIGHT over the pool house and pool when we moved in. It cost us $800 to take down. We had him move it to our burn pile that took a L.O.N.G. time to burn down but it happened over time.

 

[Orion7319]

OUCH!! We go lucky to know a tree guy just starting out on his own when we moved it. He had worked under a guy many years so knew the tricks and had picked up the equipment as he could. We had an oak tree RIGHT over the pool house and pool when we moved in. It cost us $800 to take down. We had him move it to our burn pile that took a L.O.N.G. time to burn down but it happened over time.

Yeah I think it gets expensive when they have to bring in cranes and climbers to avoid taking out the houses. If it wasn’t anywhere near anything I would just do it myself. It’s going to be around 2k just to prune it. I think because a huge branch is right over the house. In Tallahassee you guys got a lot of live Oaks. That’s my favorite tree. Wish I had one of those. Mine is a big post Oak, which is what is typical around here.

 

[SoDel]

To return to the topic at hand, what soil concentration of Cl will kill a live oak?