Hi all,
Long time lurker, first time poster. I have a ~12K gallon pool (non-SWG, cartridge filter, solar heating but isolated for now for winter) here in north California. First time pool owner (since Nov) and have handed off the maintenance to a local pool company for the last 5 months. They report weekly readings and have noticed that since January the pool has been regularly reporting 0 ppm chlorine during their weekly checks. Up until January it was @ 4 ppm. There were two weeks or so in February where chlorine was reported at 3 and 4 (so the pool sort of held it's own for a bit). No *visible* algae that I can see. Periodically the water could get cloudy after some rain.
Company suggested getting a floated and they are using some sort of tablets.
As of January they tested CYA and hardness:
350 ppm total hardness
110 ppm cyanuric acid
Obviously this is quite high and I've asked numerous times regarding the chlorine value. I am not sure if they are measured FC or TC (but most likely the former). Last week they recommended replacing filters (which... were not really looking bad, but nonetheless.. why not). They have also recommended a copper-based product for filling in the weekly chlorine deficiency. That's what prompted me to order my TF100 kit (arriving next week) to sort of get an idea as to what's happening. I'm not too comfortable as many have stated here putting in stuff that normally doesn't go into pools. Plus their ongoing reliance on chlorine tabs has me wondering about that quite high CYA reading from January (which may be even higher... not sure they tested with dilution or not).
We've had quite a bit of rain since end January so I'm hoping CYA dropped from those elevated levels. But if I was to be looking at a water replacement I read that the norm is to drain via sump pump and refill via hose. We have a overflow drain (water-level type) at the deep end. Would I be able to get away with filling from shallow and leveraging that for draining out some of the water? Or is a sump pump a must?
I'm just getting ready for taking things into my own hands. A bit concerned about the costs of purchasing my own chlorine (as I was told that cost would be higher than the copper-based algaecide) in the long run... but then again, if what I read here is true then if i fully switch to my own maintenance I might actually come out to the same monthly costs as current monthly fees for chemical balancing (do my own brushing, skimmer cleaning and whatnot).
Any advice as to first things first and how to handle addressing any findings with my current pool maintenance? They are great folks but I appreciate they have to work with the reality of touching the pool once a week but I'd like to have numbers a bit more in line with what everyone recommends here.
Long time lurker, first time poster. I have a ~12K gallon pool (non-SWG, cartridge filter, solar heating but isolated for now for winter) here in north California. First time pool owner (since Nov) and have handed off the maintenance to a local pool company for the last 5 months. They report weekly readings and have noticed that since January the pool has been regularly reporting 0 ppm chlorine during their weekly checks. Up until January it was @ 4 ppm. There were two weeks or so in February where chlorine was reported at 3 and 4 (so the pool sort of held it's own for a bit). No *visible* algae that I can see. Periodically the water could get cloudy after some rain.
Company suggested getting a floated and they are using some sort of tablets.
As of January they tested CYA and hardness:
350 ppm total hardness
110 ppm cyanuric acid
Obviously this is quite high and I've asked numerous times regarding the chlorine value. I am not sure if they are measured FC or TC (but most likely the former). Last week they recommended replacing filters (which... were not really looking bad, but nonetheless.. why not). They have also recommended a copper-based product for filling in the weekly chlorine deficiency. That's what prompted me to order my TF100 kit (arriving next week) to sort of get an idea as to what's happening. I'm not too comfortable as many have stated here putting in stuff that normally doesn't go into pools. Plus their ongoing reliance on chlorine tabs has me wondering about that quite high CYA reading from January (which may be even higher... not sure they tested with dilution or not).
We've had quite a bit of rain since end January so I'm hoping CYA dropped from those elevated levels. But if I was to be looking at a water replacement I read that the norm is to drain via sump pump and refill via hose. We have a overflow drain (water-level type) at the deep end. Would I be able to get away with filling from shallow and leveraging that for draining out some of the water? Or is a sump pump a must?
I'm just getting ready for taking things into my own hands. A bit concerned about the costs of purchasing my own chlorine (as I was told that cost would be higher than the copper-based algaecide) in the long run... but then again, if what I read here is true then if i fully switch to my own maintenance I might actually come out to the same monthly costs as current monthly fees for chemical balancing (do my own brushing, skimmer cleaning and whatnot).
Any advice as to first things first and how to handle addressing any findings with my current pool maintenance? They are great folks but I appreciate they have to work with the reality of touching the pool once a week but I'd like to have numbers a bit more in line with what everyone recommends here.
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not sure how much is a gimmick from all that. The skimmer angel is an OK addition I guess, I didn't care much for it - but it would be nice to have something other than rocks to hold down the basket with. I did also get the digital ph meter, but based on reading opinions of it after the fact that might have been an extra thing to have. Ah well, we'll see.
