New member - johntniman

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mknauss said:
Your CYA is pretty high to attempt to SLAM. You said you could not see the dot at 70 but could at 90? That is odd.
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I did the first test in my kitchen with the overhead lights. I was staring pretty hard at the black dot looking for truly opaque. Since I have everything here anyway, I followed the test as you suggested, but outside and not in direct sunlight. 70 is all but invisible at a glance under those conditions, so 80 would be the reading.

Have I followed along that there's really nothing doing for CYA but to drain and refill? Not that it's a bad idea anyway given the CH, but hopefully not to the 92% PoolMath indicated :oops:

ETA: Ionizer is out. And probably going back to Amazon since I have time on the return.
 
I would do another CYA test in the morning with bright sun. But, a 50% exchange would be a good idea.
You can exchange some water without draining.

If you place a low volume sub pump in the deep end and pull water from there while adding water in the shallow end (through a skimmer or into a bucket on a step so you lessen the water disturbance) you can do a fairly efficient exchange. That is assuming the water you are filling with is the same temperature or warmer than your pool water. If your fill water is much cooler than your pool water, then switch it. Add the water to the deep end (hose on bottom) and pull water from the top step.

The location of the pump and fill hose may change if you have salt water, high calcium, etc.
In my pool, with saltwater and high calcium when I drain, I put the pump in the deep end and hose in shallow end. The water in the pool weighs more per unit volume than the fill water from the hose.

Be sure to balance the water out and water in so the pool level stays the same. Also be sure your pool pump is disabled during this process. Once started do not stop until you have exchanged the amount of water you wish.
 
Thanks again!

I'll do another CYA test in the morning. I'll also adjust the pump speed right now.

I can make a harbor freight run for a pump this weekend. Draining on Saturday is probably the most likely. I assume doing it the way you suggest is preferable to, say, vacuuming to waste with a hose attached to a manual vac, then refilling? I'd assume my fill water will be about the same temperature, but I don't know what the temp is for my pool water. I should probably pick up a thermometer.

Other than time, is there any way to actually know how much water I've exchanged?
 
It is best to not leave your plaster to dry out. Bad things can happen to it, especially as it will be warm this weekend.

I suspect that with your calcium level you are best to pull from the deep end and add in the shallow end.

Once I get things balanced in and out I use a 5 gallon bucket to time one of the hoses. Then extrapolate. It will take some time.
 
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I have the 1/2 hp model. It helps if your hose run to your sewer cleanout is long. I would go with the 1/3 hp model if you can use a short hose to the sewer cleanout.
 
Unfortunately there's no direct sewer connection that I'm aware of, or even gutters on my street. My house is connected to the sewer, of course, but I think it's all underground. It's probably 100' or more from the pool to the street. It'd probably be shorter if I ran it to my kitchen sink drain, actually, but I'm guessing with a hose flow rate this is going to take 20+ hours and I don't want my back door open all night.
 
johntniman said:
Well, maybe I lied. There's a cover near my front door I just checked. It's a pipe leading into the ground. I'm not sure where it goes, exactly, but it might be a sewer port.
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Most likely. Any house connected to a sewer has a cleanout somewhere.
 

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Will do! I really hope it is, actually, because at the moment when I backwash / pump to waste I either have to roll out a long firehose-type thing into the street or, more usually, backwash into my front yard which floods it with a lot less volume than I have here. This would be a lot cleaner.
 
Pump ordered - it should be here Saturday. Depending on when it comes I'll spend Saturday and/or most of Sunday draining and refilling, then check the levels again and get it prepared to SLAM (probably the first weekend of May, so I'm not at work all day during the initial phases at least.) Since I shouldn't run my pool pump while draining and refilling, do I just figure out the refill time, do that, take all the sub pump stuff out, run the main pool pump for half an hour or so, and then test to see where I got to? I'm guessing that testing while refilling won't be accurate?

Also, thanks very much for all your help. Even though the pool's still green, all the good advice has been well worth the cost of a donation.
 
Run the exchange process for as long as you think you need it based on the bucket test I described. When done, turn pool pump back on and run for a few hours to get it well mixed. Then test.

If you are going to wait to SLAM, I would suggest adding 3/4 to 1 gallon of 10% liquid chlorine each evening while you wait. Run the pump for at least an hour after adding the LC.
 
I could potentially SLAM and drain/refill this weekend at the same time. I assumed that I'd be.pumping fresh chemicals out and that I needed to drop the CYA before starting, but if I can start this weekend that would be fine too.

Otherwise, will do!
 
Got my sub pump today, worked together an adapter, and it's now hooked up and draining from the deep end. Draining rate is 5 gallons about every 3 minutes. I set the fill rate to match, and put the hose in the attached spa so it spills over into the pool (I figure it's basically like a big bucket.)

If I'm getting 5 gallons every 3 minutes it should take about 3,600 minutes to get 6,000 gallons exchanged - or about two and a half days, assuming no issues. So, Tuesday morning I should be about good as long as my math checks out, though I may give it until I get home Tuesday night.

So far, the hose is in what I think is the sewer clean out and there's no issues. I'll keep you posted if anything significant changes.
 
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