i hang the cya sock on broom handle further out into the pool as it can bleach the pool finish if resting against it
The simplified version: it's the chlorine that protects you and your family and your pool surfaces from nasty bugs and pathogens and algae. It also burns up other harmless organic material in the water (leaves and pollen and whatnot). The CYA doesn't do any of that. The CYA protects the chlorine. It buffers it, stores it in a sense, and shields its degradation caused by the sun. So in essence it allows the chlorine to last longer in your pool. Which in turn makes the chlorine more effective and efficient. So... even though you might not have all the CYA in your pool yet to best protect your chlorine, you still need to have the chlorine in the water to protect YOU, even if you have to add it a little more often until the CYA can take over and do its job.When I did the math on the 3 PPM of FC I need to add should I wait till my CYA is at 30 PPM? Because the math is different depending on CYA. Wait till tomorrow to add Chlorine?
The simplified version: it's the chlorine that protects you and your family and your pool surfaces from nasty bugs and pathogens and algae. It also burns up other harmless organic material in the water (leaves and pollen and whatnot). The CYA doesn't do any of that. The CYA protects the chlorine. It buffers it, stores it in a sense, and shields its degradation caused by the sun. So in essence it allows the chlorine to last longer in your pool. Which in turn makes the chlorine more effective and efficient. So... even though you might not have all the CYA in your pool yet to best protect your chlorine, you still need to have the chlorine in the water to protect YOU, even if you have to add it a little more often until the CYA can take over and do its job.
Simpler still, get the FC up to 3PPM immediately, and do whatcha gotta do to keep it at 3 or above. A little extra FC is better than too little. You must maintain FC regardless of where you are at adding or testing CYA. That last thing you want in a new pool is an algae outbreak, because then you have to add large amounts of chlorine to address that.
Once the CYA shows up in the CYA test, then you refer to the FC/CYA chart to determine if you need to raise your target FC level. Until then, use FC 3 as your bare minimum.
It's cooler now, and the affect of the sun on your chlorine will be somewhat less than it will be next summer, but it can still degrade, so test for FC often at this point, like every day, and replace whatever is missing every day (keep it at 3 or above). As the weather gets cooler, and your CYA takes over, you'll find that it might not drop below 3 as often, so then you can back off on the chlorine additions, and even the testing, until you find a rhythm. And then come Spring, you'll see the reverse, as the weather warms, at which point you'll test more often and add more chlorine. Hope that helps.
That makes sense thank you, so I assume Ill leave my Chlorinator valved out until the CYA comes up and just use liquid chlorine for now. Ballpark how long does it take to bring up the CYA with a sock in the skimmer?
Using the chlorinator is likely how your CYA ended up so high in the first place. Chlorine is a gas, it must be bound to something else in order for consumers to handle it. That's either a solid (CYA, calcium, or rarely lithium) or liquid (water). Lithium is super expensive now and used mainly in batteries. The other solid forms also contain other chemicals (CYA or calcium) that will build up in your water and cause problems. That's why TFP recommends liquid chlorine only, or SWCG.
CYA testing might or might not be accurate in 24 hours. Reliable after a week. It takes a while to show up in the test for some reason.
Every 8 oz tablet adds 4.6 ppm FC and 2.8 ppm CYA. Your CH will climb to 800 ppm or so every two years or so. Your CYA will climb to unmanagable levels in a month or so during the summer.
That's exactly the best use. Liquid when you are home, tabs in your chlorinator if you go away. By managing your CYA directly, you can keep your CYA on the lower end of acceptable, in order to have room to use tabs once in a while.So would leaving the Chlorinator valved out for now and just use liquid chlorine be my best bet? Then when we leave for vacation etc use the chlorinator? I heard that was the biggest pain with liquid chlorine is you have to add it everyday and if you leave you are kind of screwed.
That's exactly the best use. Liquid when you are home, tabs in your chlorinator if you go away. By managing your CYA directly, you can keep your CYA on the lower end of acceptable, in order to have room to use tabs once in a while.
CYA does gradually break down in a pool, as well as being lost through splash-out and backwashing, so as long as you aren't using the tablets constantly, you'll be fine. Since you have hard water already, you'll want to be sure to use dichlor or trichlor and not calcium hypochlorite tablets when you do use a tablet.
It's too soon in your learning curve to introduce the myriad of details, but I see two of my own initial "wonderings" in some of your posts: which chemical will first drive a water exchange and how do I deal with a pool when I'm not home for a week or two. Suffice to say I tackled these challenges head on and solved each. And mind you, each of those two challenges have multiple "sub-challenges" to address. I've got it down now. I've learned here separate solutions for the accumulation of CYA, CH and salt (don't forget about that one), so I am currently on track to never have to replace water because of chemical accumulation (so far so good, three years in). And I've figured out how to leave my pool for up to two weeks at a time and come back to perfectly balanced water. Not bragging (OK, bragging a little) but pointing out it is possible for you to learn how to get all this under your thumb, whenever you're ready... There's no such thing as a maintenance free pool, but I'm close...
You can run your pump at low speed. No real reason to run on high speed unless you have a specific function that needs that flow rate.
I would wait until Wednesday at least before testing CYA. This time of year there is less UV impact on the pool water.
You run the pump for a couple reasons. In your case, you need to run the pump long enough to mix in the chemicals you add. That is about an hour each time you add chemicals. The next reason is to skim the surface. That depends on what debris you get each day. Last is to filter the water, which typically needs little run time. Do you have a pool cleaner or robot? That can impact pump run time also.
Right now, you can run your pump just a few hours per day. But if you have CYA in the skimmer, run the pump until it is fully dissolved. It is slightly acidic and leaving it in the skimmer without the pump running creates an acidic stew that is not good for your equipment.
Definitely run the pump around your TOU electric rates. Time of day to run the pump really does not matter much.