New Pool Plaster - Please Help!

[Jen-Pool]

Hello!

We just had a new pool installed ~8 weeks ago and really getting A LOT of differing advice on our new pool plaster. Can someone help me get our levels where they should be? We brushed like crazy and followed the plaster councils guide for the first 30 days, been testing the water probably too much, but as I have been reading through not sure exactly what we should be doing. So here we are, please help.

New white plaster pool 32,000 gallons plus 9 sf spa with spill over plus sheer decent. Sand filter, variable pump, with pre-filter, ozoniator (what the heck does this do?), 4000 BTU gas heater and inline chlorinator (just installed this week after heater). Tiger shark cleaner, Taylor 2006K test kit.

FC 1.8
PH 7.6
AK 90
CH 200
CYA 50

 

[Texas Splash]

Welcome to TFP! Now that your new plaster is considered cured for chemical purposes, you can increase your FC right away with liquid chlorine (or regular bleach) to about 5-6 ppm. Then be sure to keep the FC balanced to your current CYA (50) as noted on the FC/CYA Levels. Your CH is a tad low. I would increase it to at least 250 ppm for now, maybe even 300 if your water is soft and/or you plan on losing water soon if you close for the winter.

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[Jen-Pool]

Wonderful, thank you! I was just reading about the FC and now understand. I was also unclear about the calcium since we do have a spa that is connected. We only run it a few hours a few times a week and then it goes back into the normal flow but some of the basics mentioned a lower CH for spas.

 

[PoolStored]

You note that you have an inline chlorinator. I would say the number one issue I see on this site is people have algae problems and the pool stores can't fix. Typically because people don't know that they need to maintain the right FC for the Amount of CYA in their pool. Read this -->FC/CYA Levels

The other thing they don't realize is that the inline puck chlorinators, or more specifically using pucks ADDS SIGNIFICANT CYA to their pool. So they continue to use the pucks, CYA gets so high that you can't maintain a high enough FC to stave off algae and then they get algae. they come here and the first piece of advice is to get a proper test kit...Test Kits Compared

The second piece of advice is that they will have to drain some large portion of their pool because that is the only way to remove CYA. TFP advice is that you should use Liquid Chlorine or get a Salt Water Generator to create chlorine. One of the few cases we recommend pucks is when you go on vacations.

On the Ionizer, I would disconnect/unplug or bypass. Here is a good read why: Ionizer

 

[Jen-Pool]

Really appreciate all the help here. Working on getting FC and CH up. A few more questions if possible.

I really just use straight up bleach from the store?

Do all chlorine tabs have CYA?

Anyone know how to disconnect a ionizer?

Seeing all these “molting” plaster posts wants me to make sure that my plaster is good. I know that Covid created many issues with sourcing materials. Could someone take a look at my photos and tell me if this color variation is normal for white plaster? The surface is smooth and we are happy, just the color variation when overcast or shady is a lot. I want this surface to LAST!