Newbie help

[xMarkx]

Just recently found this forum and im glad I did. After removing my winter cover a few weeks ago, my 30ft round pool was a dark green, full of algae. So off to the pool store I go with my water sample. Buy algae killer, and shock, should be good. Nope. The pool did turn blue but extremely cloudy. After 2 weeks of shocking and wasted money, no change. My CYA level was 155 according to the pool place. I just drained about half of the water from my pool and refilled it using softened water from my home. Took a sample to the pool store and these are my results.

PH 7.2
ALk 103
FC 0.1
Total Chlorine 1
Total Hardness 638
CYA 122

I was hoping for a normal CYA level so I could SLAM my pool but its looking bad. The pool looks identical as to before I drained half and refilled it. Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

 

[woodyp]

Half drain should have lowered your CYA by half as well. See where I'm going with this? Their numbers don't make sense. Your OWN numbers will make sense if you go to TFTestkits.net and order a TF100. Have to have one to do a SLAM. Please add a signature line to your profile listing your pool specifics. Welcome.

 

[Rollercoastr]

Welcome to TFP Mark. At least that store did you the favor of proving how lousy their testing is! Just for the record, tap water contains no CYA whether it's softened or not, so a 50% drain will reduce CYA by 50%. Since we know at least one of their tests was way off, we can't (and don't) trust any of their numbers.

If I were you and I had any un-opened, ill-advised, over-priced and ineffective products, I'd take them back to the store and show them the false results and demand a refund. Unless their results have a clear disclaimer about being rough estimates, they're basically committing fraud by giving you false results and selling you products based on them. This hasn't even happened to me and I still get all bothered by it.

More discouraging news is that pool $tore testing almost always reads too low on CYA. Be prepared to do another drain after you get your own kit and get a real CYA figure.

The TFP community often recommends adding 1 gallon of beach a day while waiting for a test kit, but I'm not sure I'd bother when you don't have much progress to lose and you're likely going to have to drain again...

 

[HoosierDaddy]

You're in the right place, Mark. Ditto on the test kit. Once you get it, run through the list of tests and post your new (more reliable) numbers.

In the meantime, take a tour through the "Pool School." Pay special attention to the SLAM process, because this will be your first big task.