No chlorine after ascorbic acid treatment. My personal fix....i think....

[GeNioS]

Just wanted to post this. After going through my issue I thought I'd just post my experience here so maybe it was newer if anyone is going through the same issues. I did some searching and found this thread: Pool Stains treated with Vitamin C... Chlorine gone! . But I didn't see anyone mention what I think my issue was and how I think I fixed it...on accident.

After doing the ascorbic acid treatment I couldn't get free chlorine in the pool. I tried everything over the course of a week or so....and then yesterday my filter hit my backwash pressure.....when I backwashed, I didn't get the usual dirty water....I got white. So I think what happened was that I used way too much ascorbic acid (i know I did), and then I went from recirculate to filter before it was all dissolved. It got stuck in the filter and cancelled out all the chlorine as it went through.

After running the pump overnight after the backwash, this morning finally got color on a strip and a reagent test....took a water sample to the pool store and they said I had 1.9 Free Chlorine, so i think we're out of the woods. Anyways, I'm sure this is old news to the gurus here, but I just wanted to post because I didn't see anyone mention backwashing as a possible fix to no free chlorine after using ascorbic acid, at least on that thread.

Am i right? Also, the pool store said everything was in range except I had phosphates and gave me something to remove them....is that another residual from the ascorbic acid?

Thoughts from the gurus? (bowing in reverence)

 

[jblizzle]

I was with you until "color on a strip" and "pool store"
And then even worse "phosphates"

Please invest in one of the recommended test kits if you want to truly take control of your pool: Test Kits Compared
Test strips are just worthless and pool store testing is historically unreliable.

Ignore phosphates and take that junk back to the store.
If you maintain adequate chlorine in your pool according to the FC/CYA Levels, then they can be ignored.

I would recommend taking a look at Pool School, starting with ABCs of Pool Water Chemistry

 

[GeNioS]

I guess I missed the part that said:

• Phosphate – Doesn’t matter, despite pool store claims otherwise.

Dang. - Doc Brown, Back to the Future / Me, today.

 

[Tena]

Your post is helpful for me as I am about to start AA and was probably going to overdose. Lol

I just watched a pool guy YouTube explain how phosphates are algae food. ??‍ I had to stop watching. He said algaecide was a waste of $

 

[YippeeSkippy]

Well...its true for the most part. Algaecide doesn't kill algae. It only helps prevent it.

But...if you have the correct level of FC in the water anyway, you won't have algae anyway. So save your money.

Maddie

 

[IceShadow]

Your post is helpful for me as I am about to start AA and was probably going to overdose. Lol

I just watched a pool guy YouTube explain how phosphates are algae food. ??‍ I had to stop watching. He said algaecide was a waste of $

I think I saw that series. He’s not wrong and I suppose removing phosphates would also control algae - but he also says in another video that water gets “old” and when CYA gets too high you should drain and refill the pool. :/

 

[Tena]

@IceShadow Well when cya gets too high, you do need to drain some, so again, he's not entirely wrong, just misleading. Right?

My point was intended to be, algaecide is useful, and his entire point was never use it, only decrease phosphates which is not TPF standard. Very confusing for a new TPFer.

I'm just trying to get things straight. ?

 

[mknauss]

algaecide is useful,

In certain cases when you winterize a pool, but in Texas, where you do not do that, algaecides are a waste of money and if you use the metal based ones, will cost you dearly eventually.

 

[Tena]

algaecides are a waste of money

Except polyquat60¿ Which is highly recommended for that AA treatment and dropping Chlorine to 0¿