Pool chemistry regime for dummies, novices and guests

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Propertyopp said:
Thank you! That makes it more clear :) Now, I assume if i want more CYA that will lengthen the life of my chlorine which means I might want the Diclor as you suggested.

My calcium is always low in the spring water by the way. So I'm assuming that anything that makes calcium go up will not be a problem.
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I am not suggesting you chlorinate exclusively with Dichlor.

Be careful with your CYA level. As it rises you will need to compensate with higher FC levels to keep the pool sanitary.

[FC/CYA][/FC/CYA]

You should never let your FC go below 7.5% of your CYA, with a daily FC target of 12-15% of your CYA. If you choose to chlorinate exclusively with Dichlor, those CYA levels will rise quickly, which will require more Dichlor to raise FC, which will raise CYA requiring more Dichlor adding to your CYA...... it becomes a vicious circle quickly, even with your leaking / constant top off you will need to stay on top of these things with regular testing.

CYA is also acidic, using Dichlor will also push down pH & TA, requiring consistent monitoring.
 
Here are a few other issues:

I measured the pool by walking it, length about 40 ft, by width about 12 feet by average depth about 4.6 and get about 22,000 gallons. So I guess my estimate of 30000 is high. BUt since its constantly being refilled.....To shock effectively I put in 3 bags of cal shock that each say cover 16,000 gallons. I have done this a couple times during the week.

I swirled a test/guess strip into the pool last night and it showed almost no chlorine. Do I assume that even those strips won't have a false positive reading for chlorine? That is, there won't be more chlorine than the strip shows, although there might be less? Swirling a test strip is something a guest can do.... Im not sure I can ask them to do the chemistry experiment.

Even without a FC level pool water looks good. I have 3 tri clor pucks that have been in skimmer for three days.

However, there is definitely algae so i brushed down and will vacuum later, then backwash (rinse?) and add some DE. Then I will test with the FAS DPD.I tried to post a picture but am over quota apparently. Anyway water is clear, but sides have algae which powders into the water when brushed. I am assuming its regular green and not yellow....There is also some debris.

So my plan is to shock tonight with 3 bags (or should I use more) of 68% cal hypo. Will add LC if its available at the store. Then test in the morning. Do I add chlorine again if its low during the day? I thought it should be put in only at night.

I will keep adding shock each night and test in the morning. Sunday is my last morning here.

My two puck floaters arrive tomorrow so will put 3 dichlor pucks in each one and have 3 trichlor pucks in the skimmer which I'll change out to dichlor when I run out.. Can these be used together like this? From now on I will use dichlor pucks. Can I use dichlor with cal hypo shock?

Thanks again everyone!
 
Not to be a downer (nice yard) but this really isn't a swimming pool...it's a swimming pond. This pool is more like a Natural Swimming Pool (NSP) but without the biological/chemical filtration of a regeneration zone (a separated region of plants and aquatic flora to filter the water and remove contaminants). It's also a body of water being fed by a spring (so, basically, unsanitary water in terms of the normal definition of sanitization with respect to fill water) and it has a fairly large leak rate, about 600 gallons of water per day by my calculations.

So, at the end of the day, I don't think it really matters WHAT method of chlorination you use (pucks, granular shock, etc) because the pool will lose so much chlorine every day (probably as much as 5-6 ppm/day) that your only hope of keeping it "sanitary" (in the loosest possible definition of that word) is to float a puck floater loaded up with trichlor pucks and add cal-hypo or liquid chlorine daily. This pool can not be taken care of in the traditional sense that TFP teaches because it simply loses too much water and is fed by water that will naturally have a high chlorine demand to start with.

Have you considered converting this pool to a Natural Swimming Pool (NSP) ? There are many companies nowadays in the US that are doing NSPs and your home is certainly scenic enough and has enough property to consider it. We don't teach any methods here to deal with NSPs so you'd have to find a forum that deals with those.

Good luck, hopefully you can find a good solution to your pressing situation....
 
THANK YOU AND YES, IT'S A SWIM POND!! That's actually how we designed it. And the more info I receive here the more I think you solution is right for this particular situation.
MY current READINGS FRON THE POOL STORE TEST ARE
PH 7.7
FC 0.1
SATURATION INDEX : LOW (?)
TA 52
TC 0.1
TH 44
CYA. 2
TDS. 200

SO what to make of this reading in light of no shock for two days prior, and 3 triclor pucks in skimmer, filter running 24/7
 
I meant to ask you before about pool putty. We have drained and patched epdm but patches still come loose in some places due to water pressure or something. We have used the roofer adhesive so it's as strong as it can get I think. We have also used Big stuff spray foam in certain places to fill in around the stone perimeter that's in the water.
Thanks for your advice!
 
Those numbers are what I'd expect from a pool that is constantly being refreshed with ground water. Your spring has low saturation (low TA and CH) and so your pond will have the same. In an outdoor, pool stabilizer (cyanuric acid or CYA) is absolutely critical as it both buffers chlorine reducing its harshness on bather's skin, eyes, etc, and it also protects the chlorine from UV loss. With no CYA in the water, the chlorine has a half-life of about 30mins. So, if you add chlorine, it will more or less be gone in about 2-3 hours. On top of that, your spring water likely has some level of dissolved organic carbon in it and that will act as a source of chlorine demand. Top it all off with your persistent algae bloom (yes, your water has algae in it even if it looks clear) and there is no way to keep the FC up.

I'm not sure how much help we can be. Traditional pools are designed to be closed loop bodies of water that can retain chemical additives. Your pond is not that. The EPDM rubber liner is compromised and you're going to have to fix that or else anything you add will simply go to waste. In the short term you can keep adding chlorine and maybe even get a detectable level of CYA using liquid stabilizer as the source, but you're always going to be fighting a losing battle against the water loss. You have to get that liner fixed or else there's really no point in operating your pond as pool.

Also, as a chemistry aside, if you chlorinate water with a lot of organics in (carbon compounds from the input stream), the chlorine tends to react with those organics forming trihalomethane (THMs) compounds which are very irritating to be around (stuff like chloroform, etc). This is in addition to combined chlorine compounds from bather waste like monochloramine and chlorourea. So just dumping A LOT of chlorine in the water will not help and could very likely sicken people. This is why municipal water suppliers don't chlorinate raw water streams without doing significant filtration or else they'll create a larger problem.

As for pool putty, I have no idea if that will work on EPDM rubber. It's meant for cementitious pool surfaces.
 
They make seam rape for that pond liner material, Basically same as the liner material, they also have a specific adhesive to use, If I recall correctly from my pond making days it has 3000 in the name and is black and sticks too EVERYTHING!

Basically without you doing some experimentation we have no idea what your chlorine need would be, so we have no ideal how many pucks to float, which is why I mentioned the in line chlorinators, where your could direct water over the pucks to disperse them faster. But you would have to test, alot.

I love the NSP concept, and you should consider that when you reline. I'd want the overflow opposite side of the incoming water however.
 
I think JoyfulNoise's post is straight to the point, and the focus need to be shifted on whether this will be a closed-loop isolated body of water (i.e. swimming pool), or a stream fed pond.
Until the leaks are fixed and you stop the constant introduction of spring fed water, this is not a traditional swimming pool, and cannot be treated as such.
 
Thank you for this interesting explanation and I am understanding that short of re-doing the pool we will just have to chlorinate for the remainder of this season, about 6 weeks. I am understanding that I will have to create a custom approach, but I now understand the parameters more clearly. Yes, a lot of $ on chlorine.

We have actually had this pond pool for 20 years so I don't forsee anyone have any major problem at this point, so as long as the water is clear and algae is not too visible and we keep brushing, backwashing and chlorinating and refreshing with the spring water which we used as drinking water for 20 years. It is not used daily except when our grandkids are here, in which case they are in it most of the day which they were for 2 weeks in June. They are still fine.

So the remaining question is if and how to replace the pool next year. I am wondering if there might be some type of spray on product we could use that would not require disassembling to current apron. Something like a 3 D printer version of a pool! So one issue is what material to use. I suppose we could go with concrete but I'm not convinced that we wouldn't have cracking problems or some other issue. But I suppose those could be patched. Fiberglass or other material that could be molded to fit the existing shape??

The second issue is then what system to use. We did run eco smarte for a year successfully, but could not get a service person to set it up and calibrate it with the pool chemistry and he was an hour away so checking it was prohibitive. IT actually worked well for a year and we still have the system parts. THE SWG option seems to be the preferred option here of TFP. We have a one year old Jayco pump and a working DE filter so what can we do that might work with those?

Should this issue be a new thread?
 

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Ecosmarte uses copper which will cause blonde hair to turn green, will stain everything the water touches, and cannot kill pathogens that cause person to person transmission of diseases. Chlorine is best sanitizer to kill pathogens and algae.

A vinyl liner would be the cheapest option. When the pool company installs the liner you can make sure that you no longer have any leaks so you could treat it like a regular closed loop pool.
 
This might be a "don't try this at home" but for your few weeks left of the season, I wonder if flex-seal would bond with he EPDM? I've got a gutter corner it will last a season on.

For replacement, I'm wondering if they could just install a track under your stone edge and drop in a vinyl liner right over the EPDM so you didn't have to tear down all the rock.

Once it holds water, swg is a reasonable option if you're not worried about the stone...so too would be a liquid chlorine dispensing pump such as a stenner. Either would give you the extended control you're looking for, eg keeping guest out of the equation except for simple checks and weekly servicing and a reliable (if parameters are maintained) dosing system once you had it dialed in.

Caveats on each are with swg, you may need to monitor ph; with automatic dosing pump, you'd need to refill the reservoir, and with either, you'd wan to have your cya dialed in per [fc/cya][/FC/cya] chart. Dig around for expanded readings on these topics because I guarantee you'll end up more knowledgeable than a typical pool service guy...and in this case you kinda need to be ;)
 
If you were wanting to spend a little more I wonder if aquabright would be a good solution for your pond/pool. It is a sprayed on surface that is then set with, of all things, a flamethrower!!

I think you would have to have shotcrete sprayed as a surface first and then the aquabright applied. However it is chemically inert, can form many shapes, you could pick a colour so that the water looked more natural
 
Wow, this sounds really interesting. I will look into this as an option for next year. thanks! So far my guests are keeping it brushed down, pucks in a floater while I await the errant pool guy to come and vac and DE. Plus it's cool so Im hoping al will be OK.
 
Re: Pool chemistry regime for dummies, novices and guests. Update! 2018

I'm back this year with an update and am considering a switch from chlorine/DE filter stem to salt water generator.
First, a bear got into our pool when water was low this winter and completely tore up the rubber liner. Result,we had to rebuild the stone apron and install a new liner! We are just now refilling it with water from our spring. If it doesn't cost too much we want to go with a SWG system. Any advice on where to buy and who should install would be much appreciated, along with any pros and cons.
 
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