We just moved into a new house with a pool 2 weeks ago, and we have never owned a pool before. Until last Thursday, a pool service company had been maintaining the pool weekly. I noticed after they left on Thursday that the pool appeared a bit dull, but I'm not a pool expert, and I thought the chlorine was just doing its thing. On Friday the kids said it looked "like the ocean" underwater with their goggles on. Not Maui ocean, more like Maryland ocean (what they are used to). We decided it was time to break out the water testing kit I had ordered and dive into learning about pool chemistry. Our conclusion was that the CYA was so high that the FC wasn't working (not sure of proper semantics here). The CYA was over 100, so I can't be very precise, but I would estimate around 130. The pool service people were simply dumping in more and more liquid chlorine every week and putting six 3-inch tablets in the chlorinator (I think that's what it is called) while CYA accumulated unchecked.
Here are the test results from Saturday night:
FC -- 11.0
pH -- 7.5
TA -- 100
CH -- 125
CYA -- 130 (roughly)
We read a lot of stuff about CYA, watched Youtube videos about pool equipment, and decided to drain 15 inches of water on Sunday morning. (We were scared to take out too much water at once because some articles/videos talked about pools caving in and such.) We filled it back up and let the new water circulate overnight. On Monday morning we had:
FC -- 10.0
pH -- 7.5
CYA -- 95
We drained and added another 15 inches on Monday. This morning we had:
FC -- 6.5
pH -- 7.8
TA -- 70
CYA -- 65
We are draining and adding water again once more today to lower the CYA as much as possible since we've committed to this process. We have had tablets in the chlorinator this whole time, and I know that builds up CYA. We have 13 gallons of liquid chlorine (from the pool store, 10%) on hand right now, along with soda ash and dry acid to adjust pH as needed. We haven't used any of this stuff before. My plan right now is to test the water again in the morning and add the SLAM amount of liquid chlorine recommended by the PoolMath app. The pool is looking kind of green with some visible yuckiness spreading on the floor. Based on what I've read, it seems like we'll need to test and add more liquid chlorine throughout the day. Are we on the right track here? Does my plan seem okay? Should we turn off the chlorinator? How long should I wait before adjust the pH, if necessary? Please give any advice you have!
Here are the test results from Saturday night:
FC -- 11.0
pH -- 7.5
TA -- 100
CH -- 125
CYA -- 130 (roughly)
We read a lot of stuff about CYA, watched Youtube videos about pool equipment, and decided to drain 15 inches of water on Sunday morning. (We were scared to take out too much water at once because some articles/videos talked about pools caving in and such.) We filled it back up and let the new water circulate overnight. On Monday morning we had:
FC -- 10.0
pH -- 7.5
CYA -- 95
We drained and added another 15 inches on Monday. This morning we had:
FC -- 6.5
pH -- 7.8
TA -- 70
CYA -- 65
We are draining and adding water again once more today to lower the CYA as much as possible since we've committed to this process. We have had tablets in the chlorinator this whole time, and I know that builds up CYA. We have 13 gallons of liquid chlorine (from the pool store, 10%) on hand right now, along with soda ash and dry acid to adjust pH as needed. We haven't used any of this stuff before. My plan right now is to test the water again in the morning and add the SLAM amount of liquid chlorine recommended by the PoolMath app. The pool is looking kind of green with some visible yuckiness spreading on the floor. Based on what I've read, it seems like we'll need to test and add more liquid chlorine throughout the day. Are we on the right track here? Does my plan seem okay? Should we turn off the chlorinator? How long should I wait before adjust the pH, if necessary? Please give any advice you have!