Taking over pool care, don't know what I'm doing!

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Sounds like you are figuring out this pool stuff! Nothing wrong in hiring out for help when needed or even wanted. Do what you want and can. Hire out the rest. If you want to think about trying to do it just let us know and someone can walk you through it. You can decide from there if it is something you want to try.

The others have you covered with your questions.

Kim:kim:
 
Ah - that's it! I remember now that he would adjust the pump run time! Thanks so much for the reminder santacruzpool and Marty!

Thanks for the encouragement, Kim. I am usually willing to try things and am the most surprised when I am successful. :lol:
 
It's just over a year since my husband died and the pool is looking good. It is covered with a leaf cover and the salt cell is off. I'm using bleach for chlorine right now. I have a question about the salt level - is it okay to let that drift down while the cell is not being used? I'm at 3000 right now, I think I normally keep it around 3400-3600 in the warmer weather.

Also, at what temperature will the salt cell work again? The water is 50 degrees right now.

Thank you all for your help over this past year and your patience with my basic questions. <3
 
Great job!

Your SWCG stops creating chlorine at 50F.

Your salt level can drift down while SWCG is off. When your water temperature warms above 50F and you are pretty confident it will stay above, test your salt level with an independent test and add some salt as necessary to make the SWCG happy.

Take care
 
I love reading this. So glad you found us and it is working for you. The questions you are asking are not basic questions. They are the deeper ones that are not covered until you are past the basics! Well done!

I want you to keep a close eye on your water temps as the outside temps start getting warmer. Once your water temps start getting to 50 and on up you will really need to watch the FC to head off any algae. I learned this by experience :roll: was lazy about checking the FC and adding chlorine as needed and had a slight algae bloom....going to watch it much closer this year!

Kim:kim:
 
Thank you Marty and Kim!

And thanks for the warning on the algae, Kim. I haven't been watching it super close these past couple of months and with the cover on it's a PITA to do anything. :tongue: But I'll set a reminder for myself to check more frequently with the water temp going up soon.

I gotta also say, I love the TFP app! I think my husband would have liked it, too - he wrote a few apps himself and appreciated apps that made things easier and more convenient. I just added your comments about the SWCG, salt level, and algae to the notes section. Great job, TFP!

:lovetfp:
 
Okay, this got long. Sorry. I don't know how to tell a short story. :p

Yesterday my neighbors behind me informed me that my pool is either overflowing or there is a leak that is running into their yard (they are downhill from me.) The area where the water comes in has killed off their groundcover (asian jasmine) so they think it is chlorinated water. I have not noticed my pool being low on water, but I do have it set to autofill 2 minutes per day every day (but it does get skipped if there has been a lot of rain.) They say they have been struggling with it for a couple of years. They are just now telling me, though.

I dug around in the area of my yard where the water is flowing to their yard. It is definitely wet but was covered with dry leaves and wasn't noticeable until I raked them off. I found a couple of pop up drains under the mulch. One of the lids was loose so I opened it up and it was clogged with mud and water and there are some roots. I pulled out as much as I could with my hands and tried running a hose in there to get more but it is still clogged and now it's covered with water. I did find a drawing from the pool construction that shows the deck drains seem to be routed to the back, so maybe one of those is the deck drain? I can't find any drawing of the overflow or any of the pool plumbing. We also have some gutters that are routed into the deck (before we got the pool they were just regular downspouts) so I wonder if the other pop up is the gutters? Does the presence of roots mean the pipe needs to be replaced and is that how the mud got in there? Or maybe the lid was loosened somehow and it is getting in there?

Meanwhile, my brother has a pool guy who was willing to come look and he came over today. He said to turn off the equipment, filler, and sprinkler system for 2 days and he will come back to check on it Tuesday. I guess the goal being not to add any water to the situation and we will see if the pool level drops more than it should. He told me the pool overflow is supposed to go to the street out front. And I think it is supposed to, also. But I don't know how to be sure what is going on with all this stuff. My husband probably knew but I don't and I'm the only one left. :scratch:

I did have a little convo with the pool guy where he was asking about my chemistry as part of his investigating - I showed him the TFP app log and he said it looked normal. He also tested the chlorine, pH, and TA himself. I told him I use bleach for chlorine while the SWG is off and he kind of grimaced at that (lol.) Said I should use tablets in a float in the winter. I said I heard those add CYA, though, and I add that myself separately. He didn't like the bleach for some reason, I don't know why and did not ask. I don't really care because I like what I'm doing just fine thankyouverymuch and he did say the pH and TA were good (I just adjusted them a week ago.) I am sure he was just trying to be helpful, he seems like a nice guy.

Any thoughts on this water situation and what those pop ups could be besides the deck drain/gutter drain? I'm trying not to freak out. :crazy:
 
Been happening for a couple of years and they are just now telling you?? Well at least they told you.

Now it is time to play detective-Do you have a overflow pipe? There will be grate somewhere in your waterline tile.

Clean out the popup as much as you can. It might take a couple of goes to get it all cleaned up.

Let everything dry like the guy said. THEN see what gets it wet again using a hose. Place the hose so the water goes into the overflow grate. If that does not get the area wet them move onto the gutters. Might take getting up on a ladder to get the water to flow so be careful. It might take a time or two until you pinpoint the problem.

LOL on him making a face at you using bleach. Next time say chlorine and see if you get the same face :roll: For some reason just changing the word helps.

Kim:kim:
 
Hi Kim! Yes, there is an overflow. Right now we're letting everything dry up still. This morning the water around the pop up has gone down, now there is water standing inside the pipe maybe 2-3 inches below the top of the pipe. The pool level looks good still.

Great ideas for testing - I will try those after we get things dry. I pulled as much out of the pop up yesterday as I could reach. It makes a 90 degree turn so it's hard to get very far. I jammed a water hose as far as I could and it seemed to hit another turn and got stuck - it could have been another jam but things were softening up from the water I was using and it felt like it was hitting something hard (like the PVC.)

Thank you for your super smart ideas on how to test the overflow and gutters! I will try to remember to just say chlorine to pool guys in the future. ;)
 

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The pool guy came back today - my water level is fine so I don't have a leak (good thing.) He says he showed the drawing I have with the deck drains to a colleague and he said it's my pool overflow that's draining back there. Apparently I have been adding too much water causing it to overflow. Oops. So I'm leaving the filler program off (it's part of my sprinkler system controller) and will just keep an eye on it and add water when it needs it.

After he left we tested running water through the overflow grate using a hose and it came out the second pop up back there, not the one that the lid was loose on and was open. Then we ran water through the pool deck drain and it came out the open one. It filled up the area with water so it's still pretty saturated back there. Water did flow through so I know it's not clogged, at least. The gutter probably goes through one of those but I flooded the area so I couldn't tell anymore what was going on.

Just an update - I was so happy to not have a leak. :whoot:Hopefully my neighbor's yard will dry up and their vegetation will grow and they will not come banging on my door anymore. :?

Thanks for your help, Kim!
 
Mama, if you really want to make nice with the neighbors I have an idea. Buy a couple of the plants that died and bring them to them and explain what you found out and what you are doing to prevent it from happening again. Good neighbors are good to have!!!k

I am so glad my ideas worked! I never know which one of my wild ideas will stick and actually work!! :hug:

Kim:kim:
 
Well Kim, that is a great idea that I’m just now seeing! I used to get email notifications when there were replies but not anymore. :confused: I have not heard from them since so hopefully all is well - seems a little late to take them some plants at this point. Don’t want to stir the pot now. They do have my phone number and email address now so hopefully they will use it if there’s anything I need to know.

We are having a really hot, dry spell so I did put the pool filler back on a program after adding manually since this incident.

Recently I was having to lower my SWG percentage for awhile because the FC was staying kind of high although everything else seemed okay. It just seems to be a lower than normal setting for the cell but now it’s staying under 10 now. I have been in the middle of a major home renovation so I’ve not been focusing on it much and we’ve only been in the pool one time. :( Planning to swim tomorrow, though!

I’m going to see if I can figure out how to get emails again when there are replies!
 
Hey y’all! I don’t know if I should be posting on my own thread or starting a new one? I apologize for not knowing the protocol. I have a quick question.

My pH is 7.2. It usually runs high (7.8 to 8.2 normally) and seems to be dropping now. I have never seen that before. I turned on the waterfall because I think that raises pH. What could be causing my pH to drop?
 
Refreshed my memory: The poolmath app said 40 oz and I know that is what I added because I weighed it at 2lbs 8 oz. It was a big amount compared to what I normally have to add. We had a TON of rain over the past few weeks. I had to add 80 pounds of salt 2 weeks ago. Looking back on my tests, it does look like it dropped a bit from 12 days ago, before I added the CYA even it went from 7.8 to 7.5 before adding the CYA, now it's at 7.2 just after the CYA. Could the rain also be a factor for pH?
 
Rain typically raises the pH due to aeration. But the rain itself is normally fairly neutral pH. So offsets somewhat.

Use the Effect of Adding Chemicals in PoolMath to see what pH effect the CYA you added would have.
 

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