Test kit in ... let the SLAMing begin!

[Caco]

Yeah one brand I used did
The other kinda turned to a slurry and took about 24 hours to dissolve

Change your CYA in the now and target column to 30ppm
We wont be upping your CYA for a couple of days, until we are sure the algae is all gone
We assume the cya is all in there while it dissolves
But it could take a couple of days after dissolving to show up on the test

Ok, so what is the ph at now?

 

[buballodingo]

PH is at 7.2 now!!!PROGRESS!!

 

[Caco]

Woohoo!!

 

[Caco]

Ok, now onto your calcium
You have 50ppm in your water
1725g of calcium will bring the pool up to 125ppm

So I would get a half a bucket of pool water
Add the calcium and stir
You may want to do it in smaller lots so its easy to mix

When its dissolved in the bucket pour it into the pool next to the return
Keep the pour rate slow so it will mix in
If it seems to pool in the water just give the area a quick brush

Then change pool math to reflect the addition of the calcium

 

[buballodingo]

Do I need to buy more at this stage or do I wait to SLAM?

 

[Caco]

You will need to get some more calcium next time you are out and top it up

We will start on slam after adding what you have

It can be added at any time

Need to get your CSI better

Will talk over that later

 

[buballodingo]

CSI? Crime Scene Investigation

It ended up being 1.7kg exactly of hardener. Now added.

 

[Caco]

Alrighty then
We have ph at 7.2
CYA dissolving to get to 30ppm
Calcium at 125ppm

TA we will leave at 60ppm. There is no hard and fast rule for TA really. You need more than 40ppm to prevent a ph crash. We will check how your ph reacts. If it climbs too fast we could drop to 50. I think it will be fine where it is

Now onto chlorine
At 1ppm FC with no CYA that has probably dissapeared by now
So we will assume 0 chlorine
We need to get to FC of 12 for your 30ppm cya
Poolmath tells me at 13% weight you need to add 1910ml (1.9 litres)
So go pour that slowly in front of the return
It should take a couple of minutes to pour that amount

And then you are slamming

 

[buballodingo]

Done. 1.9 to 2L in. Took about 3 minutes to do. Is that it - SLAM away. When do I test chlorine levels next?

Also in relation to the CYA chart - the SLAM video if I understood correctly said CYA 70-80 if you have a SGW - I assume it is better to turn off the SGW as we have and SLAM under non SGW paramaters so we control the amount of chlorine beterr. Once we pass the OCLT we can then play with the balancing to get the pool to operate with the SGW?

 

[Caco]

I would test your chlorine in about 15 mins to see what level you got to
Then test again in 2 hours and report back on the level

Yes we are going to slam as though you do not have a swg
A swg cannot produce enough chlorine to slam
High cya means you have to have high chlorine
So easier and cheaper to keep the cya down and dose with bleach

We can do salt next
It generally takes salt a couple of days to fully dissolve into the water before you can turn on the swg anyway
What weight are your bags of salt?

 

[buballodingo]

Im using sunray salt 25kg bags.

 

[Caco]

If you look down at the bottom of the poolmath page there is an 'effects of adding chemicals' section
If you select 'salt' and enter 75kg (3 bags) it tells me that it would raise salt to 3609

You said you wanted to go to 3500 on salt to start
I would just add 3 bags based on the above
You can just tip them in
I like to swim to stir them in, if the water is warm enough
Someone posted on here about his young daughters swimming through the salt and calling it 'diamond day', lol so cute

 

[buballodingo]

Salt in and measuring the chlorine now.

 

[buballodingo]

FC now at 13.5...I didnt measure CC on this one. I will do on the next...just forgot to.

 

[Caco]

Ok awesome
We can assume from that your chlorine is still at 13%
If you consistently get high chlorine results then your pool volume may be a little smaller than you think

No worries on the CC
We only do that test when we think we have issues
Or when we do an OCLT

How you feeling? Stuffed?
Cracked open a cold one yet?

 

[buballodingo]

Im nearly over it - but until then I will keep on going - really its been ok... Im not gonna SLAM every day so it is good and a very knowledgable process for me.

In reference to the pool volume it can only be off by 200 - 300L maximum as I measured it by laser and tape. I have 3 steps in my pool so it was a detailed calculation. I am currently 40mm below the skimmer and not the 20mm used in the below calculation so this is 360L.

Pool Dimensions			Pool Water Volumes
Width	3.010		Step 1 Volume	0.607
Length	6.155		Step 2 Volume	3.029
Step 1 Length	0.650		Step 3A Volume	8.031
Step 2 Length	1.610		Step 3B Volume	8.383
Step 3A Length	1.948		Remco Pit	0.675
Step 3B Length	1.948		Total Water Volume	20.724	cu.m.
Remco Pit Length	0.650			20724	Litres
Step 1 Depth	0.310			5475	US Gallons
Step 2 Depth	0.625
Step 3A Depth	1.370
Step 3B Depth	1.430
Remco Pit Depth	0.780
DDT Remco Cover	0.851
Note: Measured depth to 20mm below top of skimmer

My issue will be the remco swimroll and when closed how that impacts the chlorine levels. Something I need to work on.

 

[buballodingo]

I also have an auto top up which I just adjusted by 10mm I think so it will add some water in there now too.

 

[Caco]

If anything having the cover closed is going to lower your FC usage
You may notice a faint whiff of CC (that awful public swimming pool smell) when you open the cover
If the smell ever gets strong you know something is wrong and to up your testing and chlorine

Well, you have balanced (sorta) and started slamming your pool
Its been a big day
So we will see what the FC is like in about an hour to see if you lost any

If you have lost chlorine you can change your now level to what the test said, the target level stays at 12 and put in the amount of chlorine to bring it back up to 12

If you have not lost chlorine I would like you to do an OCLT tonight, just to confirm all is good
Do you know how?

 

[buballodingo]

Measure FC and CC tonight after sunset. DO again in the morning and if 0-1 max drop in FC and CC less than 0.5 I am clear?

Is that it?

If that does happen what next? Do we need to determine the best levels for my pool etc? I might go to the hardware now and top up on some things - I will get more hardener and stabiliser. I have enough chlorine and acid for now and 1 bag of salt remaining...is there anything else to keep handy you think?

- - - Updated - - -

Oh and am I better to close the cover now...the reason I ask is that the chlorine will cover the cover too more efficiently than being rolled up in the pit of the pool so any potential algae on the cover also gets SLAMed...or am I over thinking it?

 

[Caco]

OK you seem to have the basics down
You know how to test and use poolmath to calculate the dosage

Now advanced pool school = CSI = calcium saturation index
It is shown near the bottom of pool math
Less than -0.6 means that the grout in your case could possibly etch
More than 0.6 means you could possibly get calcium scale on those tiles
This does not happen overnight, it would take some time

So if you top up your calcium to 200ppm and let your ph drift up to 7.5 it would put your CSI at -0.59

Of course if you add more salt for your swg, this will change the CSI too

It is something you can tweak over time to get your water nicely balanced