the &#$^OI*&#$ SPA! AGAIN.

DMS2014 · May 30, 2015

Okay. This is unbelievable. We test that stupid spa just about every day. Today, out of the clear blue, the spa is ugly. it has a smell. Now last night my husband said the chlorine was low so he added another bromine tab. Now it's registering NO chlorine at all. There were 3 bromine tabs in the little thing that floats in the water. What is the deal?!?! We put spa clear in it and another thing that you are supposed to do to get rid of contaminates or whatever.

What are we missing? I have sent my husband to the pool school page to read in the past. I have bought the test kid. We check and check and yet this suddenly happens! it's weird and my husband is totally baffled! I didn't test that water yesterday bc we had just changed the water out last week and it had been testing just fine.

chem geek · May 30, 2015

Was their any change in bather load? It sounds like you are using a bromine system with bromine tabs in a feeder, but unless your bather load is consistent you need to set the amount of tabs to give you a background dose of bromine while you need to add chlorine (or MPS) after every soak to oxidize the bather waste. Spas are not like pools and the disinfectant can get used up quickly if you have even a single high bather load event.

DMS2014 · May 30, 2015

chem geek said:
Was their any change in bather load? It sounds like you are using a bromine system with bromine tabs in a feeder, but unless your bather load is consistent you need to set the amount of tabs to give you a background dose of bromine while you need to add chlorine (or MPS) after every soak to oxidize the bather waste. Spas are not like pools and the disinfectant can get used up quickly if you have even a single high bather load event.

NO! it was just the two of us all week. We didn't go in it last night as we were tired. My husband is diligent about checking it. We are using bromine in a feeder. We always leave the feeder in there and my husband shakes it regularly to be sure. We do add fresh N clear and then spa perfect once a week.

chem geek · May 31, 2015

Bromine tabs don't dissolve that quickly so it may be that the bather load from the two of you built up and the bromine got behind. Either that or something happened to block the bromine from the feeder. At any rate, just as with a pool you need so elevate the disinfectant level to kill off or oxidize whatever is causing the demand so add some chlorine (or MPS which is Fresh 'N Clear though that's more expensive) to create more bromine. Keep the level up until it decays a normal amount, usually less than 25% of the Total Bromine level over 24 hours.

DMS2014 · Jun 1, 2015

to us, it's really baffling considering it's just us two 95% of the time and it makes us worry about going on vacation. we've even wondered if like the pumps stop working or something and does this. My husband checks it every time before we get in it. Last night we got in it and afterwards I dumped 2 capfuls of that Spa Perfect in there and let the water circulate with it. The spa is more trouble than the pool!

pooldv · Jun 1, 2015

It definitely can be more tempermental. The heat and the gallons per person makes it much different than the pool. 2 people in 400 gallons vs 2 people in 20,000 gallons is a BIG difference. I use the dichlor then bleach process.

There are definitely times when I add my usual 1/8-1/4 cup of bleach and test again later and I has dropped to 0 or the tub is cloudy. This is usually when some kids are in there or something but sometimes it is unexplainable. When my tub starts to cloud for no reason I add the usual bleach and test every 15-20 minutes and add until it doesn't drop to 0. Sort of a mini-SLAM.

chem geek · Jun 1, 2015

Spa Perfect is an enzyme, but what you need to kill of growing bacteria is disinfectant (chlorine, bromine) and for it to not get too low at any time (certainly not for more than an hour).

Also, in a bromine spa to keep the water clear you usually need to shock with chlorine once a week or two. In theory, the enzymes in Spa Perfect should work similarly to take care of bather waste that bromine doesn't handle well, but it sounds like it's not working so well whereas we know that chlorine can keep a spa clear.

As for vacations, if it's only a week then bromine tabs in a floating feeder should work. If it's longer than that, then you may need to have someone add more disinfectant to the spa while you are gone. If you didn't object to using chlorine then you might consider using a saltwater chlorine generator such as the ControlOMatic Technichlor. Also, for a bromine spa, if you had an ozonator then it could generate more bromine (from a bromide bank initially created by adding sodium bromide to the water), but it sounds like you don't have an ozonator in your spa.

DMS2014 · Jun 3, 2015

our spa is 475 gallons. I believe that we do have an ozonator but I am checking with the hubby on that. to us it's unexplainable why all of a sudden after NO use it turns. We have started adding bleach to our pool and I will get the hubby to research again. I had him read pool and spa on here.