Hello everyone! Nice to meet you. I've taken over pool maintenance from the other members of the family, since they are no longer able to. Which is fine with me. They were happy to do it in the past so I didn't give it too much thought, other than what they told me to do when it needed to be done. I haven't lived at home where the pool is for many many years anyway, so it really wasn't in my purview.
I'm a huge STEM fan, enthusiast, citizen scientist, engineer, professional and technical hobbyist. I love the gritty details and the even smaller details behind those. So I'm hoping this will be in my wheelhouse more or less.
Ok on with the situation.
I was sent to the Local Pool Store to pick up whatever was needed to clear up the moderate green algae problem we had coming out of this last spring. They sold me some shock and told me the chlorine tablets I'd been using were garbage and that I should be using theirs, and oh my! look at my phosphates!! I need to buy $150 in chemicals to fix that! And they even scolded me for not knowing more...
I found this to be unacceptable and the people working there abhorrent. I resolved to go home and learn all I could about pool maintenance from the most highly regarded and well cited source I could find online. So here I am.
I'd been going off the store's measurements but wanted to get the Taylor Test K-2006c as recommended, so I could compare and post the results here as indicated. The test arrived today, just a couple hours ago. In general, their tests look to be on par with what I got from the Taylor test that I just performed. So at least they weren't doping those one direction or the other.
Before knowing better, I used the shock that they'd sold me, along with something called Clear Aid. This did the trick for killing the algae but I'm still left with a fairly cloudy pool. Before I went any further with anything I wanted advice from the prophets of pool care.
The pool:
18,000 gal., IG, Plaster.
Located in Central California.
FC 0.6
CC 1.2
CYA ~32
pH 7.4
TA 90
CH 450
I completely cleaned the filters a few days ago and ran the pump for about 12 hours after doing so. Then I added 1 gallon 12.5% liquid bleach because my FC and CC levels were reading even lower than they are now. I ran the pump roughly 6 hours when I did that and now btw 6 - 4 hours each day. It took nearly 5 days for the test kit to arrive so I didn't want to risk another algal bloom with such low Cl levels. Basically just maintaining it until I could take my readings and post.
If I were to guess, I would think that I need to bring up my CYA levels a bit, the pH down just a touch, then continue to add bleach and run the filter pump until levels are within ideal range. If the water didn't clear, SLAM. Although, that might be the recommended first step.
Thanks in advance for your advice and running a well tended forum.
Chyllo
I'm a huge STEM fan, enthusiast, citizen scientist, engineer, professional and technical hobbyist. I love the gritty details and the even smaller details behind those. So I'm hoping this will be in my wheelhouse more or less.
Ok on with the situation.
I was sent to the Local Pool Store to pick up whatever was needed to clear up the moderate green algae problem we had coming out of this last spring. They sold me some shock and told me the chlorine tablets I'd been using were garbage and that I should be using theirs, and oh my! look at my phosphates!! I need to buy $150 in chemicals to fix that! And they even scolded me for not knowing more...
I found this to be unacceptable and the people working there abhorrent. I resolved to go home and learn all I could about pool maintenance from the most highly regarded and well cited source I could find online. So here I am.
I'd been going off the store's measurements but wanted to get the Taylor Test K-2006c as recommended, so I could compare and post the results here as indicated. The test arrived today, just a couple hours ago. In general, their tests look to be on par with what I got from the Taylor test that I just performed. So at least they weren't doping those one direction or the other.
Before knowing better, I used the shock that they'd sold me, along with something called Clear Aid. This did the trick for killing the algae but I'm still left with a fairly cloudy pool. Before I went any further with anything I wanted advice from the prophets of pool care.
The pool:
18,000 gal., IG, Plaster.
Located in Central California.
FC 0.6
CC 1.2
CYA ~32
pH 7.4
TA 90
CH 450
I completely cleaned the filters a few days ago and ran the pump for about 12 hours after doing so. Then I added 1 gallon 12.5% liquid bleach because my FC and CC levels were reading even lower than they are now. I ran the pump roughly 6 hours when I did that and now btw 6 - 4 hours each day. It took nearly 5 days for the test kit to arrive so I didn't want to risk another algal bloom with such low Cl levels. Basically just maintaining it until I could take my readings and post.
If I were to guess, I would think that I need to bring up my CYA levels a bit, the pH down just a touch, then continue to add bleach and run the filter pump until levels are within ideal range. If the water didn't clear, SLAM. Although, that might be the recommended first step.
Thanks in advance for your advice and running a well tended forum.
Chyllo