stilloriginal

happy thanksgiving. CYA reading is "low"

OK so its been like 6 weeks since shocking and the chlorine still won't go down. This is INSANE. This is the shock I used: http://www.homedepot.com/p/Pool-Time-1-lb-Shock-PLUS-4-in-1-Pool-Shock-22816PTM/100003536 I lowered the generator to "1" and only ran it 4 hours a week for a week and just got back to down and the chlorine is still too high to use the pool. I am thinking I will have to drain it and start over, because I am at my wit's end.

ok so I got the neutralizer. It brought the chlorine in the pool to zero. I immediately turned the generator back on, and set it to "4" to make sure the chlorine would come back up. After several days of reading "0", I finally read a "2" this morning, perfect. So I set the generator to "2" and let it run the rest of the day. I just tested the water now and we are back to "10-20". Why is this happening???

I have several chlorine tests and they all put the chlorine over 10. Its been 3 weeks since shocking and the chlorine still has not dropped, even a bit. Should I go and get the chlorine neutralizer or what? I live in florida, the pool is uncovered.

Thank you for your reply. What do I do about the high chlorine? It is over 10 and has not gone down, it's been over a week, and I am starting to get concerned.

Thank you for any help on this question. I have a salt water in-ground pool which had an algae bloom, due to me lowering the generator down to "1" when it got cold out. Next time I will run for fewer hours and leave it at "2" where it normally is. I shocked the pool with 2 jugs of liquid chlorine that had been sitting in my garage about a year and it did not work. All the while cleaning the filter daily, even bought a new filter just to be sure. After about a week Free chlorine was about 10 and Total chlorine about 3. Yes you read that correctly. I figured I had a problem and bought 2 bags of crystalized shock and threw them in there at nighttime, ran for 24 hours, everything cleared up, crystal clear. Ever since the Free chlorine has been around 20 and Total chlorine about 10. After about 4-5 days when it wouldn't drop I turned off the generator altogether. its been about another 4-5 days and we are down to about Free Chlorine 10 total Chlorine 5. Has anyone ran into anything like this before? I have tested with the test strips which give a separate reading for Free and total chlorine, since the dropper method has you simply wait longer to get Total chlorine it wouldn't ever give a reverse reading like I am seeing. Thank you in advance, I am starting to get concerned.

We had a problem with staining from metals....Pool expert said it was from the copper in the heater (we recently rennovated pool and the builder installed a salt system and a new heater). Pool expert said I let the pH get too high and there was too much chlorine which caused the staining. He repaired all damage. However, after he was done I couldn't get the pool filter clean enough to keep the pressure down. So finally I caved and bought a new filter. Everything has been going fine for the last month, until a week ago, during normal monthly maintenance, I added a half bottle of stain control (sequesterant). This week the pressue shot way up, the motor started whining... I just took the filter out to clean it. The water washes out blue.... I did get it sparkling clean (just using water). The pressure did not drop, however.... IS the blue-ness from metals in the water (like how copper corrodes blue-ish)? Am I having a problem here? Since the problem was corrected I have kept the chemicals very nicely. The pH shot up before I did the chemicals last week, but it couldn't have been up more than a few days as I have been doing the chemicals weekly or even more often. I tested the water 3 days ago and everything was on target. Thanks for any advice.....

waterbear, in the video, when the add the 3rd reagent (starting at 1;10), it appears to turn a very strong hue to me, much stronger than the "5" on the comparator. This is the same hue as my water turns. (here is a pic: http://www.imgur.com/NIOr2 ) I end up having to do a 1/4 dilution and get a final reading 15-20. Or am I missing something???

waterbear, Take a look at this video on the Taylor site: http://www.taylortechnologies.com/products_choose_slideshow.asp?KitNumber=K-1005 Click on "To Test Chlorine with Liquid DPD [updated 3/5/10]" That is the Taylor test that is showing high amounts of combined chlorine. If you watch the example video....THEY GET THE SAME RESULTS AS ME. At this point I think Taylor is selling a bunk kit, and I am thinking about calling and complaining. This seems to have been a heck of a lot of work all for nothing. Thanks for your help.

waterbear, thank you again so much for taking the time to help me. 1.The test kit is a Taylor K-1005 icare. Here are the results as of 10 minutes ago (it's been a week since doing the chemicals): Free Chlorine: 1 Combined Chlorine: 15 pH: 8.5 alkalinity: 90 Calcium Hardness: 550 Cyanuric Acid: 50 2. I got the 3-way kit you recommended. The color in the first few seconds was like mountain dew- and then turned pretty strong yellow. (about a "3"). Here is a pic: http://www.imgur.com/8aaMV 3. The pool was shocked with liquid chlorine from day 1 and then by using the pool's salt system. We have never had an algae problem and never added algecide as far as I know. 4. The pool is not square or round unfortunately it is an amorphous shape. If I take all the curves and "average" them into a square, the pool would be about 25' x 15', 7 feet deep and the deep end and 3.5 at the shallow, with the dropoff about in the middle. There is an attached spa which is 6' in diameter, with a 3' diameter "foot area", each step about 1.5' deep. So, I calculate the pool is 1969 cubic feet, but since the bottom edges are all curved, and there are stairs, I would take about 10% off of this and just call it 1770 cubic feet. I calculate the spa is another 40 cubic feet. 1810 cubic feet should equal 13,500 gallons. Please let me know if you see the math any differently. The water here in florida is high in calcium deposits so I don't know if draining and re-filling will sove that "issue". we are planning to invest in a water softener and at that point may consider re-filling the pool with filtered water. Thank you again for all of your help!!!!

I see....please forgive a noob! any idea why I am showing these levels of CC but the pool store shows 0 chlorine across the board??

Sorry about that. I don't know exactly how many gallons it is. It is 6 feet in the deep end and about 3 in the shallow. A bit too small to be a great lap pool, it looks like a small to medium sized in ground pool. I estimate about 15,000 gallons, maybe a bit more. There is no autofill. only once this summer did I need to re-fill with the hose....we have had so much rain I have had to drain many times... I bet we have gotten close to 20 inches this summer. How do you know if the CC has broken?

yes, I was washing it every 5 days for the last month and finally put a new one in this past weekend. Do you think if I hit "superchlorinate" on the cell for the next 24 hours it would solve it now that I have a new filter?

no dead animal, but we do get a ton of spiders every week. I never see them crawling around the patio, only ever in the skimmer or at the bottom of the pool. These guys couldn't be doing it could they?

Hello water bear, I am looking for the docs. But this is the heater: http://www.rheem.com...ool-spa-heaters The old heater ran on propane and it was expensive to re-fill. Since we had gas installed when we rennovated the house, we went ahead and installed a gas heater. -yes the plaster is still curing, it was done in april of this year. I think this is why the pH keeps rising. We used "florida Gem" brand. -This is the Salt Cell: http://www.pentairpo...elliChlorIG.pdf It is the model IC 40. I don't know the salt level but it reads that the salt level is good. The pool store says I need to add 120 lbs. -I checked out the taylor videos and realized how to do the diluted test. I am now getting a reading of about 15-20 on the TC. Thanks for that. Any help is greatly appreciated. I am wondering if I just superchlorinate today with the new filter if It would take care of it.

Thank you for the quick response! -yes, the pool is outdoor exposed to sunlight. It in a screen enclosure. -I think you may possibly be confused about the test kits, or possibly I am. This kit sure does test for CH and CYA. It calls the chlorine test a "DPD" test. I fill the tester to the line, add 5 drops of two different things to get FC, then 5 drops of something else to get TC. (right now adding just 1 drop of the 3rd bottle turns the color red enough to be over 10) -When we bought the house, the pool had spots on it which we found during inspection. These spots were areas where the plaster was breaking down. The sellers conceded enough to get the pool re-surfaced. We figured to go ahead and also re-tile and put a new heater and salt system at the same time. So, it was all installed on the same day, or possibly the heater was connected like 3 days later, I can't really remember. But all basically the same time. Thank you so much for taking the time to help. I replaced the filter yesterday because the pressure was going high like every 5 days. Maybe this will be the answer. edit: I tested the chemicals today again...pH is a little low (I must have added too much acid yesterday, I am sure it will go back up on it's own), FC is 2, TC is infinity, Alkalinity is 100, CYA is 40. (though that last one would depend on your eyesight, my girlfriend saw it dissapear around 70 and she wears really thick glasses. I could still see a very faint outline at 50. )

Thank you for taking the time to read about my pool problems. I will try to explain clearly the whole picture. I have a pool in central florida that we recently resurfaced and put in a salt system. I was doing the chemicals by taking the water samples to the pool store and following their recommendations. I ended up with stains all over the pool. I called the builder because I was concerned it could be due to the salt system. He called in a professional who took care of everything and now the pool is sparkling clean again. He claimed that it was high chlorine levels which caused the copper in the (brand new) heater to corrode. So I bought a test kit (taylor k-1005 i care) to do the tests myself. 1 month has passed and we have yet to go in the pool, because of consistently high CC levels from day 1. I cannot get it to go down. It is driving me nuts. Every time I test the chlorine, the free chlorine is the right shade, but then I add the drops for the CC reading and it turns dark red. I have tried "superchlorinating" on the salt cell, most recently for 48 hours, and nothing happens, I get the same readings 2 days later. To confound the issue, when I take the water to the pool store, they read 0 free chlorine, 0 combined chlorine, 0 total chlorine, and tell me to add more. Every time I have ever gone in, they say to add salt (but the salt cell says salt is fine) and add stabalizer, always 2-4 lbs, no matter how many times I add it it always needs more. It's like banging your head against a wall. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance.

We have gotten a few quotes to refinish our pool. How long should this process take? One quote we received was for a full week, another quote said the job would be completed in 3 days. This quote was obviously cheaper but I am concerned that they aren't "doing it right". They want 1 day to drain the pool, one day to prep it, and on the 3rd day they will spray it with the new surface and fill it with water the same day. Does this sound right?