Anka

This is a 10,000 gal a/g pool in its first season. The pH maintains well at 7.4. Sanitizer is trichlor pucks inline with the sand filter. CYA is mostly at 30-50, never higher though sometimes the strip reads below 30. FC and TC readings are stable at between 1 and 3. TH has never been above 100 but I've never added any muriatic acid or other such hardness increaser. I occasionally shock with liquid chlorine. The total alkalinity ranges between 80 and 120 and I've been told by both the installer and the pool store that for a vinyl a/g pool the TA should be at 150. I keep adding Alk-Up but the alk doesn't go up. What the heck am I doing wrong??? I don't understand WHY the alkalinity should be at 150; what does it do to the liner and/or equipment if it's too low? The same question applies to total hardness. Waterbear, if you're reading this, could you give us some input? Oh, and P.S.: can I just get Arm & Hammer baking soda at Sam's Club? That would be a whole lot cheaper than the pool store product.

You were right The pool had some dead Japanese beetles on the bottom and a few clumps of dog hair, and it was VERY full from the rain, but the water was clean, clear, and sparkling. A minor spot of green algae in a liner wrinkle, that's it. I appreciate your advice.

Thanks for the timer URL. The pump is hardwired and a plug-in timer won't work, and there isn't time to hire an electician or have the pool installer come do it. I really should have thought of installing a timer when we initially put in the pool. When you said, "I'd make sure the pool is clean (vacummed and filter backwashed, all skimmers cleaned and the water chem balanced) and maybe add a bit more chlorine to the pool before I left " do you mean you'd not leave the pump running and just count on having well balanced water for the duration? That's probably what I'll do because I don't want to take a chance on the pump burning out for one reason or another. Plus, we do tend to have a lot of power outages here and if that happens, the pump won't come back on, anyway. Thanks for your input!

I have a two-phase Hayward pump. On 'LO' the pressure gauge reads 10, regardless of the condition of my filter medium which is sand. On 'HI' it reads 20 when I have a clean filter, just backwashed and rinsed, and 28 when the filter medium is really grungy. I also don't have a flow meter but am thinking of fitting one in because it would be enormously useful to have. I backwash when the pressure gauge reads 26 or so, or when I'm just not getting the right amount of output at the return, and I've learned to judge that by putting my hand over it and checking the water pressure.

I have to be gone for a few days and do not know what to do about the pool. This is like a living thing, like my garden and my dogs. It needs TLC. I don't know anybody around here well enough to ask them to come over and turn the pump on in the mornings and off at night. The way it's wired I can't find any sort of timer to connect to it. If I leave the pool alone for four days, I fear it'll be green sludge when I come back. I can let the pump run on 'filter' and not worry about the thousand Japanese beetles which will get caught in the skimmer, but what about water chemistry? I check this every day and add what needs adding, if anything. What if the pump quits for some reason? What if it pours rain and the pool overflows? What if the sky falls????? Really, what do you do when you have to leave for a while?

. . . has drowned the skimmer. The pool is within an inch of oveflowing. I guess I don't have to worry about filling it with well water for a while What do you experienced pool owners do during periods of heavy rain? Do you continue to run your filtration system? Do you keep checking water chemistry and make adjustments to sanitizer and pH, etc., or do you wait out the weather? Obviously, there's a heavy dilution factor at play, and the rain is expected to continue throughout the week. Do you ever drain water from your pool in order to keep the skimmer functioning? For sure this is a good time to backwash the filter medium, all that free water.

Thanks for the suggestion. I've seen this product at the pool store but didn't pay much attention to it because it was labeled for hot tubs. I'll give it a try. Anka

There is a line of grey-ish sooty stuff on the skimmer walls, also on the hand rails of the steps and on the white parts of the thermometer. I rubbed at it with my thumb and it sort of smears but doesn't come off. It reminds me of road grime on a vehicle. This substance is NOT on the pool walls or on the steps. Water chemistry tests consistently acceptable with both reagent kit and strips. Any ideas of what it could be? Soot from the burn barrel? Carbon from the air? We're in a flight path. And how do I get rid of it? I can't very well wipe it with solvent, that would do terrible things to my water Anka

YEOW !!! I think we'll stay away from that. Our fill water is chlorine treated well water. The Cl is mostly removed by a carbon filter but I'm sure there's a small residue. We could, of course, bypass the chlorine injector and use pure well water in which case we'd be introducing hydrogen sulfide since the well tapped into a sulfur vein. The joys of living in the Pennsylvania slate belt I had wondered how you'd convert back to chlorine from PMBH. The Bacquacil site didn't say. Sounds like a disgusting process.

Thank you, Waterbear. No, we haven't added any CYA and are really hesitant to do so. From what I've read on this forum, reducing an overload requires partial drainage and refilling. $$$$ I didn't know about adding liquid chlorine. Like Chlorox, you mean?

I just heard about this water treatment product from a friend who has started using it instead of chlorine. I'd like to learn more about it from people who use it, not from their Website or from a dealer. Pros? Cons? Cost? Anka

We have a 12,000 gal a-g pool which uses 3" trichlor tabs through an inline feeder. The feeder is set to 1/2. I test the water daily with AquaCheck strips and a 4-in-1 reagent kit. I had some trouble at the beginning of the season with low pH readings, 6.8, but after slowly adding pHPlus I'm now at 7.4 pretty much. It reads 7.2 with the strip and 7.6 with the kit. Total alkalinity is between 80 - 100, depending on which test I use (strip or kit). My problem is the FC and CYA. The trichlor, from what I understand, has the stabilizer in it and the feeder says on its lid to use only trichlor. The water is clear and feels smooth and silky, no problem there. Chlorine smell is minimal to none. My skin does not feel dry although my eyes burn a little. The FC reading is 0 - .5 with the strip and 1.0 with the reagent kit. The 'standards' given by the test docs say I should have 1.5 to 3.0 free chlorine. The CYA reading is 0 on both tests. I don't really understand why I can't get the FC/CYA readings to anything near 'normal' and yet the water is clean. Should I shock the pool to bring the Cl level up? Or should I just not mess with it on the premise that it ain't broke? We're new to pool ownership and maintenance and want to do it right because it's a pretty expensive toy. Thanks for your input, Anka

Yes, I did need to raise the water level and, having done so, the return works much better. It no longer blows bubbles across the water surface. I also contacted Polaris about the situation with the eyeball fitting. They were very helpful! They have a part called UWF Eyeball Fitting, part #6-511-00, which they're sending me free of charge. Now all we need is a few warm days to help heat the water.

Please bear with me. I don't know the proper terms for the equipment which is giving me grief and I hope my description will make sense. We bought a Polaris 65 pool cleaner which works off the um . . . water recirculation outlet (?). Normally, this outlet has a directional 'eye' which can be pointed downward or sideways to direct the flow of water. To utilize the Polaris quick-connect hose end the eye has to be removed and replaced with a universal adaptor. This adaptor has threads on the outside and the eye also has threads on the outside. Never the twain shall come together, I guess. What I'm wondering is, is there a gadget, a threaded ring, yet another adaptor perhaps, which will let me attach the eye to the outlet when I'm not using the Polaris? Because the problem is, as things are presently, the outlet is just below the water level and it bubbles the water across the surface rather than shooting it below or to the side toward the skimmer basket. I'm hoping you can visualize the situation because words fail me Thanks for any ideas!

Thanks for the link, Josh. This ramp would certainly extend the swimming season, especially at the front end when the water is too cold for us to put the steps in but warm enough for the dogs to swim. Any water that's not frozen solid is swimming water to our pack. Having to be in the pool to seat the steps and insert the weighs is a real limitation. We probably can't do that for another 4 weeks but with this ramp and some guided training the dogs could certainly learn to exit the pool. Again, thank you!

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Do they have to be stored inside in the garage or basement or is it ok to kep them outside during the winter? Our concern is that they might crack from the cold. Anka

Shari, We have three German Shepherds swimming in our pool and have no problem getting the hair out. We installed a 1.5 hp 2-speed pump which we run on high while they swim and for a couple of hours after and it has done a fine job pushing the hair into the skimmer. Before we had our own pool they swam in a friend's. She did nothing special as far as chemical treatment. Just make sure you check and clean the skimmer basket dilgently. Rinse the dogs off with clean water to remove the pool chemicals. If you live in a humid climate you might want to consider getting a dog dryer and blow them dry. We've had some skin problems on ours because their coats never really dried when the humidity was high. Anka

Several weeks ago I came here asking questions about dog hair filtration because we wanted to build a pool for our three German Shepherd dogs. Based on the advice and guidance from several members of this forum we selected the various components and the pool is now installed and functional. We chose a 15 x 30 Sunshine pool with J-hook liner, a 1 1/2 Pentair 2 speed pump, and a 19" sand filter. Although the water is very cold the dogs have been in it daily and loving it! The pump runs on high speed for a couple of hours after they swim and does a terrific job of shooting the hair into the skimmer. I've now ordered a Polaris 65 to vacuum stray leaves off the bottom and am anxiously awaiting its arrival. I wanted to thank everyone with whom I corresponded about your excellent advice. Anka