waterbear
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Posts posted by waterbear
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IF you are going to be shocking with chloirine then you don't need MPS. You use either one or the other. I see no advantage in using MPS for shocking. Both will oxidize the bromide ions into hypobromous acid. (And if you have the sodium bromide in the waer there will be no chloirne, it will be converted into chloride ions--the MPS will form sulfates in your water).
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IT really depends on what part of the country you are in. Vinyl liners do have an advantage where the grounds get a hard freeze because they can flex with the freeze but in other areas of the country they are not as good. In S. FL they were not permitted at all until very recently, as a matter of fact. I work in a pool/spa supply in N. FL and customers with liner pools need to replace the liners about every 7-10 years, perhaps because we don't close pools here for the winter and the liner is exposed to UV from the sun year round. There are many fiberglass installs that have been in the ground for about 20 years now that I know of that are still in excellent shape and concrete/plaster pools last very long (given that the plaster does need to be acid washed about every 5 years and replastered perhaps every 15-20.)
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I think you misunderstood me. Shock is not going to be sodium bromide but will be plain MPS. There are some products on the market that are supposed to be 'one step' and combine both sodiium bromide and MPS or dichlor together. The sodium bromide should be adding on filling the spa each time to create your bromide reserve in the water and then shocking with either MPS or chlorine to activate the sodium bromide into bromine sanitizer, hypobromous acid. I suggested using chlorine (bleach) for shocking instead of MPS.
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Please post a full set of test results. You did not say how you chlornate or what kind of filter you have. It is possible your Cyanuric Acid is too high and that will require replacing some of the water. High calcium can also be a problem and that would require replacing some of the water with softer water or by very careful attention to your water balance. Either high CYA or high calcium/TA could cause cloudy water.
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Your tap water should not have any CYA in it. If it does then I would contact your water company since that would mean your water is contaminated (probably with runoff from herbacides, which degrade to CYA and other things from bacterial degredation).
It is usually safe to drain to a foot or two below the skimmer but if you can safely drain more then that would be a faster way to reduce the level. You are looking at replacing about 50% of the water in your pool. Then again, it's hard to measure CYA levels above 100 ppm so your actual level might be higher. The strips are just not that precise. Also, if you have had high CYA levels for a while it is possible that some might have deposited in the surface of the pool and in the plumbing and as you lower the level it will redissolve so you might have to do a second water replacement in a week or two after you initially get it to where you want it.
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IF the CYA is too high a few things happen. The chlorine in your pool becomes less effective and it will require higher chlorine levels to maintian sanitized water and to prevent algae. Manually chorinated pools are usually recommened to be between 30-50 ppm CYA and salt pools generally 60-80.
Also, recent studies have shown that CYA levels in excess of 100 ppm can attack plaster pools and cause suface damage.
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i have a mate who added benzalkonium to a green fiberglass pool, flocked it and left it for an excessive time period before vaccuming. it has left him with a green stain.
before knowing what specific algicide he used i suggested it may be copper staining from cheep supermarket algicide and to try removing in a small spot with a teaspoon of oxalic acid. however he has gone and put in a couple capfulls and now has a clowdy pool. ive recomended balancing the ph and lots of filtering.
Oxalic acid often precipitates out calium oxalate, which can cloud the water. This is why I like ascorbic acid better.
now...after he told me this and reading the chemical he used as an algicide(benzalkonium) i have no idea what it is. does this contain copper, could the floc have had copper in it, could the algae alone have stained it alone, and what should remove it :S
Benzalkonium chloride is a linear quat, the most common form of algaecide. They are the kind that can foam. Some of them also contain copper so you have to read the ingredients to see if there was copper in the mix. It is possible that the green stain you are seeing is just algae that is on the suface of the pool. Does it brush off? IF it does it's algae. Copper ususlly produces black stains in fiberglass pools.
Algaecides don't really kill algae (except for copper, which has it's own set of problems and I would only recommend it for a very reistant case of black algae), they help the chlorine to kill them so if you hare trying to kill algae you need to raise the FC levels and keep them there until the algae is gone. How high you need to raise the FC depends on how high your CYA is. The higher the CYA the higher a FC you need to kill the algae.
my last resort ill be suggesting will be citric acid after its all clear and balanced.
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What a great forum and wealth of information here. Hoping some of you can help me with a very expensive problem I'm having with my spa. I have had to replace nearly all of the jets in my spa due to the plastic that holds them together becoming very thin and brittle and eventually falling apart. When they come out, they feel a little slimy and when they dry out they have a white powdery coating on them-- maybe just plastic residue.
This is a Clearwater spa with a Genesis bromine generator. I have had problems with chemistry-- mostly keeping my pH down and my alkalinity up, which has been discussed here thoroughly. Is this what it causing my problem? I've tried to raise my alkalinity with sodium bicarb, but this puts the pH through the roof. I'm confused and could really use help. I've now spent over $500 on new jets and now I'm losing some of those, and of course concerned about what's happening to the rest of the system.
Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.
This is a common problem with this style of jets. There is not much material making up the particular part of the jet that keeps it locked in posistion to begin with. Low PH eats away what little plastic there is in no time, if water is not kept in balance. You can probably scrape away the surface plastic with your fingernail. Normally the PH will fall when you use the tub. I find it odd that you have to lower the PH with chemicals. Water should be changed every three months. At 3 months you have added so much calcium to the water it acts like sand paper on the parts. (Calcium is a common filler ingreadient used to cary your sanitizer bromine chlorine ect.) bromine in it's natural state is a gas. it requires a (binder) to be handled. I recomend also that you use all products from one manufacturer. If Guard-x for example use all Guard-x. Don't mix, as some binders may not be compatable, never use any products containing Hydrogen Peroxide, IE. Baqua spa. Baqua requires special replacement parts, not ever mentioned, to the consumer. Baqua eats up plastic fast. Alkilinity should require adjustment more frequently than PH. Alkilinity increaser should not affect your PH, some alk increasers do both. read your label. It is more important to keep the PH correct than the alkilinity. High PH will leave deposits, (Sand Paper) on parts exposed to the water. Low PH will eat the same parts away. PH= Power of Hydrogen. H2O ratio. If the water is low on Hydrogen. it will take it from whatever it has contact with. I hope this helps, and look forward to any comments, or additions.
A few clarifications. Alkalinity increaser is sodium bicarbonate, it will increae TA and slighly increase pH.
High pH can lead to scaling because it causes calcium carbonate to preicipitate out but only if calcium harndess and total alkalinity (carbonate hardness) is also high.
Low pH means more hydrogen ions than hydronioum ions so your explanation is not really correct about how low pH affects plastic. What is usually does is leach plasticizers out of the plastic, manking it brittle--much in the same way it effects vinyl pool liners.
Thank you Wizard for the reply. Some of the information you provided however is precisely why I'm confused. For instance, I know that low pH will eat away at plastic-- but I have NEVER had low pH-- it's always high. So it seems like something else is eating the plastic. Also, I don't add sanitizer products with fillers-- only the Genesis Tru-Blu (98% sodium bromide) after a water change to establish a bromine bank for the generator.
I assume that the first step would be to balance my water, but what other than sodium bicarb can I use to raise the alkalinity without raising pH? Any recommendations? Waterbear outlined in a previous post a treatment to bring both TA and pH up together with bicarb and then bring them down slowly with predissolved sodium bisulfate, which I am in the process of trying.
You also mention that this is a common problem with these jets, but I have searched all over the internet for solutions to this problem but couldn't find others with the same problem. Has anyone else solved this problem another way?
Thanks again
You mention above that you do not use any fillers, (binders) "Sodium" is the filler, (binder) it is the product used to hold the Bromine (Gas). If your tub looks like a alkaseltser, foaming white water when you turn on the jets, you need to change the water, you have too much Sodium in the water, grinding down your parts.
Sodium bromide adds both sodium ions and bromine ions to the water. The sodium is NOT a filler but an intregal part of the chemical. Also, bromine is not a gas but a liquid in elemental state at normal temperatures but we are not dealing with elemental bromine in a spa, we are dealing with hypobromous acid and with sodium bromide, which is an intregal part of bromine sanitation whether done with a generator or with a conventional 2 steop or 3 step bromine system. Ions in the water will NOT 'grind down your parts' since they are dissolved in the water and are not particulate matter.
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One of the main problems you will encounter is that your pH will rise very fast since you will need to operate the SWG at a very high output to produce that level of chlorine. Bite the bullet and start drains and refills. It's for the best.
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Goldline controls recommends a CYA level of 60-80 ppm and I have found that 70-80 works very well. Get your CYA down to that level (and DON'T use strips to do it...they are just not reliable!)
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Well, since my first post, I have done some 'googling' and I think I may have solved the low Cl problem. I put my system into 'Superchlorinate' mode for 24 hrs. I am still perplexed with seemingly conflicting information. Inside my Aquarite box, it states that ideal Cl range is around 1ppm. And yet my test kit (Taylor) says ideal FC 2-4ppm, Br 4-6ppm
So still confused.
Can someone tell me what is ideal Cl for SWG??
Thanks
Just chatted with hubby. He said not necessary to superchlorinate. He had me bump up Aquarite 5% and then re-test after sufficient time.
You need to get your CYA tested. Goldline recommends 60-80 ppm and it really does help you maintain chlorine. I test a lot of pools and have found that FC between about 3-5 ppm seems to work very well in salt pools. Lower levels do need to be shocked but if you keep it between 3-5 ppm and keep the CYA between 60-80 and make sure to keep the pH in line the chances are you will never need to shock your pool. If you do then don't use the superchlorinate setting, It shortens cell life. You will shock much more effectively by adding liquid chlorine.
You do not have a bromine system so ignore the bromine readings in your test kit. The same test is used for both chlorine and bromine but the bromine numbers are higher.
Keep you salt level slightly on the high side and you will also prolong cell life. Between 3200-3500 ppm is good. The Aquachek Salt test strips are exremely accurate and easy to use. Just be sure to allow enough time for development, which can take up to 10 minutes.
I have found that the following numbers are a good guide for salt pools based on my experiences, my customers experiences and the experiences of salt pool onwners on two other forums that I am active on.
FC 3-5 ppm
CC less than .5 ppm
pH 7.6 (not lower, when it hits 7.8 it's time to put acid in to lower it back to 7.6)
TA 60-90 ppm BEFORE stabilizer correction (this is lower than normally recommened but combined with the pH adjustments above it will help minimize your acid usage)
CH 250-350 ppm to achieve water balance with the lower TA recommened above
CYA 70-80 ppm
Salt 3200-3500 ppm
Borates 50 ppm (an optional addition that can really help reduce acid usage and also lessen your santizer demand considerably)
I anm not going to go into all the chemical justificaton for why this works but these chemical levels really do optimize the performance of your SWG and are what I run in my own salt pool and have my cusotmers run.
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If you have algae it will consume chlorine very quickly. Also, certain types of algaecides (chlorine enhancers based on sodium bromide or inorganic ammonia) will also create a very big chlorine demand and make it difficult to maintan a FC level after their use. Get your water tested and post a full set of results.
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ARe you using bromine or chlorine? Most test kits will test either bromine or chlorine so they will have a scale for both but you only look at the one for the chemical you are using.
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I have suggested numerous times before that biguanide is NOT the best choice for several reasons. I am surprised that the degredation of plastic has resufaced again! I had assumed that manufacuturers were using more resistant plastics this days but I guess that price over performance is still a motivating force when they select materials for construction.
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A few facts....a salt bromine generator does not reduce the chemicals in the water. You are just manufacturing them instead of adding them. It's really more of a convience factor than anything else. Bromine is a known sensitizer and many people do develop an allergy to it! Much more so than chlorine!
As far as ozone and bromine systems--ozone does cause bromates to form in the water and bromates are a suspected carcinogen in drinking water (but nothing concrete has ever been published that I have been able to find about any dangers in spa water.) This is the main negative about ozone and bromine systems.
Ozone, chlorine, or non chlorine shock will make the bromine levels rise if there is sodium bromide in the water. This is true if you have a bromine generator or not. It's normal bromine chemistry. Bromide ions are oxidized into hypobromous acid, the active bromine sanitizer. The Brormine generator is actually generating hypobrmous acid directly. You still add the non chlorine shock to bump up the bromine levels by converting some of the bromide ions into hypobromous acid also.
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Please post a full set of test results for FC, TC, CC, pH, TA, CH, and CYA. I suspect that you have elevated CYA levels from the trichlor and do not have enough FC in the water to prevent algae because of this.
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What you are seeing in your pool and what made it cloudy is most likely calcium oxalate that precipitated out when you put in the oxalic acid. IMHO, ascorbic acid is a much better solution to stains in fiberglass pools than oxalic acid. Vacuum as much of it as you can to waste. DE is often used in sand filters as a filter aid and, unless you have broken laterals in your filter, should not end up back in the pool.
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HAD NEW FIBERGLASS,POOL INSTALLED. ONCE POOL WAS FILLED WITH WATER A DAY LATER CRACK APPEARED AT BOTTOM OF POOL ,NEXT DAY ANOTHER CRACK APPEARED WITH LARGE BULGE,SURROUNDING CRACKS. POOL INSTALLER/SELLER SAY NO PROBLEM THIS CAN BE REPAIRED WITHIN 60 MINUTES. I'VE TO FIBERGLASS POOL TECH COME IN AND SEE IT BOTH CONCUR SOMETHING IS UNDERNEATH THE POOL. BOTH SAY IT NEEDS TO BE CUT AND REMOVE WHATEVER IS UNDERNEATH AND PATCH UP POOL. i HAVE HAD THIS POL ONLY 3 DAYS AND ALL THIS TOOK PLACE. I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT POOLS/IS THIS ACCEPTABLE TO ACCEPT A NEW PATCHED-UP POOL,I WOULD PREFER A NEW REPLACED POOL. I WAS TOLD BY SELLER ABSOLUTELY NO. HELP! ANY ADVICE APPRECIATED.
Sounds like a faulty installation. Get a lawyer, you will need one. I would demand a new pool! Also contact the company that manufactured the fiberglass pool and let them know of the problems you are having with your installer.
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copper and silver have very slow kill times for pathgens compared to chlorine and bromine. In an open system like a spa fast kill times are a necessity if you want santized water. Every bather that enters the tub intorducec sweat, urine (the two are almost identical chemically, btw) and feces into the water. Add to that anything that might drop into the water while it is being used (such as from a bird flying overhead for example) and you will see why fast kill times are needed.
If you do not have chlorine in the water you will not have any chloramines. That does not mean there are not orgaincs and ammonia compounds in the water. If you add chlorine and you do get chloramines then it means that your oxidation from the ozone and the MPS has not been enough to keep the organics under control.
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OK, I'll ask the next ignorant question... If the pH and TA are in range (to the precision of a test strip) and the hardness is one box below the optimum, but the bromine drops to a very low level, what is one most likely growing to cause the cloudiness? Algae? Bacteria? What species?
most likely some 'nasties' growing in the water if the shocking cleared it up quickly.
This is now an academic question as the water cleared up nicely (this is actually kind of fun, like a big backyard experiment with benefits, who knew the thing would react so quickly) after shocking it.
And to beat the dead horse (apologies to my horse) I could buy the argument that to stay in true balance with a small body of water, you need to be very precise, wouldn't I also need to be sure the chemicals are very pure and dispense them by weight using a very accurate scale?
If you are using weight measures for things like calcium and baking soda,yes. A kitchen scale has enough accuray. You need more accuracy than test srips can provide but you don't need a chemistry lab!
Are professional maintenance folks really that careful?
IMHO, most are very sloppy and don't dose right (I know I will get a lot of flack for that but in my experience it's been true! I have several service people as customers and they really are rather clueless about water chemistry.
I'm thinking of the installer cavalierly tossing 4 tablets in the filter well and saying "that should last you two weeks". He forgot the sodium bromide to boot! I put it in after reading the instructions he gave me, plus the ones in the chemical startup kit.
I rest my case!
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Thanks. That does help.
How precise does a measuring tool need to be for balancing? Why isn't the coarse granularity of a strip "good enough" for a residential spa, recent catastrophe aside...
Spas have a very small quantity of water in them and small mistakes in dosing or meaureing levels can cause water balance to go off by a large margin. If you are adjusting TA or CH this could cause you to overdose and cloud the water, for example. The smaller the volume of water you are testing the more precise your measurements really need to be. Even in a 10000 gallon pool the strips really don't have enough accuracy to get good results for water balancing. Think about how much you paid for your spa and then ask yourself if an additonal $60 is really too much money to spend on a test kit that will help you get your water balance 'perfect' and help you save on chemical costs.
Also, strips only test total hardness, which is a useless test for water balance, you are interested in calcium hardness, which can only be done with a drop test.
Is the water safe at 5-9 ppm bromine regardless of how it looks?
Depends, for example if the water is cloudy because the TA and CH is so high that you have precipitated out calcium then it's ok to go in but if the water is cloudy because you are trying to kill algae and you need to keep it at shock level for a few days to do so then you need to keep it at shock level and wait for the water to clear.
When do you decide it is time for a drain and refill aside from doing so every 2-4 months on a regular basis?
If the spa has a lot of use or a heavy bather load you will want to drain more frequently (maybe every 2 months) than one that gets little use (every 4 months). Under average use about every 3-4 months is usually fine. Water that needs to be drained will look 'dull' and will tend to foam when the water balance is correct even when the time to drain has not been reached.
Hope this helps.
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Hi everyone,
I'm a brand new pool owner and opted to go with an SWG system. I'm using the Goldline Aqua Rite and just started it up a few days ago. My pool is 18,000 Gallons and I added 400lbs of salt (8 bags at 50lbs per bag). My pool is showing that it is at 3100 ppm. The Manual says that 3200ppm is optimal but I really didn't want to open another bag of salt just to get that extra 100ppm. The Control System shows that the pool isa at 3200ppm when it first starts up and then drops to 3100ppm after about an 30 minutes. I have the output set at 70% and the pump is on for 8 hours a day. My chlorine levels are good and the pool is holding the free chlorine so everything seems fine. Does it hurt anything to run the SWG system at 3100ppm or should I add salt to bring it up to 3200ppm?
I apologize in advance for my ignorance. We jumped into this pool head first (pun intended) and did little research before hand. Keeping everything at optimal levels is a little overwhelming at first. there seems to be so much I need to know.
If you want to know your salt levels you need to use a chemical test for chloride (such as the Taylor titration testkit for chloride or the Aquachek Salt Test strips.) The salt level meters in SWGs are really conductivity meters and only estimate the salt level and the level will change as the temperature of the water changes. It's close enought for government work so don't loose any sleep over your reading of 3100 ppm. However, it's ususally a bit better to run the salt slightly higher than lower since it will help lengthen the life of your cell and it gives you a bit of backup in case you get a rainstorm that will dilute the salt level in the water. Your SWG will shut off and stop producing chlorine if the salt level drops below 2500 ppm to protect the cell.
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Ph and total alkalinity are right at the optimal level, calcium is slightly low. I'm just rinsing my suit at this point, not putting it in the wash. We have been using it twice a day for these first few days! After the shock this morning, it is reportedly looking much better.
Our startup kit came with 4-way test strips from Leisure Time. The strips certainly seem convenient, do we need a liquid/reagent kit?
I would recommend a Taylor K-2106 for bromine. It will make your water testing much easier! Strips are pretty usless for anything other than a quick check of whether there is any sanitizer or not. They shoud NOT be used for water balancing! They just don't have the precision (NOT the same thing as accuracy. Strips are accurate, they are just not precise.)
I used Leisure Time Renew non-chlorine shock, which came with the startup kit. One treatment was all there was, so I plan to stop by a pool and supply store on the way home for work to get some more. I've read here that household chlorine bleach can also be used, but I'm not sure how long we'd have to wait after using it.
Once your bromine levels drop below 10 ppm you can use the spa no matter whether you shock with chlorine or MPS (non chlorine shock). Both will oxidize the bromide in the water into hypobromous acid, your active bromine sanitizer and both will cause the level of sanitizer to rise.
The shower before thing is just not going to happen. I'd do it, but my S.O. has back issues and likes to get in right after his P.T. so I think we need to be sufficiently aggressive about the sanitization.
I had no idea a spa could go from too much bromine to too little in less than 48 hours! We will test daily for a while until we think we have some kind of steady-state achieved.
If the spa is exposed to sunlight all your bromine sanitizer can disappear in a matter of about an hour since bromine cannot be stabilzied against UV light like chlorine can. Also, the bromine gets 'used up' when it santizes and converts back into bromide. This is why you need to shock. The bromine tabs in your floater put bromide into the water and also contain chlorine to activate (oxidize) the bromide into bromine santizer but they are only useful for maintaining the level between shocks. They cannot be used as a stand alone 'one step' system.
Is there a quick and dirty guide (so to speak) as to when it is or is not safe to get in the water? Will 10 ppm bromine cause a problem? What if it dips below 1 ppm but the water looks OK? What about cloudiness, is it always a no-no to get in? Or is it OK if the sanitizer is present?
Below 10 ppm is safe to go in. Below 4 ppm and there is not enough residual sanitizer in the spa to keep the water pathogen free. 6 ppm is a good level to shoot for.
Hope this helps.
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Thanks I liked it better than Tardigrades. (Inside joke, google water bear to understand)
I had a feeling it was something like that!
So... do you test a lot of hot tub water or are you a marine biologist?
I work in a pool/spa supply and have been keeping salt water reef tanks since the 70's, so I have tested a LOT of water!
I did do reaseach at the U of Miami School of Marine and Atmospheric Science my senior year of high school in oceanographic physical chemistry on the precipitation of calcium carbonate from seawater and the effects of various ions on the rate and form precipitated. Half a day of high school and half a day at the marine lab my senior year. Was a chem major in college.
Vinyl Liner Pools
in All Swimming Pools Types
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My point is that you cannot generalize for all locals just because a certain type of pool works best in your area. As an other example, inline feeders and trichlor work very well in areas that have short swim seasons and winterize pools but in areas like mine that have very long swim seasons (up to 10 months) and pools are kept open all year they lead to overstablized pools that need to be drained and refilled on a regular basis. Vinyl pools are the least expensive type but there are unique problems with them (as with any type of pool). Algae control is more difficult since they cannot withstand high chlorine levels (above about 15 ppm) so clearing a green pool is more problematic than in other types of pools and killing pink slime or white water mold is just about impossible for this reason, since these require VERY high chlorine levels to kill.