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waterbear

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Everything posted by waterbear

  1. Depends. Are you using chlorine, bromine, silver/MPS (Nature 2 or other "mineral stick" , biguinide/peroxide (soft soak, BaquaSpa) or a different "sanitizer"? Post a full set of test results and also a list of chemicals that you have added and we can take it from there.
  2. Be aware that a saltwater system is usually a chlorine system. The chlorine is generated by electrolysis of the salt. If sodium bromide is used instead of sodium chloride then it becomes a bromine system. Chlorine is not a sensitizer, bromine can be. However, the usual culprit for those with 'sensitive skin' is MPS or non chlorine shock so that should be avoided. As far as less work, you won't have to worry about daily dosing of sanitizer or weekly shocking but the chemistry is the same. The water still needs to be tested and balanced and pH control is a bit more of an issue. You still have to maintain your calcium hardness, total alkalinity, and cyanuric acid if you are using chlorine. Cyanuric acid is a chlorine stabilizer. It is not used with bromine.
  3. How are you testing your water? Are your bromine granules pure sodium bromide or are they a mixture of dichlor and sodium bromide? Read this: https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/53410-how-to-use-bromine-3-step-method/
  4. Don't use the water wheel. It's only applicable to Plaster pools, not acrylic shell spas. pH is fine, don't worry about lowering it until it hits 8.0 TA is high, you were perfect at 60 ppm. Because of the extra aeration in spas pH will rise faster if the TA is higher or the pH is brought low. https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/52522-some-truths-about-ph-and-ta/ CH is fine, you want it high enough to help prevent foaming (sift water will foam more readily that hard). Anywhere between 130 to 200 ppm is a good range. If you are going to use N2 with MPS then follow the N2 instructions. If you are going to use plain chlorine (dichlor/bleach) then dump the N2. end color is blue, not purple. that is an intermediate color. Keep adding drops until the last drop produces no further color change and then don't count that last drop. These videos from Taylor might help: https://www.taylortechnologies.com/tv/page/231/k-2006-complete-kit-with-fas-dpd Most pool/spa stores don't have a lot of knowledge and much of what they know is wrong, Sadly it's common in the industry. Also, the main reason a pool/spa store will test your water for free is to sell you chemicals, many of which that you don't need. Their bottom line is selling chemicals, the more they sell the better their bottom line. Accurate testing is NOT what they want. Even those that use some type of colorimeter or strip reader will have the software set up in such a way as to maximize chemical sales. I used to work in the retail end of the industry and have seen this firsthand. Most pool/spa store employees have little or no training and what they do receive is often from product manufacturers, who also want to maximize product sales. I have even dealt with CPOs (Certified Pool Operators), who have to sturdy and take a test to get that certification so they can maintain pools and spas at commercial facilities such as hotels, water parks, community pools, etc.) that could not properly test a pool at a facility where I used to work. They were unable to read the comparator and were confusing the chlorine and bromine scales, which are different. There is another forum on the internet that I contribute to that calsl what has happened to you as being "pool stored". It's common which is why I recommend testing your own water with a good test kit and not strips.
  5. Trust your K-2006. How is the store testing? If they are using strips that would explain the discrepancy in test results. If you want to verify your test kit Taylor does sell standard solutions that you can test to determine if your testing method and/or reagents are good. Many men have problems differentiating shades of red. This is a main reason why the FAS-DPD chlorine test in the K-2006 is much better than the DPD test found in most other test kits (including Taylor's) and the vast majority of test strips. The FAS-DPD also will not bleach out and read low when the sanitizer is high, which could explain why the strips are reading about half of what the FAS-DPD test is showing. (BTW, dichlor is a form of stabilized chlorine, it will add 9 PPM of CYA for every 10 ppm chlorine added so once you have about 30 ppm CYA in the water you should switch to bleach (sodium hypochlorite), which will not raise CYA. pH often reads low on strips but no one ever talks about it. I've seen the same thing many times. Strips also don't have a resolution to provide useful results for many tests and pH is one of them. You can get into the tub as long as your FC is below 10 ppm. with 30 ppm CYA. The resolution on your Taylor kit is +/- 10 ppm with a 25 ml sample. Strips can't test for calcium hardness, only total hardness,which usually gives a higher number since it is a combination of calcium and magnesium hardness. This explains the different readings. The Taylor test is testing only calcium hardness. Also, if you look at the resolution of test strips the best ones will have a resolution of +/- 40 ppm while the majority have a resolution of +/- 100 ppm or worse! Do you mean non chlorine shock (MPS)? Be aware that it will test as combined chlorine, as will residual ozone in the water. It is usually not needed unless you have persistent combined chlorine over 1 ppm and running the tub with the cover off and exposed to sunlight for abut an hour will often take care of it, making the use of MPS unnecessary. You mention the N2 stick. Why are you using it if you are running your FC at normal levels. It's not doing anything for you at all. If you were using it wiith MPS only that's a different story since the combination of silver, hot water, and MPS IS a fast acting residual sanitizer (that still requires the use of chlorine for shocking). Taylor sell an add on for the K-2006 to remove the interference from MPS and ozone, btw. pH in spas will rise usually rise on it's own as CO2 gases off from the aeration from the jets. By my calculations your CH is right on the money, fill water starts at 100, CH increaser added to raise it about 25 ppm should put you right at 120-130 PPM.
  6. You are in the right category. My expertise is water chemistry, not hardware but @RDspaguy and @CanadianSpaTech should be able to provide some insight.
  7. Just to clarify, a Biodesign pool is not the same as a 'natural' pool. Biodesign pools are liner pools with a resin shell that have beach entries and are built to look like a pond. It is a construction technique that uses no concrete but can have a custom design like a concrete pool. It is not a 'natural pool, which is a pool that uses no chemicals but relies on an ecosystem of plants, anerorbic and aerobic bacteria, and gravel to 'filter' the water, much like a natural pond. The water is not sanitized and can contain harmful organisms such as Naegleria fowleri, also known as the 'brain eating amoeba'.
  8. Is there a broken pin in the cable connector plug itself? Sometimes if a line is not used the pin in the sicket is broken off on purpose.
  9. Chlorine tabs are trichlor and extremely acidic. They are not recommended for use in spas for this reason because of the small volume of water compared to pools which means pH is less stable than in a pool. They can and will cause ph to crash to dangerously low levels which can cause pump seals, o-rings, and other rubber and plastic parts to become damaged. The black junk you are seeing is probably from very low pH dissolving something in the workings of your spa. Trichlor goes in acidic and has an acidic reaction when it sanitizes. TA must be in the 100 to 150 ppm range when using it in a pool. On the other hand, liquid chlorine is pH neutral on use. (goes in alkaline and had an acidic reaction when it sanitizes). Also, continued use of trichlor WILL cause overstabilization, much like dichlor. Trichlor add 6 ppm Cyanuric acid (stabilizer) for every 10 ppm of chlorine added. Dchlor is even worse, adding 9 ppm Cyanuric acid for every 10 ppm chlorine. Please post a full set of test results (FC, CC or TC, pH, TA, CH, and CYA) and how they were obtained (strips, liquid reagent test kit, strip reader or colorimeter and whether they were home tests or dealer tests and if possible, the brand (Taylor Technologies, LaMotte, Hach, AquaChek, etc.) so we can get a better idea of what's going on. This tells us nothing about the condition of your water. Test result numbers do. For example, the chlorine level necessary for sanitation depends on the current cyanuric acid (stabilizer) level in the water.
  10. Read these to understand why your pH is rising and how to stop it. You should not have to add alkalinity increaser (baking soda) weekly! Your alkalinity should be in the 50 to 70 ppm range. If you want to save some money IF you need alkalinity increaser in the future it's nothing more than baking soda, sodium bicarbonate, sodium hydrogen carbonate--different names for the same chemical (same stuff you can buy at the grocery store for a LOT less money). https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/28846-lowering-total-alkalinity-howto/ https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/52522-some-truths-about-ph-and-ta/ As far as calcium hardness, you want it around 130 ppm or higher to help prevent foaming (very soft water will foam). If your calcium hardness is lower than this then you should add hardness increaser. If you calcium hardness is above about 400 ppm you need to keep close tabs on pH and make sure it does not rise above 8.0 to help prevent scale deposits in the tub. Ideally, keep the pH around 7.6 and the TA around 50-70 ppm for the best pH stability. Hot tubs will have a rising pH because of the aeration from the jets that cause CO2 go gas off. This loss of CO2 is the main cause of pH rise in hot tubs and spas and the higher the TA the faster the pH rise. Likewise, the lower the pH the faster the pH rise. The links I posted above explain why. Read them. The Frog@ease system uses a proprietary chlorine source they call SmartChlor that WILL test as total chlorine. This is normal for this system. The addition of dichlor is not recommeded by the manufacturer of this system and they also recommend using THEIR test strips becuse of their non standard chlorine source.
  11. "House brand" bleaches from major grocery store chains or big box store such as Walmart are often cheaper than brand names and don't have all the additives for laundry enhancement (that might or might not help in whitening clothes).
  12. You can use borax but it will raise the pH so you will also need to add acid with it which complicates the process. I used to use borax decahydrate from from the grocery store and muriatic acid but using boric acid is much easier since you don't really need to compensate for the pH as long as your starting pH is not below about 7.4. Only drawback it it's a bit more expensive than borax and acid but it's still WAY less expensive than the commercial products (which are basically a mixture of boric acid and borax pentahydrate to create a pH neutral product. The pH lowering effect from boric acid is negligible but the pH rise from straight borax, either pentahydrate or decahydrate is quite a bit. The only difference between the pentahydrate and decahydrate forms of borax is one had 5 water molecues attaches andt the other 10 so the pentahydrate needs less by weight to achieve the same level of borate in the water. The first commercial borate products such as Proteam Supreme and BIoguard Optimizer for pools and spas was just the pentadydrate form and required the addition of acid. Newer formulation (Supreme Plus, Optimizer Plus) are pH neutral because they contain both the pentahydrate form of borax and boric acid. If you still want to use borax let me know and I will calculate dosing.
  13. which you neglected to say. In that case you are not doing 3 step bromine. You are using a silver/bromine system and I would recommend following the instructions for the Frog or stop using the mineral cartridge and use 3 step bromine (my suggestion). I am not a fan of mineral cartridges since the low sanitizer levels that are often recommended can lead to water problems. You have answered your own initial question. Your fill water has a high pH and, depending how much you are adding, will raise the pH. My suggestion is to lower the pH after adding fill water and keep your TA around 60 ppm and add 50 ppm borate to create a secondary boric acid/borate buffer system (get some LaMotte borate test strips or Industrial Test Systems Poolcheck Borate test strips for testing borate. Stay away from Hach, Taylor, and AquaCheck, their color changes are very difficult to read and very close together.) Don't lower your pH below 7.6 and don't worry about lowering it until it climbs above 8.0. Sweet spot for pH when using borate is 7.8 to 7.9. Borate is compatible with mineral cartridges. There are commercial borate products such as Proteam Gentle Spa, Phoenix Serena Spa Borate Plus, Proteam Supreme Plus (for pools but can be used in spas) , or Bioguard Optimizer Plus (for pools but can be used in spas) , or you can use granular boric acid from online retailers as Amazon, DudaDielel, or the Chemistry Store. You want to maintain a 30 t0 50 ppm range. It is lost by splash out so you will need to test and add more when you add new fill water. One advantage to using boric acid is that when you add more to compensate for the fill water it will slightly lower the pH,. You still might need to add some acid to get the pH in line. 4 oz. of boric acid per 100 gallons will get you to 50 ppm (3.8's oz by weight or 4.1 oz by volume if you want to get exact but it's not necessary, 4 oz either way is close enough. That's half a cup.) 1.5 tablespoons per 100 gallons will raise the borate level approx. 10 ppm for when you need to bump it up after refilling the splash out. If you are losing water from evaporation you should not need to add more since it's not lost by evaporation. As I said early, you want to maintain the borate level between 30-50 ppm so you don't need to add more until it drops to 30 ppm then add enough to bring it back to around 50 ppm. If you decide to use a commercial borate product for pool or spas follow the directions.
  14. This uses FAS-DPD which is the preferred method of testing sanitizer and not subject to bleachout. I would look to your fill water at the culprit.
  15. Yes but I would not r recommend it. You could use both MPS and chlorine at the same time if you wanted to. MPS is a known sensitizer and will add sulfate to your water. it is also more expensive. IMHO, the only reasons to use MPS is with a chlorine tub or indoor pool that has persistent CC over 1 ppm or with a sliver nitrate cartridge such as Nature2 in a hot tub (silver ions and MPS become an EPA sanitizer in hot water). There is no known advantage to using MPS to activate bromine.
  16. which kit? test it. it might be the culprit. This can caused the pH to rise more rapidly. When you add fill water do you add any other chemicals to the tub or shock the the tub? If you are testing bromine with DPD (comparator with shades of red) and not FAS-DPD (drop counting testing with color change from red to colorless) or OTO (comparator with shades of yellow) it is possible that your test is bleaching out because of high sanitizer and reading much lower than it actually is. High sanitizer will cause pH to read high when it's actually low because the high sanitizer converts the phenol red pH indicator into bromophenol red (which has the same color changes but for a much lower pH range(. This is why I asked which Taylor kit you are using since they sell kits with all 3 methods of testing sanitizer.
  17. yes but you will still test as combined chlorine (monochloriamine) which is actually a good algaecide. In fact, there are products on the market to kill algae that are nothing more than an ammonium salt to form monochloramine and in the old days ammonia was often used as a chlorine 'stabilizer' before the common use of cyanuric acid and stabilized chlorine sources. There would also be a very strong "chlorine" smell from the monochloramine. (Think busy public pool at the end of the day when everyone's eyes are starting to burn and the smell is very strong.) As far as bromine, i would not recommend it for an outdoor pool since it cannot be stabilzied against decomposition from sunlight. It's fine for an indoor pool or a spa that is covered when not in use but not a good choice for an outdoor pool.
  18. Are you using stabilizer (cyanuric acid)? Cal Hypo is an unstabilized chlorine source and the chlorine can be destroyed very quickly by UV from the sun if 30 to 50 ppm CYA is not added. What strength cal hypo are you using? 10 lbs of 48% (commonly available strength) in a 9000 gal pool will raise FC by 43 ppm and calcium hardness by 45 ppm while 73% will raise the FC to 96 ppm and Ch to 68 ppm. I suspect that you have algae growing in the pool since you describe a greenish black sludge. This could explain your problem, especially if there is no stabilizer (which would be why the problem started in the first place). I have a very limited knowledge of biodesign pools but my understanding is the top layer is resin and sand over a liner so it would seem to be like a flexible aggregate finish and would be similar to a liner or fiberglass pool in terms of water balance less like a plaster/aggregate finish by not have the problems of rising pH from fresh plaster and worrying about the calcium saturation index to protect the finish from scaling or pittitng.
  19. Not really. We are both well versed in chemistry so I don't want to go into too much depth here, but in a nutshell the carbonic acid/bicarbonate buffer will generally cause pH to rise as the carbonation is lost from outgassing. Henry's Law says that CO2 will off-gas until it reaches equilibrium with the air above the pool or spa. This the pH ceiling and it is around 8.2 for recreational water. If the TA is higher then there will be more carbonic acid at a given pH as the buffer reaches equilibrium and there is then more CO2 to outgas along with a faster pH rise as opposed to slower outgassing and slower pH rise at a lower TA since the overall carbonation of the water is lower. FWIW, adding a secondary boric acid/borate buffer WILL slow the rise of pH which the main reason to add 50 ppm borate.
  20. I am moving your post to the Hot Tub Water Chemistry section of the forum. How are you testing? Are you using DPD for testing bromine? (I want to eliminate a false high pH reading because of DPD bleachout) What is the pH and TA of your fill water. Main cause of pH rise is outgassing of CO2 had this is directly related to how low you place the pH and how high the TA is. With a TA of 50 you should have minimal outgassing but if you are lowering your pH below 7.6 this will cause pH to rise faster. These posts will explain what is happening, read them: https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/52522-some-truths-about-ph-and-ta/ https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/28846-lowering-total-alkalinity-howto/
  21. Please post a full set of test results and how they were obtained (dealer testing, strips, liquid reagents, etc.) What are the numbers? "In range" tells us nothing. Are you using chlorine or bromine? It's one or the other, not both. Even if you are adding chlorine to a bromine tub you will have bromine and not chlorine in the water. Have you purged the spa? The facts that the water is cloudy and you are having trouble maintaining sanitizer level it usually indicated either biofilm or something 'growing' in the water. Have you read the pinned posts at the top of the hot tub water chemistry section of the forum? Lots of good information there.
  22. You would have found your answer in the pinned topics in this section of the forum. Start by reading these two the first one will explain the yo yo effect you are seeing and how to aviod it): https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/28846-lowering-total-alkalinity-howto/ https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/52522-some-truths-about-ph-and-ta/ You might also find this post useful: https://www.poolspaforum.com/forum/index.php?/topic/53410-how-to-use-bromine-3-step-method/
  23. @Shenshaw You posted in a 10 year old thread. You will have a better chance of getting an answer to you question if you start a new thread.
  24. Don't worry, it's all good. You've gotten over a pretty steep learning curve very quickly. You now know that you can't test pH or TA when sanitizer is high and if your sanitizer reads low or nonexistent there is a chance your DPD test has bleached out and is reading low so dilute your sample with distilled water 1:1 and retest, multiply test results by 2 to get reading. (OR just get the Taylor stand alone FSD-DPD test kit. Much easier to use, no color matching. You are looking for it to go from pink to colorless as you add drops and count the drops. It will also handle a much higher sanitizer range than the DPD test and give you accurate results with NO dilutions. Once the bromine drops don't put the floater back until we get the pH, TA, and CH in line. If you could post a pic of your bromine floater it would help, Some are totally useless as far as adjustments go. I recommend the Pentair 335 floater that holds 1" bromine tablets . It looks like this and is VERY adjustable. It's often sold unter the Rainbow brand, which is one of Pentair's brands.
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