bamamelena

I've been backwashing every day. I meant to get a new set of numbers today, but had an emergency with my dog and forgot. I added 3 more gallons of bleach this week, and put in some PH last night. The water is still a light green, there's been no change really since last week. I need to take a picture, I'll try to think to do that when I get home. Quantum...I asked this before and can't remember if you answered what you said....should I be brushing the walls??

I can't get the test kit this week, money wise. But I will. Should I be brushing the walls down? I told my husband I didn't think I should be, as that would just agitate the algae but he thinks I should. I did the 5lbs of shock, and I've since put 6 more gallons of bleach in (last night and today) I don't really see much more of a change, except maybe a slight change in color.

You can only get those test kits online or from a pool supply place, right? Not from a local pool place? As for the bottom....I'm hoping there's not too much junk. I worked for 2wks vacuuming to waste, getting leaves, etc out. I also used (until I lost the 2 bags in the deep) one of those leaf bagger things. I figure my biggest issue will be vacuuming to get the dead algae out at this point. There wasn't much change today. I tested my water last night with my test kit, and the chlorine/PH levels were about the same as they were the night before, chlorine was just a little higher.

As long as you maintain the chlorine and keep filtering When you say keep filtering, you mean cleaning out the filter, backwashing, etc, correct?

Look at the ingredient information on the label; it should say Sodium Dichloro-s-triazinetrione or Dichloroisocyanuric acid. There is a granular trichlor, but you do not want that. I see that your calcium is now at 275 where earlier it was at 90. That makes a big difference as far as risk of scaling goes. One of the reasons I initially wanted to lower the pH was concern for scaling. I had a feeling that the calcium might be higher than 90 ppm. Right now, you want to add 3 pounds of dichlor. Mix the dichlor in water before adding it to the pool. Mix a maximum of 1 pound of dichlor to 4 gallons of water in a plastic, 5-gallon bucket. Do not allow any granules to go into the water. Tomorrow, add another two pounds of dichlor. After using a total of 5 pounds of dichlor, switch back over to bleach. As long as you maintain the chlorine and keep filtering, the pool will clear. You need to maintain 10 to 15 ppm chlorine at all times. I would like to reiterate that getting your own good test kit is the absolute best decision you can make. You will have the best quality water you have ever had and you will spend far less time and money than you ever have. Your current test kit and strips are not going to be able to give you enough information to give you the best results. Are the current numbers before or after you added the bleach? We have the Sodium Dichloro-s-triazinetrione, but it is granular, I'm thinking, but it's the only kind of shock/chlorine I've ever bought. It's in a bucket. The pool store did tell me to mix my shock up with water. I will look into getting our own test kit, thanks for that info. The test results are after I added the bleach last night but before I added the bleach this afternoon. I'm going out to put the shock in in a little while. Thanks again for the help!!

Here are my current numbers: FC .84 TC 1.62 PH 7.69 CYA 8 ALK 125 CAL 275 The pool is looking a lighter green today. I put more bleach in earlier. I have the chlorine shock that has the stabilizer in it, is that what you mean by dichlor??

Is it eventually going to not be green? I didn't add any more bleach tonight, planning on adding it tomorrow.

The clear thing is still working, I can still tell when we go from green to clear when we backwash. I tested with the OTO kit tonight. Chlorine was a little on the high side, PH was normal. I don't ''have'' to have the floater, we just got it last year at the end of the season. I actually have a feeder on my pump, but I'm told you have to have those special packs, and we can't get the dang thing open anyway.

Waterbear, have a fun and safe trip!

I'm pretty sure my pressure gauge is broken, but I'll check it again I do know that my husband remarked that the jets were pushing the water around more rapidly than they had been, the ripples were greater in other words. I added 3 gallons of bleach tonight. Have 3 more gallons that I was going to add tomorrow in the daylight. When you say OTO kit do you mean the kind where you put the yellow and red color stuff to test the water? If so I have one of those.

Thanks Quantum. I just put 3 tabs in my floater I'll get them back out. I tested with my strips to see if chlorine was showing, it's not.

Oh, and as for the ammonia? I'm not sure, but it's a STRONG possibility. We had about 100 frogs in our pool for about 3wks (Not exaggerating) At one point, when I put some shock in during that time, my whole pool ''fizzed'' up as I put it in. It did NOT do that the last time I used shock, over the weekend, though. The only thing my DH and I could figure was it was reacting with the ammonia from the frogs.

Filter sand is generally good for 10 years and I know of people that have had the same sand for 20! It does lose a bit of filtering ability as it gets "polished" by the water flowing over it all the time but it still works. Changing the sand every year is just another way for the pool stores to make money! Thanks SG!! I just added 3 Gallons of 6% (I got it at DG, before I saw your post, but I made sure it was 6%) so we'll see. I've only had phosphates that one time, the time that I used the bleach, so it's just strange to me. Thanks for telling me what CYA is in your above post, I wasn't sure. I'm not using a floater right now, I took that out. I have tons of the 3" tabs, but I'm not using them right now either. Do I need to drop it in with some tabs? I'm going to get the water tested tomorrow, and no I won't buy anything from them. Oh, and the phosphate remover?? it's $26! So, after adding this bleach, and adding more tomorrow, and getting my water tested, is there anything else I need to be doing? I thought about putting my Polaris in to stir the bleach up, etc, but wondered if that would just make the water worse at this point. Thank you again for your help!!

Here's another thing....we've been here since 07, and we've never changed the sand in the pump. Does that have anythiing to do with this?

I don't know what dichlor is I was just sitting here thinking about going to the Dollar Store and getting gallons of bleach. The only thing that makes me hesitant is the one time I did that, we ended up with phosphates for some reason, but I guess that's better than green

These readings are about 3wks old, the only thing I have added is algacide and drop-out, and chlorine which isn't reading on my test strips. I will get my water tested again. The water is greenish/black, I cannot see anything in the pool at all. As for the type of filter, I'm unsure on that. I have a Hayward pump, if that helps. Thanks again to all of you for your help!!

My pool is a liner pool, about 14,000 gallons. I have some test results from the last time I had it tested. I'll post these for now, and then get more Tuesday or Wednesday. FC-.02 TC-.02 PH-8.05 CYA-2 ALK-175 CAL-90

Thanks for the info Waterbear. I do not use the pucks, if you're talking about the tabs?? I've used them once this year. I use granulated chlorine. I will get a set of test results and post them but I'm beginning to think that you're right about possibly draining it.

We've been working on this pool since Apr/May. We've had green before, we almost always have green once a year. This year, we didn't cover or keep up the chems, and we're obviously paying for that. I've tried algaecide and drop out twice, wasting around $100 on all that. I've wasted almost a $70 bucket of shock. I've gone through PH, etc. NOTHING is holding. At one point, my PH was high, now it's low. That's the only thing that will even register on my test strips or at the pool store. I've had them test for phosphates, which we've had in the past, we don't have them now. I'm at my wits end with this pool. We spent 2 weeks vacuuming out leaves, etc in the 90+ degree heat, only to have nothing change. My husband (and myself for that matter) is tired of throwing money at it, and won't anymore. We just cannot afford to. I've had several people tell me all I needed to do was put the algaecide in, as instructed, then the drop out, as instructed. I've done that twice now. The pool store told me to double shock....I've done that. What can I do, other than throwing more wasted money at this pit in my backyard? Thanks in advance for any help/advice you can give me.

I hope that I'm allowed to post again. I don't really know what happened. If I'm breaking some kind of rules, Mods, please let me know. Went to the pool store yesterday. Finally, after telling her that my pool would NOT hold chlorine, and never had, she tested for phosphates. It was almost purple. So, I came home yesterday and put eight ounces of phosphate remover in. Here's what I originally planned to post: Ok, here's my numbers from yesterday. Notice that the CYA level is down a lot! HAR-118.95 TC-.92 FC-.75 BR-.90 ALK-134.76 CYA-69.86 BOR-14.55 PH-8.00 Therefore, I feel like I'm doing something right. But, finding out that I do have Phosphates in my pool, answered some questions. We've NEVER been able to hold chlorine in our pool, since moving here in April. Therefore, I think this may be the root of all my problems. I wouldn't have algae this bad if I had been able to hold chlorine. Of course, I feel like I've wasted everything I've put in there, especially the chlorine. But, lesson learned. If it starts not holding it again, I'll know to have it tested. It looks like if you go into a pool store and say 'My pool is not holding chlorine' they would say 'Here, let me test it for phosphates.' But, nope. Not my old store. I just kept spending buckets of money. Anyway, I think I'm going to go out and put some off brand chlorine in this evening, and see if it holds. At least I've learned from this experience, anyway. Thanks again guys!