Need Help With Cholrine

[bapbrb]

I have a small problem with our pool. Last week the water went really green, come to find out my brother wasn't taking care of the pool like he said he was. Hadn't put chlorine in it for a while. My husband and I cleaned up to bottom of the pool where all the leaves had fallen. On Friday, night after a slight rain the pool had turned green again. So I put in 4 cups of chlorine. Normally I will put 1-2 in it. Well On Sat I tested the chlorine level, and it didn't even register it was so high, instead of a yellow color it was RED. So I told the family not to add any we would check again on Sunday. When I check yesterday it was still a bright orange color. The strange thing about it, is you would think that if it was that high you would smell the chlorine in it right? No smell of it at all. I called the local pool place and the girl there told me that if you smell chlorine that there isn't enough in the pool. That doesn't seem right to me. I checked the PH, and it is right where it should be along with the alk. and it is fine too. Pooel water is still coudy, blue but cloudy. Any suggestions?

Any help would be great! My kids want to swim so bad, but I am afraid to let them in the pool with it that high.

[pamperedjess]

You are best off to take a sample to your local pool place to have it analyzed. It's usually free to do it. You'll need about 500mls (2 cups) of the sample for them to test. they will give you a print off of exactly what you need to add to the pool without all the guess work.

[Angela]

Alternatively, you could take half a cup of your pool water and add half a cup of tap water and test the whole cup for chlorine. You should get a lower reading on your chlorine as you have half diluted the pool water that way. Your ph and alk will also be different but you can ignore that as I think it is just to put your mind at rest i.e. you have shocked your pool. The chlorine level usually comes down after a day in the sun though. The cloudiness might only be the residue left from the algie etc in the pool. I dont know what type of filter pump system you have but I would run mine for a good 8-10 hours after shocking the pool.

Good luck

[bapbrb]

Ok, I will try that to see what happens. I know I shocked it, but when I have done that in the past it is usually fine the next day. The pool sat in sun for 2 days (Sat and Sun) so I thought it would have been fine by lastnite. Even when I used the hth brand of "shock it" it didn't get that high on chlorine. Thats what concerned me about it. Like I said I have done the 2 cups in the pool before and by the next day it was back down to the low side of ideal. So I would have thought for sure after a day it would have been fine. Our temps on Sat and Sun where in the upper 90's with full sun! Who knows.

Thank you for your help. I will let you know what happens

[Angela]

I agree it is perplexing. I think FC comes down about 2-3ppm per day in sun light. So I dont know why yours is so high still - unless someone else also added bleach!

Hope you can swim soon.