Is The Spa Biting My Wife?

[jd-santaclarita]

We have had our spa for about a week now and a couple days ago we noticed my wife as broke out with a bunch of little bites or bumps like mosquito bites. The seem to cluster up around her upper back close to where her bathing suite top strap goes. But there are a few others randomly in other places. I am wondering if it could be something funky in the spa or possibly an allergy or something. I dont have the same breakouts. I have "possibly" 2 of those kinds of bumps, but they could be something else completely also. Is it possible that I have cooties in my water already after a week. I use the leisure time spa 56 chlorine. The guy at the store had my toss in 1 cap full at fillup and i toss in about a spoonful each day we use it. The test strips are pretty on the money for everything, except the FCI usually doesn't register past a shade of off-white. Maybe i am not using enough chlorine? My spa is 330gal tiger river. I also changed the filter before I filled it last week.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

JD

[sjt2900]

We have had our spa for about a week now and a couple days ago we noticed my wife as broke out with a bunch of little bites or bumps like mosquito bites. The seem to cluster up around her upper back close to where her bathing suite top strap goes. But there are a few others randomly in other places. I am wondering if it could be something funky in the spa or possibly an allergy or something. I dont have the same breakouts. I have "possibly" 2 of those kinds of bumps, but they could be something else completely also. Is it possible that I have cooties in my water already after a week. I use the leisure time spa 56 chlorine. The guy at the store had my toss in 1 cap full at fillup and i toss in about a spoonful each day we use it. The test strips are pretty on the money for everything, except the FCI usually doesn't register past a shade of off-white. Maybe i am not using enough chlorine? My spa is 330gal tiger river. I also changed the filter before I filled it last week.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

JD

I can't answer your question, but that's exactly what's happening to my husband. We've had our spa since mid July and his "bites" are mainly around his knees. The dealer said he might be allergic to chlorine and we should maybe switch to bromine. I'm also waiting to hear from the experts on this forum before we do anything. Good luck!

[chem geek]

It could be hot tub folliculitis caused by the bacteria Pseudomonas aeruginosa. See the links under "Hot Tub Rash Pictures" in this link to see if this looks like what you are seeing. If so, then how are you sanitizing your hot tub? The bacteria should only thrive if you are not consistently maintaining sufficient sanitizer levels.

[Hillbilly Hot Tub]

Chlorine allergies are very rare, sesitivity to your CYA maybe. If it is a true chlorine allergy, changing to bromine tablets will not help since they are a mix of bromine and chlorine. If you change to bromine you must find a system that uses pure bromie such as Brilliance chlorine free bromine or a system that uses sodium bromide and shock.

As Richard said, check out hot tub rash,if your levels are not reading past off white, you are not using enough chlorine. This will aloow bugs to grow. You also should be shocking the tub once per week, or more if used heavy. I would suggest MPS to shock with to help keep the CYA levels down.

[WaterBeast]

Hi, I'm a relatively new spa owner as well, but I've been doing a lot of homework.

Spa Pool Folliculitis Pics/Description

>> The[y] seem to cluster up around her upper back close to where her bathing suite top strap goes. But there are a few others randomly in other places.

From the web link: above "The result is an eruption of scattered small red itchy or tender bumps, some of which are pustular. They mainly occur in areas that were covered by the swimming costume."

Check the pictures, you likely have a match for ‘Pseudomonas aeruginosa' aka hot tub or spa pool folliculitis.

Fortunately, it doesn't appear to be a serious condition, and there are many posts on decontamination and proper sanitization procedures on this forum. Do a little reading, get a good test kit, decontaminate, refill, manage your sanitization levels and overalll water chemistry, and enjoy your new tub.

WaterBeast

[sjt2900]

Chlorine allergies are very rare, sesitivity to your CYA maybe. If it is a true chlorine allergy, changing to bromine tablets will not help since they are a mix of bromine and chlorine. If you change to bromine you must find a system that uses pure bromie such as Brilliance chlorine free bromine or a system that uses sodium bromide and shock.

As Richard said, check out hot tub rash,if your levels are not reading past off white, you are not using enough chlorine. This will aloow bugs to grow. You also should be shocking the tub once per week, or more if used heavy. I would suggest MPS to shock with to help keep the CYA levels down.

As far as I know our chlorine levels have been in the safe zone each time it was used. And, we do shock once a week with MPS. I've been hesitant to switch to bromine because of reading that it still contains chlorine. I have been very careful of our chemistry levels. The spa was last used two nights ago. After using we used 1 TBS SaniChlor. Yesterday morning I shocked with 2 TBS of MPS. Last night the chlorine was very high so we didn't use it. Maybe we should drain and start over to see what would happen.

[Hillbilly Hot Tub]

Chlorine allergies are very rare, sesitivity to your CYA maybe. If it is a true chlorine allergy, changing to bromine tablets will not help since they are a mix of bromine and chlorine. If you change to bromine you must find a system that uses pure bromie such as Brilliance chlorine free bromine or a system that uses sodium bromide and shock.

As Richard said, check out hot tub rash,if your levels are not reading past off white, you are not using enough chlorine. This will aloow bugs to grow. You also should be shocking the tub once per week, or more if used heavy. I would suggest MPS to shock with to help keep the CYA levels down.

As far as I know our chlorine levels have been in the safe zone each time it was used. And, we do shock once a week with MPS. I've been hesitant to switch to bromine because of reading that it still contains chlorine. I have been very careful of our chemistry levels. The spa was last used two nights ago. After using we used 1 TBS SaniChlor. Yesterday morning I shocked with 2 TBS of MPS. Last night the chlorine was very high so we didn't use it. Maybe we should drain and start over to see what would happen.

In your forst post you said the test strips were usually not past off white. This means the chlorine levels have been to low which allows beasties to grow. If the spa was brand new, there may be other things in the water such as the oils from the new plastics, water left in the lines from factory testing ect. Most new spa owners end up having to change water their first month. I would also clean the filter out really well.