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Can't Get Rid Of The Algae


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Hey All,

I had sort of the same problem this year when i opened the pool this year the water was just about black. In the last month or so ive learned so much about taking care of a pool and hopefully this will help. This is what i did, I started off by shocking the heck out of the water with a liquid shock. I have a 12-14000 gallon pool and i put in 8 gallons. I scrubbed the bottom and sides of the pool to release the alge blooms because if you dont do that it will continue to come back. I went and got a good test kit, because if you dont know your numbers your pool will never get clear. If your PH is low it makes the chlorine less effective. If its too high it will cause the water to be cloudy. If your CYA (stabilizer) is too low or too high it will also make the chlorine you put in the pool less effective. Knowing the pool readings is ABSOLUTELY KEY to keep your pool clear. If your numbers are off you can add as much chlorine as you want and you will just have to keep buying it cause you will be working against yourself. Once my pool started to go from green to cloudy blue i made sure i got all of the debris off the bottom of the pool because all of the foreign matter in your pool will also work against your chlorine and other pool readings. This may take a few trys but you need to get out as much as possible even though you cant see the bottom. I would suggest getting a net NOT a skimmer net but a deep net. Once i did that i gave the pool another scrub down with the brush. Then i went and got a powerful algecide. I think it was called copper 60. The pool kept getting bluer and bluer but wasnt getting clear it was still cloudy. I tryed alot of stuff but the thing that finally worked was called Miraclear it was a tablet that looked like a seashell that goes into the pump basket NOT the skimmer basket and i could see a significant difference the next day ( I could actually see the detail on the bottom of the pool) Once i could see the bottom i began vacuumning. I vacuumned to waste probably 3 or 4 times refilling in between. Now your gonna stirr up some stuff when you vacuumn dont get discouraged if you go about it in a methodical fashion you can continue vacuumning. ( i think my vacuumning process took 2 days). After that it was just monitoring my pool readings and making sure that i had a high FC reading. and let the filter do its job.

One bit of advice, obviously if you have a cartridge filter you are going to have to clean it continuously to make sure it can actually filter out the dirt. but if you have a sand filter like i do you should only backwash the pool after the filter has a 10 PSI rise in pressure from its initial start up pressure. It know it may sound wierd but the dirtier the sand is the better it filters the particals out of the water that can cause it to be cloudy. Also if you backwash too much it can cause channeling which is where little pathways are made in the sand in the filter and the dirty water just flows through those channels and back into the pool instead of going through the sand and the dirt being left behind. When you vacuumn initially you need to vacuumn to waste. The filter does a good job filtering out stuff but if you have a really dirty pool you dont want to over work your filter cause it can only handle so much and you will eventually be putting alot of what your vacuumning up back into the pool. And definately MONITOR YOUR POOL READINGS. As ive said before chlorine is only a small portion of keeping your pool clear. If you water is not balance properly you can buy all the chlorine you want and all of it will be useless. It takes more than just gallons of chlorine to get your water clear. I really hope this helps. It took about 2 or 3 weeks to get my pool clear with alot of trial and error. I just gave you the steps i used to finally get my pool in swimming condition. Take care and happy swimming!!!!

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inmay gives great advice.

I suggest reading <a href="http://www.troublefreepool.com/pool-school/defeating_algae" target="_blank">Defeating Algae</a>, get yourself a proper test kit as described <a href="http://www.troublefreepool.com/pool-school/pool_test_kit_comparison" target="_blank">here</a>, then learn how to properly manage your SWG pool <a href="http://www.troublefreepool.com/pool-school/water_balance_saltwater_generator" target="_blank">here</a> including an understanding of the Free Chlorine (FC) and Cyanuric Acid (CYA) relationship.

Note that you don't just add some chlorine and then walk away. You have to MAINTAIN a high shock level of chlorine to kill algae and clear a pool, along with regular brushing, continual filtration, and cleaning/backwashing the filter.

I have an above ground pool but I don't know how much shock to use. It's 24 ft and I'm not sure of how many gallon it holds. We have some algae, but with a weekly cleaning it usually goes away. Should I be using shock?

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inmay gives great advice.

I suggest reading <a href="http://www.troublefreepool.com/pool-school/defeating_algae" target="_blank">Defeating Algae</a>, get yourself a proper test kit as described <a href="http://www.troublefreepool.com/pool-school/pool_test_kit_comparison" target="_blank">here</a>, then learn how to properly manage your SWG pool <a href="http://www.troublefreepool.com/pool-school/water_balance_saltwater_generator" target="_blank">here</a> including an understanding of the Free Chlorine (FC) and Cyanuric Acid (CYA) relationship.

Note that you don't just add some chlorine and then walk away. You have to MAINTAIN a high shock level of chlorine to kill algae and clear a pool, along with regular brushing, continual filtration, and cleaning/backwashing the filter.

I have an above ground pool but I don't know how much shock to use. It's 24 ft and I'm not sure of how many gallon it holds. We have some algae, but with a weekly cleaning it usually goes away. Should I be using shock?

Welcome to the forum.

If your pool is round 24' diameter with a depth of 48", it holds approximately 13,500 gallons of water. If you have recurring algae either your daily Free Chlorine (FC) level is insufficient (try to maintain a minimum FC of 7-8% of CYA at all times) or the weekly cleaning (shocking?) is not removing the algae completely, or both. Example: If the Cyanuric Acid (aka CYA, stabilizer or conditioner) in your pool is 50 PPM, shoot for a minimum FC of 3.5 PPM. If you don't have enough CYA (< 20 PPM) then it's likely the chlorine is burning off too quickly during the day and that will increase your exposure to algae problems because your chlorine is being depleted.

How do you normally chlorinate the water (which product)?

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