Spa System Flush Much Better Than Spa Purge

[simonc]

I did Nitro's decontamination procedure twice on my tub. The first time I used "Spa Purge" but it didn't work very well. The second time I used "Spa System Flush" and it worked much much better. Here's my experience.

I've had my tub for about 4.5 years. During most of that time I used diclor/triclor for sanitation. I was having problems maintaining the water balance/sanitation. In Fall 2009, I joined this forum, learned a lot, and switched to the diclor-then-bleach method. It worked much much better than diclor/triclor alone. However, even with diclor-then-bleach, I was having a problem with a high chlorine demand and having my CC's regularly in the 1-2ppm range. I did a number of super chlorine shocks, but the effect was only temporary. I decided to do a decontamination. I had never done one before on my tub.

I went to the Leslie Pool's dealer and and bought "Spa Purge" for $20. It's the only brand that dealer carried. When I opened it up, the stuff inside the bottle was a yucky brown color. This struck me as strange because most spa chemical manufactures try to make their products look clean and attractive. I called the dealer and he reassured me that the stuff is suppose to be yucky brown. So I went ahead and used it.

I followed Nitro's recommendations, and let it sit overnight. The next morning, I went to drain the water. I expected that I'd find some type of gunk around the water line, but there really wasn't any. I figured I had a cleaner tub than I thought. I followed the rest of the procedure. When I refilled my tub with clean water, my high CD and my high CCs returned quickly. Again, I tried super shocking, but it's effect was only temporary.

After about 6 weeks of dealing with the CD and CC problems, I decided that I needed to do another decontamination. This time I ordered "Spa System Flush" on the internet, about $17 dollars with shipping. I did the procedure again. With Spa System Flush, I got a lot of gunk at the water line, unlike my experience with the Spa Purge product. Use of the Flush product formed a sticky greasy bathtub ring that took some scrubbing to get off. The ring was a yellowish/brownish color. Maybe from using the brown colored Spa Purge previously??? So far, my CD is much better (I don't have a number yet, just an impression.) and my CCs are near zero. It's still too early to tell if this improvement will last.

In all fairness, I can't say that I can fairly compared these two products without any variation in procedure. However, the main reason I think the Spa System Flush beat Spa Purge is that I didn't get any bathtub ring with the Purge product but I did get one with the Flush product.

Here were some of the differences in my very unscientific experience:

1. The Purge product requires an entire bottle for one cleaning. So I used most of the bottle. I have a small spa - 3 person, 275 gallons. So one bottle should have been sufficient.

2. The Flush product only requires 1/2 bottle for a 400 gallon tub. I used the whole bottle in my 275 gallon tub anyway. If a little is good, a lot is better???

3. The Purge product instructions say to set the water temperature at least at 98 degrees. I set it at 100.

4. The Flush product doesn't indicate a specific temperature, but I set my temp at 104 degrees, againg figuring more is better.

Anyway, that's my experience with these two products.

- Simon

[Dustin Golden]

Thanks for sharing your experience. I also got new tips here from you.