Elen Posted June 15, 2014 Report Share Posted June 15, 2014 Hi all. I am hoping to get some help please. We have a swim spa and are really struggling with the ph and total alkalinity. Right now the TA reads 110 ppm, but there is no discernible Ph reading. If we add Ph up, the total alkalinity will shoot off the charts... Last time we had this scenario, we added ph plus and got a normal ph reading, but the TA shot up to over 340 ppm. It seems that we can never get these two readings in the "normal" range, and it is getting very frustrating. Does anyone have any ideas for us? We monitor the levels every day but have not been going in the spa because of either low ph, or high TA. I'm about all out of hair, as I've yanked most of it out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chem geek Posted June 16, 2014 Report Share Posted June 16, 2014 You can aerate the water (run jets) to raise the pH with no change in TA. However, "no discernible pH reading" makes no sense. The pH test always shows something. Do you mean it is showing a low pH? Do you have a decent test kit such as the Taylor K-2006? What are you using for disinfecting your swim spa? It sounds like you are using something acidic that is driving down your pH. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elen Posted June 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted June 16, 2014 Pew are using a digital reader test kit (Aquacheck). The results come out in numerical format, but for PH is just reads Error and shows it as low. So my guess is that it is lower than the minimum level of 7.2 ppm. The sanitizer we are using is chlorine. Any advice you can give me would be great, thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elen Posted June 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted June 16, 2014 I should also mention that we did aerate; one time for 30 mins, and another time for about 15 mins. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chem geek Posted June 17, 2014 Report Share Posted June 17, 2014 You really should get a proper test kit such as the Taylor K-2006. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spanky Posted June 17, 2014 Report Share Posted June 17, 2014 The Aquacheck digital reader uses test strips and is no match for a Taylor K-2006. It gives people a false sense of accuracy which is simply not there. All it does is eliminate the human eye color comparison. The inherent inaccuracy of the strips remain. A Swim Spa is similar to a Hot Tub in that they both have substantial aeration and as such traditionally experience rising pH, NOT falling pH. Something is clearly wrong and I'd be willing to bet that the test strips are leading you in the wrong direction. One possible factor is FC. If the FC is high, the strips often give wildly inaccurate results. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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