Is Borax same as baking soda?

[dianam]

Can I use household baking soda for PH adjusting? How much for 14,000 gal.

[chem geek]

No. Household baking soda is sodium bicarbonate and is the same as Alkalinity Up so is used to raise TA. It is not the same as Borax.

Washing soda is sodium carbonate and is the same as most pH Up products and will raise both TA and pH. This is closer to Borax, but it raises TA more than Borax does.

The closest thing to Borax in terms of raising pH without raising TA very much would be lye aka caustic soda aka sodium hydroxide, but that is not readily available unless you make your own soap.

Richard

[waterbear]

Get a box of borax in the laundry aisle of the grocery store. It's in a green box. Use that for raising your pH and use the baking soda when you need to raise total alkalinity.

[chem geek]

To answer your "how much for 14,000 gallon?" question:

In a 14,000 gallon pool, every pound of Baking Soda or Sodium Bicarbonate or Alkalinity Up will raise the Total Alkalinity (TA) of your pool by 5.5 ppm.

Every pound of Washing Soda or Sodium Carbonate or most pH Up products will raise the pH of your pool by 0.44 and your TA by 8.7 ppm if you initially start with a pH of 7.5, TA of 80 and a CYA of 30. The effect on pH is very dependent on your starting pH and on your TA and CYA levels.

Every pound of 20 Mule Team Borax will raise the pH of your pool by 0.20 and your TA by 2.4 ppm if you initially start with a pH of 7.5, TA of 80 and a CYA of 30. The effect on pH is very dependent on your starting pH and on your TA and CYA levels.

Generally speaking, you add about twice as much (by weight of) 20 Mule Team Borax to have the same effect as Washing Soda / Sodium Carbonate / pH Up.

Richard

[tphaggerty]

Believe it or not, my local grocery store no longer sells Borax (just when I need it). They did have Washing Soda, but I didn't buy it because I'm not familar with using it vs. Borax.

In general, my pool only needs to have the PH brought up when I open, after that it stays pretty steady (seems the SWG brings it up and acid rain brings it down, sweet). My TA is about 120. Given that, does it make sense to search for Borax, or should I just use the Washing Soda??

[CarlD]

Washing soda will raise your T/A, Borax will not. Ask them to get it.

Washing soda is soda ash and T/A goes up with it.

What I would do if you are stuck is LOWER pH to 7.2 (if it's not lower).

Then AERATE your water to raise your pH without raising your T/A. In fact, this may be the BEST way to raise it.

If you have a vinyl pool, T/A of 120 gives you lots of room--you can go to 180 safely. But if you have concrete/plaster, you don't want to raise T/A.

Another way you can raise pH is chlorinate with Cal-Hypo--assuming your calcium level is low enough to tolerate more calcium.

[chem geek]

Carl,

In theory, Cal-Hypo should be no different than bleach or chlorinating liquid in terms of pH. It will rise when added, but then the using up of chlorine will make the pH fall back down again. The only difference should be that instead of having sodium chloride salt after the chlorine gets used up, you end up with calcium chloride salt so the calcium hardness (CH) is increased.

There is a very minor effect on pH from the difference in calcium levels, but is not measurable. There is also extra base added to the Cal-Hypo just as there is for bleach and chlorinating liquid, but the amount is very small and again the effect on pH should be negligible. A rise of 0.1 in pH might be seen after using enough Cal-Hypo to cumulatively add 35 ppm FC (that is then used up). By comparison, it takes enough bleach or chlorinating liquid to cumulatively add about 65 ppm FC (that is then used up) to get that same rise of 0.1 in pH. Again, this is based on my theoretical calculations. If you consistently see something different, then that's something to investigate.

Richard

[CarlD]

OK,
But the aeration method will surely work if the pH is 7.2 or less!

[tphaggerty]

Actually, my PH appears to be between 6.8 and 7.0, so I want to get it up asap. I wasn't thinking about aeration or I would have already gotten that started. I did have about 1 1/2 lbs of borax left over that I have already added.

In any case, I did get 2 boxes of borax at another store today. But, I'm thinking I might try a fountain for a while and see how that works, rather not add chemicals (even BBB) if not needed.

[CarlD]

If you get it aerating, your pH will rise--the more aeration, the faster. Since your T/A is already on target, why not? Save the Borax till you need it...