Should I raise my TA now?

[chem geek]

Larry,

Every pound (which is about a cup) of 20 Mule Team Borax requires about 7.7 ounces of Muriatic Acid (31.45% HCl) to keep the pH the same so you can add one and then the other in smaller quantities to keep the pH more stable (you don't mix them together, of course, you just put them into the pool one after the other).

For your size pool it would take 1219 ounces or about 76.2 pounds of 20 Mule Team Borax which is about 16 boxes. It would take about 582 ounces of Muriatic acid to keep the pH the same after adding the Borax. Of course, you should add about half of each of these amount (alternating in smaller additions of each) and then measure your Borates level on the test strip just to be sure you don't go to far and that my calculations were correct.

Richard

[giroup01]

What is the BleachCalc using as borax concentration, or maybe I should be asking if the borax concentration in BleachCalc is the same as the 20 Mule product, the software says 338 ounces in 20700 gallons gets you 49.9 ppm. Just wondering.

And many thanks Richard for your last reply on my high TA/pH drift question!!

[chem geek]

Evan (waterbear) and I figured out what the proper interpretation of "ppm Borates" means and it turns out to be ppm of Boron, not tetraborate or boric acid or anything else. BleachCalc was not using that convention so would produce the wrong result. I believe there is more about this in The Great Tetraborate Experiment thread.

Richard