Opening AG 24ft -Everything is wrong

[mbar]

daisy11 is right, you need to have metal out in the water, and you need to get your chlorine up there, and keep it there until it holds overnight. It can take a while to clean up a swamp (I should know, mine was nasty this year). You can also kill the algae, then work on the metals if that is what you want, but it is just as easy to do both at the same time - the metals sequestering agent can also cause cloudy water, so don't worry if the water stays cloudy for a while, but the green should be gone. You do have to brush and vacuum everyday. You also have to backwash as needed. Try to test the water at least 3x a day bringing the chlorine back up to 15 each time - the more persistent, the faster the blue water . If you brush the sides, and the stains do not come off once the chlorine has been high for a few days, then the stains are metals. When dealing with metals, you should not have a ph over 7.2, I see yours is high at 7.7. The high ph along with high chlorine will cause the metals to fall out of solution and stain the pool. The new stains can be taken care of with the metal out. Make sure it is good metal out and not cheap stuff. You sometimes need more than what the directions say on the bottle. Drop the ph down to 7.2 and add the metal out, let it run for a couple of days and see if all the stains lift (they should). You never really get rid of the metals, they just go into suspension so they don't cause the problems. When you use well water, you usually need to keep sequestering agent (metal out) in your water at all times. You add a little every week, or whenever you add water. Feel free to ask any other questions you may have. Keep us posted.

[Mom2Czars]

Two years running we had to get a pool started from scratch, owing to a liner problem. In adding water this year, we went from normal looking water (with tons of leaves on the bottom) to a green-tinted pool just after adding well water.

Well, last year we had a similar sort of issue and while I was tending to blame it on metal in the water, I kept hitting it with bleach for a few days, and I changed the DE twice in the same time frame and the whole thing cleared right up. Were I you, I'd just keep that pool at shock level for a good long time, and keep on changing out the DE every few days or so. Once you get the pool clean, you won't have to change the DE very often at all, but during the start up phase, it can get junky pretty easily. When mine gets junky, it definitely affects the return flow negatively.

Good luck!

[brianbo]

Thanks for the info. I really appreciate everyone's help.
The pool is clear with only a little bit of residue to pick up. A lot of brushing and vaccing to filter. My child went in on Tuesday. The DE filter worked great as last year with the sand filter the iron residue just blew back into the pool. I am glad to hear that the DE filter also clogs quickly with a lot of junk in the pool. Also, I backwashed to filter numerous times but not much lately as the pool is clear.
I bought new test strips but will buy the drop test as recommended.

I added 2 gals of 12% 2 days ago and yesterday went to the pool store.
FC - .1
TC - 1.1
CC - 1.0
ph - 7.0
CA - 60
AL (w/stablizer correction) - 70
CYA - 35
They said add 3 gals of 12% and 2 trichlor pucks which I did and do not add stabilizer as the CYA was good. I also added 5 lbs of baking soda.

From this website, I know that I should not have bought calcium/hardness but I did anyways. Was that a total waste of $$$ with me having an AG and vinyl liner? I resisted 4 times of testing at the pool place but I will try anything.
If Chlorine does not hold when I test this afternoon, should I add Stabilizer or just keep adding 12%?
Is CYA and Stabilizer the same thing?

[CarlD]

Do NOT, repeat NOT use the Tri-chlor tabs! That was terrible advice. Your pH is 7.0--on the very edge of too low and Tri-chlor will push it down, making it worse. Your CYA is 35 which PERFECT and the Tri-Chlor will push that up, making it worse as well!

The 3 gallons of 12%? How big is your pool? I have 20000 gallons and two of those would raise my FC by 12ppm! Still, it's not TERRIBLE advice, unlike the Tri-Chlor, excessive baking soda, and useless calcium.

Your T/A is a little low, but I think 5 # of baking soda is too much. Start with 1 # and then measure. If you are between 80 and 100, you are DONE and don't add more.

Calcium is a TOTAL waste of money! You don't need calcium in your vinyl pool! If you MUST add calcium, buy Cal-Hypo and use that--at least you'll be getting useful chlorine for your money and the calcium will be essentially free. If you need calcium or don't care about calcium, Cal-Hypo is a better source of chlorine than Tri-Chlor or Di-Chlor as it doesn't affect CYA at all, and has less effect on pH.

[brianbo]

OK. I will take out the trichlor pucks as I thought I read that it contained stabilizer. I will never bother with Calcium again.
Mine is 13,500 gal.
From Pool store:
My results Recommended
T/A - 70 100-150 (**printout said add 5lbs so I did**)
PH - 7.1 7.2 -7.8
CYA - 35 30 - 150
FC - .1 1 -3
TC - 1.1 1 -3
CC - 1.0 1 -3

The pool store said CYA was good but to add trichlor puck. I do not understand by recommended from above the CYA = 30 which is at low end but it is perfect. Is the recommended high end to sell more chemicals?

How much baking soda will raise TA by 10ppm?
How much Borax will raise PH by 10ppm?
If CYA is within range, do not use Trichlor?

[aylad]

The trichlor pucks do contain stabilizer, which is the same as CYA, but you don't need any more CYA in your pool. For the amount of CYA you have now, you need to keep your chlorine level at a minimum of 3, and preferably closer to 5 ppm. The pucks also lower pH, and yours is already too low, so that's why Carl is telling you not to use the pucks. So yes, if CYA is at the range you need, do NOT use trichlor because it will push it higher, which will require water to be drained/refilled, or require higher baseline chlorine levels to keep the pool clean.

Your CC is greater than 0.5, and accounts for almost all of your total chlorine, so you also need to shock the pool to 15 ppm to burn off all the CC, allowing the CC to return to zero, and your FC to be equal to the total chlorine.

How much Borax it takes to raise pH by 10 pm depends on your alk level, so there is no real rule of thumb like there is for chlorine. In your size pool, I would not add more than about a cup of Borax at a time slowly through the skimmer, allow to circulate a couple of hours, then retest--it's much easier to sneak up on your target level than to overshoot it.

The same goes for TA--I don't know of a rule of thumb to calculate how much baking soda it takes to raise it, except I know what works in my pool. However, TA is a pain to have to lower, so again I would use only 1 cup increments and retesting in between doses until you get it to where you want it. Since you've already added 5 pounds, I'd say you're not going to have to add any more, at least for this season.

Janet

[brianbo]

Thanks again Carl, Janet and everyone.
I read so much in this forum last week it made my head spin as the pool was a mess. I knew I saw a post about ammonia, PH and I found it as it was in this forum under FAQ. It said on startup to get PH up to 7.5 and add chlorine and do not worry about TA but I could not find it. I figured out today that I need to be logged in for Search capability. I am not to swift sometimes.
I found and saved Ben's best guess chart so I have that.
My first 2 years were easy and last year with the iron was not so easy. I think I had other issues last year but that is in the past.

When adding chemicals seems like going easy on everything except chlorine.
Pool Store recommended level on chlorine is 1 to 3.
But Bens recommended FC is 3-6 with CYA = 35. To me that is not close.
What is recommended level on TA and PH as pool store is TA 100-150 and PH is 7.2 - 7.8? My PH is 7.1 but do I want it at 7.5
Is everything rule of thumb or just learn by doing based on pool size, area, climate, etc?

Thanks again,
Brian