New Pool questions - introduction

[dmarsh70]

CarlD / Watermom,

Thanks so much for your quick response. I really appreciate it. I know what I do thus far ONLY because of this board and nobody else. Suffice to say I trust you guys more than pool builders

I will head out today and pick up some calcium flakes and or Cal-Hypo. Wanted to check out the local store anyways.

Yaeh the Lamottes Tester I have is not test strips. It has regeants and instead of looking for colors you put it in a little machine and it gives a digital read out.

They are mixing up plaster now! (yay) so should be testing this all out tomorrow I hope!

I will also pick up a small amount of "normal" tri-chlor pucks as well - until I get it all going.

I never really compared the bleach vs chlorine prices that much - may almost be a wash in some cases, but the CYA level thing seems to be the root of a lot of problems and I want to make sure that is in check before I ever start.

Amazing reading some of the pool supply websites - nobody mentions how this stuff raises CYA levels - but feel free to come in with a free water sample.

Wow I guess I'm catching on quick.

I am not really all that happy about running for 48 hours myself. I really am not sure if the pool guy is sure. He seems to always be in a rush... So I may go 12 - 20 hours on pump - full speed to get some of that initial stuff out - then start testing and adding.

I would imagine PH would be the first order of business. I assume (like you said) it will be high - so I'll hit it with Muriatic, start chrlorinating. Check and adjust TA, calcium, and let it roll.

One more final question (at least for now)

I do have a solar cover. I know - in Florida do I need it? Who knows, but I got it so I am wondering if there are any issues keeping it on almost immediately.

Can you add chemicals with the cover on and leave it on? I understand if I am "shocking" the higher concentration may degrade the solar cover so I'll have it off. Other than that is it ok to leave it on?

Thanks again CarlD and Watermom!!

[CarlD]

Again, I'm not a builder and there are some initial things we here about and our professional members confirm that seem counter-intuitive. This may be one of them: running for 48 hours w/o chems. Plus, if he warranties his work, you want to follow his directions so he can't claim you violated the warranty and therefore he's not responsible.

A solar cover hold in heat and can also reduce chlorine loss particularly due to evaporation. If you get a high end solar cover and do everything right you'll get a full 3 to 4 years out of it. If you buy a cheaper one and aren't as careful, it will only last 3 seasons and maybe a little bit more..... Been there, done that. Go ahead and add chlorine as you need it.

[dmarsh70]

Thanks again Carl - good point - better do what he says for warranty sake.

I did buy a better than average cover - so thanks for that.

One last question:

I just went to my local pool supply company - I dont know if I can mention the name so I wont.

They have liquid chrlorine in 2.5 gallon jugs for $4.79 it's 10.8 percent. The guy behind the counter agreed it's just like bleach and many folks use it !! I was shocked!

Does that price seem pretty reasonable?

David

[aylad]

Hi, and welcome to the forum!!

Watermom and CarlD have gotten you off to a great start--a new pool is really exciting and it'll be SO much easier to maintain since you've done your homework and seem to have a good grasp on the chemical requirements!

10.8% LC at $4.79 works out to less than $2/gallon for the 10% stuff, which is a much better price than I pay at Wally World for 6%--just make sure that it's actually 10%! The higher percentage stuff tends to degrade much faster than the 6%, and if it has degraded, then it's not such a great price! CarlD has posted somewhere a way to test for the actual percentage of chlorine in your jug--I'll look and see if I can find it and post the link here.

Congrats on the new pool!


Janet

[CarlD]

Yeah, I think if you pour five 2liter soda bottles full of tap water into a 5 gal bucket to get 10 liters and add 1 cc of your chlorine to the water and stir, you can then measure it as if it was in the pool....I THINK that's it. It's the same as adding 1 liter of bleach to 10,000 liters of pool water. Or adding 1 gallon to 10,000 gallons. It was an eyedropper measure or so. Whatever 1/10,000th of 10 liters is.

[dmarsh70]

WOw you guys are just awesome! Thanks so much. THe pool place said they fill them everyday - in fact they we're putting new ones on the shelf as I got there. But we'll find out soon enough - if the poolcaluclator shows me what to add and it's not close I know its degraded.. I'll test the first week with bleach and the pool version bleach to see if it's close. I hope it is.

SO this is what I did. I took water out of the hose and tested it as i really wanted to learn how to test with the digital read out and check it all out. I do NOT have a test for CC - but I think someone said its a combination of FC and TC.

So here are the readings just out of the hose:
FC: 1.39 (I guess they add chlorine to city / county water)
TCL: 1.40 (Total Chlorine -- is this total CC?? little confused here. Is my CC: 2.88 and thereby I need to shock?
PH: 7.6
ALK: 84
CH: 92
CYA: LOW reading - I was expecting this as I dont see why they would have CYA in city water.

So it appears Carl was accurate - I will need calcium, and Stabilizer. The ALK should be cool I do believe and i'll probably have to drop the PH down with muriatic the first week or two.

If someone could comment on the Chlorine levels I would appreciate it.

Also, I realize the numbers will be totally different when I get 15K gallons of water circulating in fresh plaster. I know the PH will go through the roof.

I was talking to the plaster guy today. He said he thinks I misunderstood waiting 48 hours to add chemicals. He said he would certainly let it run for several hours to filter stuff out - and I may even need to wash the filter once a week at first - however he said once it's filtered for several hours - take your readings and start working on ph and sanitizer, assuming you know how to. Told him I spent HOURS researching..,.

Guys and gals you are all great. I appreciate your continued support. As soon as I am a member out of probation (for lack of a better term) I will post some pics of HOPEFULLY sparkly clean water!

Thank you all for the WARM WELCOMES! Very nice. You are all invited to my pool open party

David

[Watermom]

FC + CC= TC so your CC is only .01. You are looking good!