Can anyone tell me what to put in my pool to clear the water in my swimming pool?

Question

I have done the 6-way test strips and this is the results:

hardness=== 50

clorine===10-20

pH===higher than 8.4

Alkalinity====higher than 240

Acid====150

I have the intex blue pool the 18x48. I always have trouble with green algae and then cloudy water. What can I do? Thanks

Answer 1

Uhh, actually, you need to drop that TA first and foremost. I'm afraid that the other answer posted has forgotten that a high TA creates pH lock. You ALWAYS adjust TA first, if needed. That's rule #1 in water balance. On the flip side, if your TA is low, you get pH bounce. It goes all over the place in hours. Take a reading one minute it's high, an hour later it's low and so on. That's why you NEED to get that TA under control first.

  If it's not in range (80-120), nothing else will ever get into range. You may be showing an ok chlorine reading there, but the chlorine won't be working well at that high TA and pH. It's present, it just can't work.

Dropping the TA in an above ground is a little tricky, since there's no deep end for the acid you need to add to drop it, to hang around in. You'll need to go at it in stages. To drop TA you do what we call a slug. Muriatic acid needs to drop to the bottom of the pool and stay there a bit. This drops TA but doesn't do anything to your pH ( more about this later). To slug an above ground, ideally you want to shut the filter pump off about an hour before you slug. This stops currents in the pool from spreading the acid you're about to add, around. You WANT it on the bottom and not up in the water column. When the pool's been off about an hour, choose a single spot, along one of the length wise walls in the middle. For starters here, given that pool volume, add 2 litres of muriatic acid in that one spot. Let the pool stay off for another hour and then start up. Check your chemistry in 24 hours to see how much your TA has dropped. You can then use that number to figure out exactly how much acid will be required to drop the TA right back to around 100. For example: You started at 240. If 2 litres drops the TA to 180, it affected a change of -60. One litre will drop your TA 30 points. Do the math to get the required amount to drop it the rest of the way. In this case another 2 and 2/3rds litres will get you to 100. Each pool is different ( different back yards, volumes, owner swimming habits) so you'll need to work out what works for YOUR pool. Don't be alarmed if the total needed to drop your TA is well over 4 litres. That 240 is pretty high.

Once your TA is in range, you'll probably find that your pH suddenly settled into it's proper range too without any help. TA is the governor of pH and why that can happen. If so..you're done the hard bit. If the pH isn't quite down far enough yet, you use that same muriatic acid to drop pH, but in a different way. You keep the pool running and put your acid in, in front of a pool return. This puts the acid into the water column, mixing it. That changes pH, but leaves your TA alone. You want that pH in the 7.2 to 7.6 range, so once your TA is good, check that pH and adjust as needed. That volume of water, usually needs about a litre and a half to drop a 8.0 reading to 7.6.

Ok..the other issue you have is that calcium hardness. Contrary to what the other poster has said, it DOES matter in a vinyl pool. A low calcium hardness breaks down the plastisizer in the vinyl and if you have a heater with a copper heat exchanger, bigger issues with aggressive water eating the heat exchanger. They're not cheap, nor is a liner. What is cheap is to fix the CH. You need to bring that level up to 80 at least but not more than 150.

Your water balance ( lack of) is what's almost certainly the root cause of your algae and cloudy water. I assume you're using the Intex filter system. It would be wise to get a second cartridge filter for it so that each week you can have one soaking in cleaner, while the other is working in your filter. No down time and you'll have a properly cleaned cartridge at each swap.

One last thing here. You're on well water aren't you or a small town water supply? ( just judging by your readings). If you are, you'll need to stay on top of your TA. Well water usually has a high TA and any you add as top up water will be raising your TA with it.

Answer 2

your levels are totally out of wack

should be around the following

calcium hardness 150-300

chlorine 1.5-5

P.H 7.2-7.6

Alkalinity 60-120

Answer 3

The best thing to do is take a water sample into a pool store and tell them your situation.  Shasta Pools retail stores have comprehensive testing equipment and very knowledgeable staff.  Going off of your strip (which seems to be slightly inaccurate) you would need to take care of a few things before treating the algae.

Hardness is inconsequential for an above ground pool, so don't worry about that.  I'm assuming your clorine is 1.0 to 2.0 not 10-20.  The pH is the first thing you need to adjust.  You'll want to add approximately 2 pints of muriatic acid to the pool to adjust the pH to 7.4.  This will make your chlorine work more effectively to sanitize your pool.  If you've been putting treatments comprised of liquid chlorine or any other clorine based chemical at that pH level you might as well put nothing in at all.  Allow a few hours for the acid to lower the pH with the pool running.  Then brush the pool down as best you can.  In the evening put in 6 gallons of liquid chlorine and allow the pool to run 24 hours continuously.  The intex pools are notorious for undersized filters, so it would be wise to make sure that is cleaned before and after the treatment.

*Note - These amounts were tailored for an 18ft round 4ft deep above ground, if your pool is smaller or larger, amounts will need to be adjusted accordingly.