In-ground pool question/rant

[John]

******************

******************

***************** Switching to an earth filter will pay for itself in the long run. Sand filters are the worst filters for a pool. They get clogged with gunk very quickly and back flushing them just doesn't remove the gunk.

I had a pool when I was raising my kids and switching from a sand to an earth filter was the best investment I could have made for that pool. I only had to run the filter 4 hours a day instead of 8 and just shock the pool once a week or so, no other chlorine products needed. The savings in electricity, wear and tear, chemicals and filtering agent (not to mention no more problems) easily paid for for the cost of a new filter.

John

[krw]

No, they're for people who don't like blond hair (or burnt hair). It takes a

*lot* if chlorine to kill algae. Chlorine is intended to kill bacteria, not algae.

[despen]

But it kills both.

Best plan is to not use the pool for a day or 2. The chlorine levels return to normal pretty quickly.

[Steve B]

"Jim T" wrote

If you are using a lot of chlorine, and you STILL got algae, I'd say it probably is your stabilizer. UNLESS, like I had when the pine trees bloomed and all the gold dust settled on the pool. A mass infusion of some type of degradable organic gunk.

Cyanuric acid testers are about $20, IIRC, and there is enough to do tests for about five years, two a year. Simple to use. So simple I did it.

Upon adding a jug of stabilizer, a gallon, IIRC, I cut my chlorine by 75%. I had a 32,000 gallon pool, and I would put two of those 3" tabs in the ducky floater, and replace when they got thin, and no algae unless I let the pool get real dirty, which happened a couple of times when I was traveling, or had a pump/filter failure for a few days.

Let us know. Even if you do have issues with other things due to the water in your area, stabilizer is one of the top three things that can cause pool problems, and one of the top three easiest things to fix. And top three cheapest.

Steve

Heart surgery pending?

Heart Surgery Survival Guide Now on Facebook, too

[Steve B]

I would power wash mine, BUT BE CAREFUL, AS YOU CAN ALSO TAKE OFF THE PLASTER!

Steve

[krw]

Not in the concentrations you want to be swimming in.

I didn't say one shouldn't shock the pool. The purpose of shock isn't to kill algae either.

[trader4]

Very good advice about the test kit. I don't trust the kids at the pool store either. Listening to them you could spend hundreds of dollars buying their Balance Pak 2000 or whatever instead of a cheap readily available chemical like baking soda.

I use the Taylor 2006 test kit, which is about $50. It tests for everything you need to measure including cyanuric acid and free chlorine. It's probably saved me $1000 compared to taking water in to the pool store. And the pool has been trouble free.

I agree with Steve that if he's putting in a lot of chlorine he may be lacking stabilizer. Key question, what form is the chlorine that's being used? If it's liquid, there is no stabilizer. If he's using trichlor, then that includes stabilizer. You don't want to get too much, because once it's in the only way to get it out is to drain the water.

[despen]

I just said that. Don't use the pool if the chlorine scares you.

I know shock isn't sold as algae control. I'm just sharing my experience.

I've been through the pool store test regimen. I've had yellow algae, black algae, green algae and specific treatments that were supposed to cure each. None of them ever seemed to work.

But then I figured out that if I over-shock the pool, everything growing in the pool dies overnight. Typically the green water turns cloudy white and in a day or 2 the filter removes the white.

[krw]

Moron. Don't use so damned much chlorine.

Your "experience" isn't worth a damn.

You obviously did something very wrong. Algae is trivial to control.

[Jim T]

Filter media makes a difference. Sand filters can let tiny dead algae through unless u use a substance that has to be backwashed.

What I did this time is check the phosphates and they were high so I used phosfree, chlorine and a floc like chemical then backwashed. The thing that works is *killing everything*; *let the pool settle 48 hours*. put some floc in the filter ~ vacuum through the floc and backwash. Works for me everytime. But it can get expensive. Chemicals and water and all.