Controlling Strong Chlorine Odors

[Your Local Pool Guy]

In a swimming pool most people tend to believe that when they smell chlorine that there is way too much chlorine in there pool. Therefore they do not add it. Chlorine in its natural form is a gas. And chlorine does gas off your pool. So you can't smell chlorine while its in the water but you can smell it while it's in the air as a gas. Hence the chlorine is not in your pool Bottom Line: When You smell chlorine, it means there is little or no chlorine left in your pool. There is something called good chlorine and bad chlorine. If you ever get your pool tested, good chlorine is what we call free chlorine and bad chlorine is combined or total chlorine. The bad chlorine also called chlormines create a gas which is where the odor comes from. So it comes from bad chlorine. You can always smell chlorine when you go to a water park or a public pool so be careful.

To get rid of the chlorine order you can either shock the pool and gas off all the chlorine or just add more chlorine to super chlorinate.

[giroup01]

Sorry to nitpick again but... What you're smelling is chlorine combined with nitrogen. So there _is_ chlorine in the equation.

Interesting choice of words, my periodic table shows only one entry for chlorine. And 'bad chlorine' is not 'total chlorine' at all, sorry.

You don't gas off all the chlorine, you gas off all the nitrogen compounds. And 'adding more chlorine' is too vague, ask Google about breakpoint chlorination.

[Richard J Kinch]

This is a mix of error, misunderstanding, and ignorance. Stuff you've heard, which is largely wrong.

No, chloramines. Chlorine-ammonia compounds, most of which *don't* smell. They're purposely added to your tap water.

What you think is the "good chlorine" smell of a clean pool is ozone and hydrogen chloride, not chlorine. Chlorine itself doesn't smell good, ever.

[Your Local Pool Guy]

Man, do you work in the pool industry? If not, you should. I've never seen so much googling and wikipeding just to try and prove someone wrong. Maybe i should write wikipedia and google explanations so that when they do thier searching i'll always be right. Again People, Everyone has a different way of taking care of your pool. Infact go to

and see what they say, they are a nationally recognized pool information website by the APSP (The Association of Pool And Spa Professionals) Which my company and every company i have worked for is a part of. I really don't know why im arguing my case to the same guys on this group, but it's fun.

[giroup01]

Well on my end I was suggesting *you* google breakpoint chlorination, as the information you've communicated previously, "Breakpoint oxidation occurs when chlorine reaches 10ppm over the normal reading of

3ppm. That equals 13ppm", is simply incorrect. It is wrong. It was for *your* own knowledge.

People may have different ways of taking care of their pools, agreed, but it remains that there is only _one_ chemistry, one set of rules. When they say "Increase your pH to the proper level before shocking your pool" on their 'pool opening kits', they're ignoring basic chemistry. When you're being sold clarifier because your water, at a pH of 8.0 and alk at 320, is cloudy, you're being screwed.

Hence the 'pool industry', and the pool stores, are certainly not reliable sources of correct and objective information. The industry is pushing trichlor (look, 90% available chlorine!) down the necks of consumers knowing the stuff is crap. And it is. They'll repackage copper sulfate and call it Miracle Algae Eliminator. The latest craze now is 'phosphates', too much phosphates and you need to add Phosphate Remover.

Pool chemistry is not rocket science, there's a lot of misinformation and bad advice out there. Nope I don't work for the industry at all but as a CPWT I want to give correct and objective information to my customers. I'm not tied to, or push any brand or manufacturer (as are _so_ many). I sell no-name sodium bisulfate by the gram ($0.23 Canadian will get you 200 grams) and give you the msds everytime. No bullshit here.

[Richard J Kinch]

So you're in the pool biz. You peddle chemicals. You don't have to understand the chemistry, you just have to seem like you do to your customers, who typically don't know grade school science.

[Richard J Kinch]

Right. Ten years ago they wouldn't sell copper, because you were supposed to buy the quats or polymers for $16/quart that wouldn't stain your pool.