Hi All
Well summer is coming to an end in NW Indiana and I’m trying to get ready to
close my IG 28,500 gal.
After the season starting late (Father’s Day) I opened up to a green pool. With
shocking, algecide, brushing and vacuuming it cleared up in about 10 days. The
pool has been just sparkling the entire summer until just before Labor Day when
it began to look cloudy. I have had the water tested by a pool store numerous
times, and the results have been low chlorine levels. I have been shocking it
almost every 3 to 4 days and it still won’t clear up. I have backwashed my DE
filter almost everyday for a week. I have taken it completely apart and cleaned
it twice in the past week.
It appears that a white slimy growth has taken over. I bombed it with algaecide
yesterday and am going to vacuum today. I want to get this cleared up in the
next 2 weeks to finally close it.
I’m wondering if there is a high level of metal in the water that the pool store
missed.
Today the water still just looks cloudy with some accumulation of “white
something” on the sides and bottom.
TIA for any suggestions
Arthur
Pool Won’t Clear Up
February 20th, 2005 · 2 Comments
Tags: chemicals
2 responses so far ↓
1 janis_40 // Feb 23, 2005 at 9:51 pm
In a message dated 9/20/2003 8:56:37 AM Central Daylight Time,
greyts@… writes:
It appears that a white slimy growth has taken over. I bombed it with
algaecide yesterday and am going to vacuum today. I want to get this cleared up
in
the next 2 weeks to finally close it.
I’m wondering if there is a high level of metal in the water that the pool
store missed.
Today the water still just looks cloudy with some accumulation of “white
something” on the sides and bottom.
TIA for any suggestions
Arthur
Arthur,
Have you stuck your hand in a felt this white slime? Stop with the
maintenance on your DE filter until we get a handle on this. Is it white or
PINK?
If you are shocking the pool with cal-hypo and the pool has cooled off the
calcium may not dissolve properly so you may be making the problem worse with
all
of the shock. What are you using to shock the pool with anyway and how much
are you using?
Can you vacuum this stuff up? If you try does it come back out the returns?
I need some answers before I can even begin to help. If it is pink then it
is not algae but a mold called Pink Algae (go figure) or you might have a
serious hole in a DE grid and you are leaking DE into the pool.
Ken
2 janis_40 // Feb 24, 2005 at 5:20 pm
INSIDE THE SKIMMER AROUND THE WATER LINE, I GET A BUILD UP OF BLACK GREASEY
OILY SCUM.
The oily scum is suntsn lotion and sun screen. No amount of chlorine will
get rid of it and a clarifier is marginal at best. You need an enzime product
that will break down the good and get rid of it Leslie’s sells a product
called Pool Perfect and there are others on the market as well.
As far as the slime goes there are no algaes that I know of that are white.
Yellow or Mustard Algae gets to be a powder but it would collect on the walls
and grow not collect around the skimmer or anyother place there is moving
water. I still think you have a DE leak in one of the tubes or around the tops
of
the tubes.
You could take the filter apart again and inspect then put it together
without DE and then vacuum. If you end up with a filter full of DE then you
know
that was the problem. Besides very wet DE is sort of a slime.
USUALLY USE WHATEVER I FIND READILY AVAILABLE, IN THE POWDER PACKS, AT
WHATEVER STORE I HAPPEN TO BE AT. AQUA CHEM. HTH. SUN. I HAVE NEVER
CONSIDERED
THE ACTUAL INGREDIENTS BECAUSE ANY THAT I’VE HAVE USED I NEVER HAD A PROBLEM
WITH UNTIL LATELY…IF THAT’S THE PROBLEM. I DON’T HAVE ANY OF THE BAGS AROUND
TO SEE THE ACTUAL INGREDIENTS. I ONLY RECENTLY ADDED, FOR THE FIRST TIME
EVER, 3 GALS OF “LIQUID” SODIUM HYPOCHLORITE. TODAY, UPON RECOMMENDATION FROM A
POOL STORE, 3 BAGS OF SODIUM DICHLORO-S-TRIAZINETRIONE DIHYDRATE. EVERYBODY I
HAVE TALKED WITH TELL ME TO ADD MORE CHLORINE.
The problem with some of the pool shocks is that they are non-chlorine
shocks. This is very true of the four-in-one products………….if you look
on
the bag in fine print it might say “Works best with chlorine”. There is nothing
wrong with non-chlorine shock but they just will not deal with algae and that
is not their purpose.
Liquid chlorine is goo in that it will not cloud your pool and it is cheap
which makes it a favorite of the pool maintenance crowd but other than that it
is very weak and you need to use a lot in a large pool. The sodium-dichlor
was a better choise and my personal favorite in that it dissolves quickly and
will not cloud like cal-hypo does plus it has four times the available chlorine
of the liquid chlorine.
HAVE ALSO USED SODA ASH TO RAISE THE PH IN THE LAST WEEK.
WITH MY OWN TEST KIT THIS AFTERNOON, HERE ARE THE READINGS I INTERPRETED:
CHLORINE BEFORE ADDING MORE = APPROX. 3.0. PH = APPROX. 7.2 STABLIZIER =
APPROX. 38 ALKALINITY = APPROX 170-180
ALTHOUGH NOT “RIGHT ON”. IT’S PRETTY CLOSE ACCORDING TO THE GUIDE BOOK I HAVE
.
The readings you quoted are more “right-on” than about 90% of the pools in
the country so do not feel bad in that respect. Was the pool cloudy after you
added the soda ash? Plus, I have never been a fan of the Hayward bump-type DE
filters. I prefer the ones with the grids or in all reality I prefer the
multi-cartridge type filter. Just personal opinion!
Ken
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