Salt level keeps dropping but no leak?

[MrSanders]

Dear Forum People,

I have a problem with my pool. I have a 10k gallon pool with a Hayward chlorine generator cell. During the summer (July) at one point our salt level abruptly dropped from 3,200 ppm to 2,200 in a matter of a week. I added about 300 lbs of salt and it slowly went back up to 3,000 ppm over the course of another week.

But last week it happened again, now it's down to 2,000 ppm. The cell is off. But before I add salt again I did the bucket test with the pump running, without the pump running, with the returns plugged in and without. Water levels were the same, looked like there were no leaks. So I thought it might be the sensor, so I tested the water with Clorox salt strips and I got a low salt level reading. To me it looks like I don't have a leak and it's not a sensor problem. What can it be?

A bit more info: I am in Southern California and we had some heat waves in the past 3 months, going above 100 multiple times (today too). I am not sure if that would have any effect on the salt though. Another thing, we have been having some wildfires close by, I had a few weeks when ash literally covered the pool, including the bottom of the pool and the top of the water. I vacuumed that. Again, I am not sure if ash can produce some sort of chemical reaction that ends up lowering the salt level. Any thoughts?

My apologies if an issue like this have been discussed somewhere, I swear I read through multiple threads but I couldn't find one talking about similar to my issue. If there is please link it for me.

[Denniswiseman]

The only way to lower salt level is to dilute by spill out, backwash or leak. Evaporation just strengthens it untill it's topped up
Don't use guess strips have a proper test done
Do you have an auto fill?

[MrSanders]

Sorry for the late reply, I forgot to check the notify me button.

Yes, I do have auto fill, and I turned it off for the few days I was doing the bucket tests.

Please let me know how I should do or what you would recommend to do the salt level test.

[Denniswiseman]

https://www.amazon.com/TAYLOR-TECHNOLOGIES-INC-K-1766-CHLORIDE/dp/B001DO35EU or get a test from a pool store
I would be inclined to turn off the auto fill and check to see if there is a water leak

[MrSanders]

Right, I did turn off the valve when I did the bucket test, and the water level decreased the same both in the pool and the bucket, about 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch a day

Also, today the salt level jumped to 2,400 ppm... maybe the cell's sensor is wrong? or there is something in the water that messes up the sensor's reading?

[Denniswiseman]

I would be inclined to not rely on the salt cell level indicator untill you can verify it with an accurate salt test as in my previous post

[MrSanders]

I would be inclined to not rely on the salt cell level indicator untill you can verify it with an accurate salt test as in my previous post

Hello,

I did the testing and now I got a 5,600 ppm and 24 hours later about the same 5,800 ppm... so obviously the salt content is not low as the sensor says...

What am I looking at, a new chlorinator cell? I am still thinking that the ash from the wildfires somehow messed up something with the cell...

[Denniswiseman]

So long as the SWCG is producing chlorine don't panic
I don't have a lot of SWCG knowledge but it seems that the sensor may need cleaning
Do you have the instructions that came with the cell or look online for them