Cloudy Water Bump

Causes and cures for cloudy swimming pool water.
Milky pool water, white, pink, brown, purple, black cloudy water.
Midwest

Cloudy Water Bump

Postby Midwest » Mon 25 Jun, 2007 10:41

So I've been reading all these posts and I think that my blue cloudy water will be cleared up by a heavy dose of Floc and vacuuming...alas I am unable to shut the system down until the weekend. It's a 120k gallon, six lane (meters) pool along with a 12ft deep diving well (which is even worse but I assume the depth just makes it look that way)

Is there anything else I can try to clear up the water during the week? And if not, whats the best course of action to not let the pools get any worse until I can floc the heck out of them?

Thanks in advance for any help, this site is pretty cool!


chem geek
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Postby chem geek » Mon 25 Jun, 2007 11:21

You need to post a full set of water chemistry numbers to know what to do. pH, Total Alkalinity (TA), Calcium Hardness (CH), Cyanuric Acid (CYA). That will help determine if the cloudiness is due to water that is over-saturated with calcium carbonate or if it's due to a nascent algae bloom. If the water balance is OK, but chlorine gets used overnight, then you've probably got algae and need to shock with chlorine, but how much depends on the CYA level. So post the numbers and we can go from there. I assume you have your own quality test kit such as the Taylor K-2006 with its FAS-DPD "count the drops" chlorine test.
Midwest

Oops

Postby Midwest » Mon 25 Jun, 2007 14:27

My bad!

Readings are as follows

CYA : 80 ppm
Cal Hardness: 150 ppm
TA: 120 ppm
Chl Free: 3
p.h. : 7.4 - 7.5

So I assume with the cyanuric acid being high it might be best to supershock the pools and drop the water/ add fresh water? ...until I can floc the pools...?
chem geek
Pool Industry Leader
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Posts: 2381
Joined: Thu 21 Jun, 2007 21:27
Location: San Rafael, California

Postby chem geek » Tue 26 Jun, 2007 00:23

Your pool is not over-saturated with calcium carbonate so that isn't the source of the cloudiness. However, your CYA level is high and more importantly, your FC level is too low for your CYA level. You should keep an absolute minimum of 6 ppm FC and generally target 10 ppm FC with your 80 ppm CYA level. To shock to get rid of algae will take nearly 30 ppm FC to clear the algae quickly though even raising the FC to 20 ppm and keeping it there with chlorine addition (as the algae will consume it) will clear your pool.

So you have a choice. You can clear your pool of algae at your current CYA level and then after it's clear maintain 10 ppm FC (with an absolute minimum of 6 ppm FC) or you can do a partial drain/refill to lower your CYA level so that you can use a lower FC level. It's really up to you. The bottom line is that the absolute minimum FC level must be at least 7.5% of the pool's CYA level and the normal target FC level is 11.5% of the CYA level. The shock level for FC (for green algae) is 40% of the CYA level though that's just for fast clearing -- lower levels will still work though will take longer.

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