Brown water that will not go away...

[Donna]

We bought an 18' x 48" above ground intex pool two weeks ago... it has been nothing but problems since the beginning...

We have a lot of iron in our well water. Everything in our house is stained a lovely orange color. The pool was filled with well water.

Before putting any chemicals in the pool it was a light see through brown color. Now it is a murky, muddy brown color. It happened as soon as we put algeacide in and has not gone away.

We took a sample to a local pool store - they did a print out - and based on that info we lowered the PH, added calcium and used a metal remover - over the course of two days - it was starting to look like it had at the beginning - a little brown, but much, much better than it had been. But then we put chlorine and shock in - went right back to being completely brown... Also - through this whole process we have used up 6 filters that are supposed to last 2 weeks each! And I hosed them off and re-used them as much as I could until they looked to disgusting to re-use.

Should we just drain it and start over? At this point we have put so many chemicals in the water I don't think I would even want to get in....

If we do drain it an re-fill should I try to get one of those salt water systems? Do they do better with heavy iron levels in the water?

[Backglass]

We bought an 18' x 48" above ground intex pool two weeks ago... it has been nothing but problems since the beginning...

We have a lot of iron in our well water. Everything in our house is stained a lovely orange color. The pool was filled with well water.

Before putting any chemicals in the pool it was a light see through brown color. Now it is a murky, muddy brown color. It happened as soon as we put algeacide in and has not gone away.

We took a sample to a local pool store - they did a print out - and based on that info we lowered the PH, added calcium and used a metal remover - over the course of two days - it was starting to look like it had at the beginning - a little brown, but much, much better than it had been. But then we put chlorine and shock in - went right back to being completely brown... Also - through this whole process we have used up 6 filters that are supposed to last 2 weeks each! And I hosed them off and re-used them as much as I could until they looked to disgusting to re-use.

Should we just drain it and start over? At this point we have put so many chemicals in the water I don't think I would even want to get in....

If we do drain it an re-fill should I try to get one of those salt water systems? Do they do better with heavy iron levels in the water?

The telltale sign of Iron is the brown water upon shocking. You need to add more metal-out to keep it in suspension so it can be filtered out. It sounds like your filters are doing what they are supposed to do...just keep cleaning them (this is one reason why a sand or de filter is much nicer than cartridges). Keep in mind that the water is not bad or un-swimmable, just colored from the iron.

The first thing you should do is invest in a good test kit. Every pool should have one. Don't buy strips, they are notoriously inaccurate. Keeping the ph, chlorine, iron levels, etc in check is part of owning a pool.

Salt systems ARE chlorine systems, they just generate chlorine from the salt instead of you tossing it in...thats it. They would not change a thing as far as iron is concerned.

The only reason to drain the pool would be if you were going to buy pool water from a tanker service that is iron free. This would give you a nice starting point, but as you topped off from your hose you would re-introduce iron and would have to keep it in solution with more sequestrant. Just re-filling from the same source would have the same result.

[crokett]

You need more of the metal remover. I had the exact same problem. Put the metal remover in and run the pump for 24hrs before testing the water again. Shock if needed after you test.

Filters last longer than 2 weeks, you just have to clean them. Lowes or HD sells an effective cleaner for about 7 bucks. Takes about 10 minutes to clean. So long as the filter is not physically damaged it will work for several seasons if you keep it cleaned.