Very cloudy pool using Baquacil

roundpoolwoman · Postby **roundpoolwoman** » Thu 08 Jun, 2006 08:42

We are having a problem this year with our pool. We use the Baquacil product and not chlorine. We have put all the necessary chemicals in it and the ph and everything look fine on the test strips. The water is very cloudy and can't get it to clear up. I just put some flocculant in it a day ago and it still hasn't cleared up. Can anyone help me. Sincerely, I need a clear pool

24round · Postby **24round** » Mon 10 Jul, 2006 20:49

I've been having same issue. Use Baquacil products weekly/monthly shock. Take Water samples to shop and they say all levels are good. Backwashed. Cleaned sand filter. Backwashed. Used Flocculant. Clarifier. Backwashed again. Still nothing. Can't think of anything else. STILL VERY CLOUDY but appears clean. Any luck since June 8th posting? I miss my clear pool.

Guest · Postby **Guest** » Sun 13 Aug, 2006 13:04

You probably have watermold. To me this is the only bad thing about baquacil but it doesn't happen to everyone. Here's some homework: Take out your skimmer basket and feel aroudn for any white slime. ALso around the stairs or jets- anyplace with little circulation. High shock and haze are good signs of water mold. Here's the solution: You need to add water clarifier and flocculant to the skimmer. 24-48 hours later you need to DOUBLE shock your pool.Never turn the pump off during this. The complete directions for this are on the back of the baquacil water clarifier bottle. This process works very well- better if you're not on a filter such as sand or de (which I hate). Don't let this turn you from baquacil- if you've noticed the chlorine to baquacil problems on this forum are 100-1.

ctaggart · Postby **ctaggart** » Tue 31 Jul, 2007 18:10

We have also had a cloudy pool, started over a week ago. We added extra shock and sanitizer along with algecide. Still cloudy, then we added the flocculant. Cleared up some, but noticed cloudy water shooting in from the return. Backwashed, after 1 minute, red came out. I now have the filter cleaner in it. Hopefully that will solve the problem. If not, anyone else have any suggestions?

ctaggart · Postby **ctaggart** » Tue 21 Aug, 2007 21:27

An update..... I tried everything to clear our pool, we had no signs of algae in the pool or the white flakes, but the skimmer basket and return had red algae when I took them apart. We decided we had spent too much money ($400 total). For $60, I dumped in 16 gallons of chlorine shock, within 3 days our water was clear and ready to swim in. It turned muddy brown, then swamp green, then it looked like Mountain Dew, then it cleared up. We have a 24' round pool, first we dumped in 8 gallons of shock, waited a few hours, added 2 more (Thursday evening). On Saturday we dumped in 6 more gallons of shock to clear the last of the yellow tinge. We have had nothing but clear water!

Postby **chem geek** » Wed 22 Aug, 2007 09:02

ctaggart,

What you have done by using chlorine to shock a Baquacil pool is to convert from a Baquacil pool to a chlorine pool. As you experienced, it is a very colorful conversion event and takes lots of chlorine to get through it. The chlorine breaks down the Baquacil, which is why in a Baquacil pool you have to use hydrogen peroxide to shock the pool instead of using chlorine to do so. So you no longer have a Baquacil pool and should no longer use Baquacil products -- just use chlorine instead. If this is an outdoor pool, you will need to add Cyanuric Acid (CYA) to the water to prevent the chlorine from getting broken down too quickly by sunlight. You can use Dichlor as a chlorine source for a while as for every 1 ppm FC you add with Dichlor it also adds 0.9 ppm to CYA. When you've added around 33 to 56 ppm FC worth of Dichlor cumulatively, you can then switch to using unscented bleach or chlorinating liquid which only has chlorine and does not have CYA.

For the other posters,

There are specific products designed to work against white water (tissue) mold in a Baquacil pool. These include United Chemical "Pink Treat" (named as such since it also works against "pink slime", which is really a bacteria) and BioGuard Soft Swim Assist. The latter is a combination of sodium chlorite and Dichlor that combined in water form chlorine dioxide which is a very powerful, though short-lived, sanitizer and should be very effective against both pink slime and white water/tissue mold.

Richard

Backglass · Postby **Backglass** » Wed 22 Aug, 2007 13:15

ctaggart wrote:We have had nothing but clear water!

You also no longer have a Baquacil pool! Welcome to the wonderful clear world of chlorine. :lol:

Guest · Postby **Guest** » Wed 18 Mar, 2009 18:34

Don't let this turn you from baquacil- if you've noticed the chlorine to baquacil problems on this forum are 100-1.

And the chlorine to baquacil user ratio is 1,000:1, meaning baquacil is 10 times more likely to result in pool water problems.

Effplayer2 · Postby **Effplayer2** » Fri 14 Aug, 2009 09:02

roundpoolwoman wrote: We are having a problem this year with our pool. We use the Baquacil product and not chlorine. We have put all the necessary chemicals in it and the ph and everything look fine on the test strips. The water is very cloudy and can't get it to clear up. I just put some flocculant in it a day ago and it still hasn't cleared up. Can anyone help me. Sincerely, I need a clear pool

Hi, I am having the same problem and am waiting for my flocculant to work I hope. Have you had your problem fixed yet? Please let me know, ok. Thanks

aa1113 · Postby **aa1113** » Fri 14 Aug, 2009 20:41

We have an above ground vinyl pool, 5,000 gallons, with the same problem. For the last 4 months the pink slime does not go away and it seems like we are getting more and more. We bought the Bacquacil CDX and have cleaned the filter a few times. I can't deal with it anymore. I am ready to get rid of the pool. Bacquacil is very expensive. How do you convert to Chlorine? Is there step by step instructions? Do you leave the filter on while you do it? Do you vacumm the ugly foam, etc? PLEASE HELP!

Postby **chem geek** » Sat 15 Aug, 2009 11:25

Read Convert Your Baqua Pool To Chlorine.

aa1113 · Postby **aa1113** » Mon 24 Aug, 2009 18:47

I have read many of the posting on that website but it still not clear to me if I need to keep the pump running throughout the entire process or just the daily norm, like 6 hours? How often to clean the filter while converting or to vaccum? Do you really need that expensive test kit? Thank you

edra4701 · Postby **edra4701** » Tue 25 Aug, 2009 13:09

Hey We are having the same problem with our pool this year too, very cloudy (white). We have spent over $400 in Baquacil chemicals. I am very frustrated & ready switch to Chlorine. It's ridiculous. Can You tell us how to switch to chlorine? Please Please Help

determine1 · Postby **determine1** » Fri 04 Sep, 2009 19:29

My pool also has been very cloudy this year and there was also some yellow build up. I spent many days trying to clear it. Finally, I was told to use the water clarifier and I filtered it overnight. At 1st I didn't notice any difference but I found you have to turn the filter off and let it settle. At that point my water was clear because everything settled to the bottom. I then tried to vacuum it all out but it just stirred it up and the water became cloudy again...well what I wasn't told was YOU NEED TO VACUUM TO WASTE....unfortunately I had to re-add more water clarifier and I have been vacuuming to waste now..I had to vacuum to waste twice and of course add more water but it now looks clear. Hope this message help someone else

Mike A Jones · Postby **Mike A Jones** » Mon 19 Jul, 2010 10:18

I too am experiencing very cloudy Baquacil pool water and like others according to Baquacil dealer water chemical levels are good.
Using the Flocculation chemicals do you vacuum the pool to waste and top up with tap water? Then use a metals remover? Then the double dose of Oxidizer? In other words is there a set procedure for ridding of water mould.
I am a long time (10+ years) user of Baquacil, had a new pump and DE filter last year and new liner this year, but never experienced such problems before. Could this be due to the very hot Spring and Summer we are experiencing here in the East? No intention of changing to chlorine but need a fast solution if anyone can help.