Balancing Your Water Chemistry To Keep Your Pool Looking Great
Now that we are well into summertime, green pools become more and more common every day. You can find them in vacant homes, residential swimming pools or in any pool that doesn’t have balanced water chemistry or not properly maintained. This is an important issue to tackle so we hope this blog post gives you a better understanding of why green pools happen and all the different factors that go into turning that green pool blue again! Typically, you will see a direct correlation to algae in pools due to a lack of sanitizer or poor filtration/circulation. Whenever you have warm water, algae loves to grow and if you don’t have the proper amount of chlorine in the water, it will grow rapidly! The same goes for filtration if you’re not filtering your swimming pool long enough your chances for algae growth increases. The following are other factors that could cause a
- High levels of Calcium Hardness
- High levels of phosphates and nitrates
- High levels of Cyanuric Acid (CYA)
When it comes to dealing with water chemistry, checking your Calcium Hardness levels should be done regularly because high levels of calcium can impede the normal function of chlorine thus making it more challenging to take care of your swimming pool. Phosphates come from vegetation, soils, and fertilizers which is a food for algae. When phosphate levels increase in the swimming pool they must be removed because no matter how much chlorine you use, algae will still spread. Typically, with high phosphates, you will need to purchase a phosphate remover if all your other chemistry levels are within normal ranges. Please note, if you use a phosphate remover, only use what is recommended as using more isn’t necessarily good. Other factors could be high CYA levels. CYA helps reduce chlorine loss by protecting the free chlorine in the pool from the sun’s ultraviolet rays, reducing the amount of chlorine needed to maintain proper sanitizer levels. When these levels get too high, it lessens the effectiveness of chlorine to act as a disinfectant. Higher levels will bind with the chlorine, making it slower acting to kill bacteria and micro-organisms, and prevent algae from growing! This typically occurs because chlorine tabs have stabilizer in them.
How To Treat Algae
When you’ve determined where the growth is coming from, Weber Pools recommends the following steps to help remove the algae:
- Identify the type of algae (black, yellow, or green)
- Check chlorine, pH and phosphate levels
- Check all pool equipment for leaks
- Check Calcium Hardness levels
- Check run times for your filter equipment. You should be filtering for a minimum of 10 hours during the summertime.
- Brush, brush, and when you think you’re done brushing… BRUSH MORE!
If any of the above is the issue, the addition of more chlorine or increasing your filter run times should help. Remember you will need to shock your pool to increase your Free Chlorine (FC) levels and filter your pool until it clears up. Utilizing the Pool Calculator can also be beneficial when trying to balance your water chemistry. If you’re dealing with high CYA levels or calcium levels then a water change is necessary. Weber Pools has the ability to make your green pool blue quickly. We can help with all filter equipment repairs or pool maintenance. We can also help you with high calcium and CYA levels too! We have a mobile filtration trailer that recycles swimming pool water instead of draining it. The Puripool Process uses Reverse Osmosis (RO) membranes to lower Calcium Hardness, Total Dissolved Solids (TDS), salts, phosphates, nitrates, and CYA without draining the swimming pool.
If you have any questions about our service or how we can help, please contact us today.