Just finished moving, and this house has a pool (yay!). But it's cold outside now (boo). Previous owners left me with a pool that is in pretty decent shape and supposedly maintained, but ... I'm not so sure. Got myself a Taylor K-2005 kit and started learning. Things weren't too far off I guess, but the CYA levels are pretty high. I can't remember exactly but somewhere in the mid 100's. Water is crystal clear though, and in the past week I've been working to get the water balance a little better. I'm going from memory, but I am at like 2-3ppm free and total chlorine, 8.0 pH, and can't remember the alkalinity. Haven't done the water hardness test yet, because I can plainly see lots of white on the stacked stone waterfall out of the spa and tile surround. Previous owner's care regimen was stated as filling the chlorine injector at the pump with pucks and setting it to 2, and filling two floaters (one in the pool, one in the spa) with pucks, and then shocking with "two or three bags" whenever it "felt like it needed it." I pulled the cartridge filters out and rinsed them, they were pretty bad. Pressure gauge was reading about 38 (I think, it's badly yellowed, ordering a new one) before, and about 26? after. Flow has greatly increased.
So, pool people, please let me know if I'm on the right track here. Since it is cold and we won't be swimming in it unless we decide to fire up the heater, am I ok leaving the CYA high and just maintaining free chlorine levels, or do I need to either drain/refill to get CYA back down (to where, like 20-40?) or just keep chlorine levels higher? How high? Something else? I stopped and bought plain liquid chlorine and muriatic acid but haven't started to balance yet, because it wouldn't make sense if I need to drain a bunch of water off.
Help lol
So, pool people, please let me know if I'm on the right track here. Since it is cold and we won't be swimming in it unless we decide to fire up the heater, am I ok leaving the CYA high and just maintaining free chlorine levels, or do I need to either drain/refill to get CYA back down (to where, like 20-40?) or just keep chlorine levels higher? How high? Something else? I stopped and bought plain liquid chlorine and muriatic acid but haven't started to balance yet, because it wouldn't make sense if I need to drain a bunch of water off.
Help lol