This is Janine with Pool Zones and we are going to delve into number three video in a series how to add chemicals to the water. Now let me clarify first of all that this is a new pool that is maybe 3 or 4 days old. So the chemistry here, it will be step by step, and very critical to keep it balanced or as close to balanced as possible. 

Now, we knew from the previous video that we must follow the sequence and that means to balance one before we continue on to the next. Of course we know alkalinity and Ph, not only are they effective together, but they actually work sometimes in contrary directions, but that will be a subject for a future video. 

Now, the first step is total alkalinity. So let’s observe a video where I’m going to show how to balance the alkalinity. Now given that let’s go back to that number for a moment, we want to aim for between 125 and 150. 

In a new pool, or a pool that’s just filled, it’s typically going to be 200 to 250 or some very high number, maybe double or triple what we want. So let’s take a look here, the first thing I do is I go to the pump and I’m going to ramp the pump up. So in this particular pump, it’s a beautiful pump and the Super, Pantair Superflow. You can hear I’ve ramped it up and I’ve put it on what’s called Quick clean mode. 

And it’s ramped up, still very, very super quiet, isn’t that wonderful. Now I’ve gone back to these chemicals which we observed in a previous video and I’m going to take… I want to bring the alkalinity down. So this is a granular chemical that I choose to use, I prefer dry acid than liquid. 

And I’m going to measure out here so many pounds of that chemical, so you’ll see here and it would sting my fingers if I touched it, so I’m being very careful. Now I’m going to load up that container with the amount of chemicals that I need. And from memory I think I’m going to put in two pounds by the look of that one, 1-2, it’s around 2 to 2 ½  pounds. That’s all I need. I’ve already pre-calculated that so we’re not going to worry about how I’ve calculated it. We’re going to do that in a subsequent video, let me just show you and it’s a very simple formula. 

So this is PH down. Now again, it affects alkalinity, remember and it affects PH. It is going to bring them both down. That is what I am doing in the beginning, I know it says PH down, but it’s going to bring down the alkalinity. 

Now I have an empty bucket out there, I may have put some water in it but I don’t think so at that point and I will take a paddle with me, and I will use the pool water and I will use a bucket while the pedals out there and I will use the pool water to actually dissolve. There we go. 

So you can see here I putting water into the bucket and I’ll leave the bucket in the pool. I’m okay with that because if I splash it you know it’ll just splash inside and then it’s a… pour that right in and just start stirring it, add some more water and start stirring.

And what I’m planning to do is I’m planning… now remember I turned the pump on and I know the skimmer is on and it’s sucking water through there and it goes back to the pump and then it returns to the pool. 

When I start to pour this down into the skimmer I’m going to pour it very slowly but essentially I have the pump running and the skimmer has got to be run always, always run pump whenever you add chemicals.

I prefer to put the chemicals into the skimmer because it will actually take a while to dissolve and blend in and melt in with the water. And so and I’m controlling it a lot more if I can send it through a pipe, through a pump, through a filter and then send it back into the pool via four outlets, or inlets, they call them inlets. 

And you can see I’m pouring this slowly. Why? Because I don’t want to dissolve any metal components in the pump, you know, I stop and stir and dissolve slowly. Now, I can tell you from that two pounds, I think I started when I did my test at… I’ll show you the number I started at when I began, so I was over 150 in the alkalinity, and I brought it back down to around 120. So slowly added it, and then you’ll probably see I’ll throw some of it into the pool, and that’s it.

I’ve added what I need to add for alkalinity down, and I also did pH as well. I didn’t have much left and you can see that I really diluted that strong acid which I think is an absolutely key factor to controlling the process. 

So that’s it for the alkalinity reading, and what I would say is what happens next? Well, in several hours, maybe two or three hours, I’m going to work on hardness. So I want to a separation between them. I want enough time for that acid to work its way through the entire pool, maybe three, four hours. And then let’s… in the next video we are going to take a look at how do you balance hardness, given that the hardness is very low, it’s maybe 50? 

Remember, it’s always parts per million – other than phosphates, but we just say 50 and we’re going to see how do we get it up to 240 to 300 and the answer to that puzzle will be given in the next video. 

So please join me for the next video, this is Janine with Pool Zones.