Help! Help! Scale,SWG etc

18 years ago

we have a black bottom pool that was replastered twice last year(I know, there is a sucker born every minute). We decided to switch to a SWG system. At that time we replaced the DE filter and put in a Jandy Stealth pump. Equipment is TrioPure Soft water and Ozone Sanitation system and Sta-Rite System 2 Modular DE filter. It started developing scale w/in a couple of months. pool man put Scale Away in, worked beautifully,then algae etc.

a. He now tells me they are taking Scale Away off the shelves. At this point I can no longer go in our pool w/out swim socks. So rough rips up your feet.

b. says triopure is a piece of crap and that is why it's not operating properly(it isn't keeping up w/chlorine). Saw that he added Chlorine and I was under the impression you were NOT supposed to add any when operating a SWG.

Any suggestions will be appreciated. i'm disabled and the pool is the only exercise I can do.

Thanks!!!

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Comments (4)

repair_guy
18 years ago
A SWG is chlorine. Can't speak for your TrioPure as I've never heard of it. With any SWG, most ignore the pH and hardness and you get scale. Scale does not just happen. It is neglect and if your poolguy is blaming it on your system, ask him why he did not tell you sooner or why he was not treating the water as he should have in the absence of a working SWG.

I'm guessing you'll never hear from him after asking that question.
thejimbar
18 years ago
...and you can safely add chlorine to a pool that has a SWG...
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creativcat
18 years ago
I have had to drop a couple cholorine tablets in the bucket a couple times..when I did not turn the dial up on the swg to account for the soaring temps, the level was low, so I popped in some tabs turned my dial up and by a day or two my chlorine was right on the money! I have not had a problem with scale. Maybe they can sand the pool down so it is not so rough?

Here is a link that might be useful: my blog
trhought
18 years ago
laughinglizzie-

Sorry to hear about your scale problem and so-called local expertise.

As repair guy stated, scale is the result of not maintaining pool balance. Scale happens when hardness is high and PH is high. Salt cells tend to push PH high and if not balanced periodically with acid PH will become too high. If hardness is also high, then scale will result.

Check your PH and calcium levels and adjust to within range. You should also check your filter and clean it as high PH and hardness will also require the filter to be cleaned more frequently.

It is possible to maintain a high PH pool with SWG and minimize acid usage, but hardness and alkalinity need to be balanced to avoid problems such as scale.

Below is a link to information on maintaining a high PH pool that may be helpful. This is a little advanced as far as pool balance is considered and if you are uncomfortable after reading this, then I would recommend maintaining the balance as recommended by commonly accepted pool industry practices.

I have a SWG pool and have been using the high PH method for about 10 months and it works. Prior to discovering this method, I was using about a gallon of acid per week for our 34K gallon pool at $4/gallon. Now, I use about a gallon every 3 months or so to adjust alkalinity and PH stays around 8.0 and I keep calcium at the low end of acceptability. No scale, no algae and minimum chemical cost. In my opinion, the less chemicals to add, the better from both a cost perspective as well as environment perspective. As you have learned the hard way, checking pool balance and maintenance is necessary no matter what system or method is being used.

Once the pool balance is in check, youÂll find that checking chemical levels once a week or so and adjusting every other week or so will be adequate.

Hope this helps!

Here is a link that might be useful: High PH Pool