swimming pool has tinge of green

[mand]

Hi all,

yesterday i thought our pool looked slightly cloudy, checked the chemicals and chlorine was a bit low, so added more chlorine.

Today it still looked slightly cloudy, could still see bottom of pool etc but just had that tinge of cloud.

we backwashed added more water run the pump and now i would say it has a tinge of green about it but again can still see the bottom of the pool and in the shallow end it is clear.



shops are closed now to buy anything, will running our pump help or make it worse?

we have visitors arriving tomorrow who were expecting to use the pool, why now

any advice would be most welcome.

Thanks

[tia]

Hi there I had the same problem this evening, slight tinge of green. Sometimes happens when there has been a storm, I put bayrol shock in it and brought it back to blue within minutes. If you put it in as soon as possible in the morning and let the pump run so it can filter then you should beable to swim in the afternoon. The lady in the shop I go to also recommends to put a sock of floculent in the skimmer when this happens but as I had only just done it before the storm wasn't much point in doing it again!

hope this helps

[Allan]

Running the pump should always help as it forces the water through the filter.

Use some chlor choc, this is fast acting chlorine that will hopefully kill the algae that are probably making the water green. Chuck in a cartridge of flocculant, this makes the particles stick together so that the filter will take them out more easily.Some people recommend stopping the pump but I find it works better leaving it running.

After a day or so backwash your filter.

Putting normal chlorine tablets in won't fix it as they are slow release. Chlore choc blasts all living material with chlorine and then evaporates leaving the pool in a usable state

Green cloudy water normally means algae which multiply when It is warm and the chlorine level is too low.

At this time of year you need to replace your chlorine tablets pretty soon after they have fully dissolved. Public pools have at least 4 times as much chlorine as most private pools, so a bit of extra chlorine won't harm anyone.

[mand]

Hi thanks for the replies.

Since the shops were already closed at the time of posting, We put 2 extra chlorine blocks in (i know it's not the same as chlorine shock, but thought something was better than nothing overnight) we have left the pump running and first thing this morning will go and buy the treatment for the pool, hopefully it will clear quickly.

Thanks again for the replies

[Santiago]

The other piece of advice I would give is to have a store of shock chlor, algicide and pH adjustment chemicals so that when something happens you can react quickly. Once the algae build up it can take ages to clear the pool properly.