On this page, we’re going to take you through the steps to help prolong the life and health of your swimming pool.
We will breakdown daily and weekly maintenance as well as a comprehensive look into the chemistry of pool maintenance.
Daily
- Check skimmer basket and remove debris
- Skim top of water, recommended a leaf rake
- Remove debris from bottom of pool, a leaf rake is good for this
- Check water level is not too high and definitely not too low, adjust as needed
Weekly
- Test water chemicals
- Brush walls, step, and ledges if you have them
- Vacuum pool manually or with robot
- Remove debris from skimmer
- Check filter pressure
- Backwash and rinse sand filters
- Break and clean cartridge filter
- DE
- Adjust pool chemicals
- Super chlorinate
- Remove debris form pump skimmer
- Rinse handrails, ladders, diving boards, and slides with fresh water.
Chemistry
- Total chlorine 1-4ppm
- Free chlorine 1-4ppm
- ph 7.2-7.6
- Total alkalinity
- Plaster 80-125ppm
- all other 125_150ppm
- Cyanuric Acid (Cya, stabilizer, Conditioner) 30ppm
- with salt cell chlorinator 60-80ppm
- Total hardness
- Plaster 200-275ppm
- all other 175-225ppm
- Salinity 2700-3400 ppm
- 2000 for better water feel with out salt cell chlorinator (this is for personal preference)
Chlorine
Free Chlorine – A sanitizer which keeps your pool water safe and free of germs. Chlorine must be constantly replenished
Total Chlorine / Combined Chlorine-Combined chlorine is an intermediate breakdown product created in the process of sanitizing the pool. CC causes the “chlorine” smell many people associate with chlorine pools. If CC is above 0.5ppm, you should SLAM your pool. CC indicates that there is something in the water that the FC is in the process of breaking down. In an outdoor pool, CC will normally stay at or near zero as long as you maintain an appropriate FC level and the pool gets some direct sunlight.
PH
PH indicates how acidic or basic the water is. A PH level of 7.6 to 7.8 is ideal, but anything between 7.2 and 8.0 is ok . PH levels below 7.2 tend to make eyes sting or burn.
PH below 6.8
Low PH is capable of causing cause damage to metal parts, particularly pool heaters with copper heat exchange coils.
High PH can lead to calcium scaling. Many pools will drift up towards higher PH when total alkalinity is high, water is being aerated (because of a spa, waterfall, fountain, Salt cell chlorinator, rain, kids splashing in the pool, etc).
To lower PH: muriatic acid or dry acid.
To raise PH: aeration, soda ash or borax
Total Alkalinity
Alkalinity indicates the water’s ability to buffer PH changes. Buffering means you need to use a larger quantity of a chemical to change the PH. At low Alkaline levels, the PH tends to climb and Dive dramatically. With high Alkaline levels, the PH tends to levitate up. You can raise alkalinity with baking soda. It is often best to make bigger alkalinity adjustments. Baking soda can increase your PH slightly test after baking soda has dissolved and circulated in the pool to make sure pH is not out of range. If you need to lower alkalinity level,
To Lower Total Alkalinity: This can be tricky to explain time just wait for it to come down, acid is really the only reducer but it will also knock down the PH
To Raise Alkalinity: sodium bicarbonate AKA baking soda.
CH – Calcium Hardness
Calcium hardness indicates the amount of calcium in the water. Over time, water with low calcium levels will tend to dissolve calcium out of plaster, pebble, tile, stone, concrete, and to some extent fiberglass surfaces. To prevent this from happening by maintaining the water with calcium. In a vinyl liner pool there is no need for calcium, though high levels can still cause problems. A plaster pool or Fiberglass pool should attempt to keep their Calcium between 250 and 650 parts per million. If you have a spa you might want to keep CH at at least 100 to 150 to reduce foaming.You increase CH with calcium chloride, sold as a deicer and by pool stores, or calcium chloride dihydrate, sold by pools stores for increasing calcium. You lower calcium by replacing water or using a reverse osmosis water treatment
.CYA – Cyanuric Acid Aka Stabilizer or conditioner
Cyanuric acid, often called stabilizer or conditioner protects Free Chlorine from sunlight that lowers the effective strength of the free Chlorine (think of it as sunscreen for your free chlorine). The higher your CYA level, the more Free Chlorine you need to use to get the same disinfectant. CYA is typically kept between 30 and 60ppm. If you have a Salt cell chlorinator your CYA is typically best between 60-90ppm. CYA is raised with cyanuric acid. Cyanuric acid is sold under a variety of names(AKA), including Stabilizer, Conditioner, Instant Pool Water Conditioner, Stabilizer 100, Stabilizer & Conditioner, etc. Instant Pool Water Conditioner is a liquid product which is significantly more expensive than the other forms.Solid/granular cyanuric acid (CYA) should have the directions thrown out please for the lo e of water dont add anything to your skimmer. IF YOU CLOG that plumbing line your pockets will never feel the same its a costly mistake. be placed in a sock or paint strainer then put in the skimmer basket or suspended in front of a pool return. After adding CYA you should leave the pump running for 24 hours and not backwash/clean the filter for a week. Squeezing the sock periodically will help it to dissolve faster. CYA can be tested the day after it is fully dissolved from the sock.In nearly all cases the best way to lower CYA is to replace water.
Salt
Salt is required with a Salt cell chlorinator. Salt can also be added to the water to enhance the subjective feel of the water. For a Salt cell chlorinator, check the manual for the correct salt level for your unit. This level will typically around 3,000, but different models vary. For improved water feel without a Salt cell chlorinator, try levels around 2,000ppm. These levels are less then one tenth of the salt level in ocean water, which has around 35,000 ppm of salt. Salt can be added using solar salt, sold for use in water softeners (sodium chloride). You want the 99.4% pure or better and doesn’t have any rust inhibitor or other additives. Crystals are fine. Pellets will work but dissolve slowly. Pool store salt always costs more and there is no real advantage to there over priced salt.
Borate
Borates are an optional enhancement that helps control PH drift and provides various subjective water quality/feel improvements. If you are not intentionally using borates there is no need to test for them. When using borates, the recommended level is between 30 and 50 ppm.
Phosphate
Phosphates are sometimes removed from the pool as a way of keeping algae in check. Since chlorine is required anyway, and chlorine alone can keep algae in check (even at very high phosphate levels), and since phosphate remover can be rather expensive and annoying to use, it doesn’t make much sense to use phosphate remover except in rare and unusual situations.