Got the "Can't Find that Chlorine" Blues?
Every year thousand's (millions?) of pool owners misplace the chlorine in their swimming pool.
They add chlorine, test, find none, add more, test . . .
Eventually, many of them sing the blues, to me, to their dealer, or to one of the 800# manufacturer hotlines.
What's happening? Well, like so many other pool problems, a single problem can have multiple causes.
Possibilities include:
There are other possibilities, but these are some of the ones I've encountered more frequently. Let's go through them one at a time:
DPD and HIGH CHLORINE
DPD (the chlorine test that turns pink) is readily bleached out when pool chlorine levels exceed 15 ppm -- something that happens far more often than most people think. The solution? Get a cheap OTO (turns yellow) test kit, too. OTO is not bleached out by even extreme chlorine levels, so it makes a great backup. In fact, we recommend OTO for daily testing, and DPD only when you need to test for chloramines, or need a more accurate reading.
MISSING STABILIZER
Each spring, many homeowners make a reasonable assumption: there was plenty of stabilizer in their pool last year, so there is plenty now. What they don't know -- most dealers don't know -- is that stabilizer biodegrades, sometimes VERY quickly. If there is any slime, algae or other 'life' in your pool in the spring, the odds are that there is NO stabilizer! And a completely unstabilized pool can lose up to ONE HALF of all chlorine present in as little as 30 minutes of full sun! So, if you were to add 10 ppm of chlorine at 11am, by 2pm, you could have as little as 0.2 ppm -- 0.0 on many kits!
CHLORINE ENHANCERS
"Use supplements carefully, and only when absolutely needed" may not be the first commandment of swimming pool chemistry . . . but it's close! And the next, ought to be, "If a little is good, a lot is NOT better!" The so-called chlorine boosters: Mustard Master, the 'Yellow's' (Yellow Out, Yellow Treat, Yello Free) and some other chemicals containing ammonia or sodium bromide are also frequent villians in the tale of the missing chlorine! These chemicals have, on occasion, real value. But repeated or excessive doses can also cause real problems. A discussion of when and when not, and of why and why not is too long and complicated for this page. If this warning is reaching you too late, and you've already nuked your pool with one of these, and had your chlorine go AWOL, email me.
OLD BLEACH
This one is simple. Bleach loses its strength quickly, especially concentrated pool bleach. How fast depends on initial concentration, contamination, and temperature, but . . . if it's last years, it's gone. Go ahead and pour it into the pool, but don't expect to see much chlorine from it!
MIXED UP CHEMICALS
I know those chlorine containers are great buckets, but I have only one thing to say here: MAKE A LABEL, BEFORE YOU REUSE THE BUCKET!
DIDN'T USE ENOUGH
It's easy to underestimate how much chlorine a pool party with 12 sweaty teenage boys . . . or four somewhat leaky toddlers . . . can consume. And, it's easy for the days to slip by: was it yesterday I chlorinated, or maybe three days ago?
And it's extremely easy to underestimate how much chlorine green algae can eat. Trust me: it tends to be more than even I'd think!
So, if you just put some in last night, and this morning it's 0.3, there's only one thing to do: PUT MORE IN! What you put in did its job, but it died doing it. So send in the replacement troops!
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