Balanced Water Chemistry For Your Swimming Pools

Now that it is February and the days are getting longer it is now time to start making some changes to how you handle your pool water. Most importantly, the main reason why changes are necessary is the fact that the temperatures are increasing and when your pool water temperature increases so does the time needed to spend on your pool.

Having balanced water chemistry is vital for your swimming pool. 100 plus degree temperatures will be here in a couple of months and if you don’t prepare for them your water will change quickly. That’s why checking and balancing your chemistry weekly during this time is extremely important for the health of your water. There are many factors that can cause chemistry to change, i.e. numerous bathers, direct sunlight on the water and debris to name a few and we hope this blog post helps to better explain why balanced water chemistry is vital for your swimming pool and to prevent problems when it starts to warm up.

First and foremost, we recommend purchasing a good water test kit. There are many choices today and we always recommend drop test kits over test strips for accuracy. Many pool owners will go for the quick method but you can never be as accurate with test strips and if you want to achieve excellent water chemistry please invest in a Taylor Test Kit.

The following are elements of water chemistry and how you will want to balance it.

Chlorine – having the proper amounts of sanitizer in your swimming pool is extremely important to prevent algae/bacteria from growing. At this point, you will want to make sure you begin to raise up your chlorine levels to 2 – 3 ppm. This should be checked regularly and definitely after a storm if it left a lot of debris in your pool which will eat up the chlorine.

pH – having a balanced pH can make a big difference in your water. Typically, you will want to have pH levels to be between 7.4 – 7.8. If you have a saltwater chlorinator balancing your pH is vital to prevent scaling on the electrode plates. On a side note, salt pools will naturally cause the pH to rise so be mindful of that.

Cyanuric Acid – this is the part of chemistry that is often overlooked but extremely important to maintain. If you want to prevent rapid chlorine loss you will need to keep your CYA levels between 30 – 50 ppm. CYA prevents chlorine loss due to the sun’s ultraviolet rays. If you own a salt chlorinator please refer to the manual for the levels they recommend as it will be different than chlorinated pools.

There are other factors that go into proper chemistry which are Calcium Hardness and phosphates but these don’t need to be checked weekly like the above. In the end, chlorine and pH are the most important ones to check each week and if you want to maintain a healthy pool make sure to always keep them balanced.

If you should have any questions on the above, contact us today to learn more!