What household ingredients would I need to use to treat a small "kiddie" pool?
Question:I have a small 10' x 6' inflateble pool. While small it still holds 290 gallons of water and I don't want to be wasteful, not to mention it takes forever (it seems) to drain and fill up. I've heard in ground pool owners using regular Clorox and baking soda to treat pools. I just need to know what amounts for 290 gallons.
Answers:
1/2 cup of baking soda when you fill it and add some more when you can't taste it in the water any more. This will raise the alkalinity.
1/2 cup of Borax (20 Mule Team Borax in your laundry detergent isle). This will raise and buffer the pH and also help prevent algae.
1/4 cup of liquid household bleach (non scented) every other day in the evening after the sunlight is off the water.
I'm not sure what concentration of bleach the one persons friend was using but little inflatable pools work quite well with this little "home" recipe.
In response to Tkuht, the chlorine stuff for pools is calcium hypochlorite. Bleach is sodium hypochlorite. Liquid pool chlorine is sodium hypochlorite. They are all bleaches. Pool water of proper chlorine levels will not fade nor bleach out clothing any more than washing it in the washer on municipal water.
Chlorine
Regular clorox will rot the rubber of the pool. You'd be better off going to a pool specialist and asking them.
Check out this link and do the math.
Just a small amount of chlorine bleach will kill most bugs, but you want exact amounts...sorry can't help. After seeing the reply that patience posted I think we'd better take a rain check on this.
I don't know about clorox and baking soda but you might want to get some of that pool chloride they sell at like the local Walmart. It only costs like $2.00 a bag and you can dilute it to suit. You could also go ask a local pool place what they would recommend. The problem with the clorox is that it'll bleach clothes just like it would if you washed with it and it'll sting eyes and damage skin and hair. Also be very sure not to inhale the fumes. They can burn the air linings in your lungs/nose and can get really heady. Also don't mix with any other chemicals like ammonia or anything that might react and cause a chemical cloud.
For a gallon of drinking water they usually recommend a drop or two of bleach to keep it from going wonky if you want to store it or sterilize it. So, for 290 gallons of water it might just be as little as half a cup but like I said you'd better ask the local pool place. I do know that if you get the pool chlorine on your clothes it will bleach it out as well--have a red athletic bra that is now orange splotched cause I got a few pellets on the wet bra. It needs to be mixed with water before it's put in so it filters evenly.
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