Questions about salt system/aquarite cell?
Question:Have an 18,000 gallon salt system inground pool that had a large tear in vinyl liner last few weeks. It took us 3 weeks to locate tear and patch it, so we lost ALOT of water and had to continuously replace it everyday. So we now basically have a cloudy green pool filled with tap water and are starting over getting the water right. The salt was reading 1600 this morning and we added 4 more 40lb bags of salt today. Now system is reading 2000 and inspect cell and Low salt lights are on. Neither of these lights were on this morning...so what's up? We've disconnected cell and it's clean as a whistle (shot the highest pressure from water hose thru it anyway just to be sure) and pushed diagnostics button as usual to reset it. Now instead of blinking, the inspect cell light is on continuously! Is this b/c the water is so low in salt the system thinks the cell is malfunctioning or is it just cruel irony that our cell gives up at this very moment?? I hate this pool!ANy help greatly appreciated
Answers:
You need to add another 180 pounds of salt if your level is indeed 2000. The 160 pounds you added should have elevated it by 1066 ppm. Added to your original 1600 you should have ended up with 3666 ppm, so either you didn't wait long enough for it to be fully mixed or you still have a leak. Soon as your reading is a stable 3200 you can switch back on the salt system. In the meanwhile it would be a good idea to balance your water (Alk 100, pH 7.4) and replace lost stabilizer to 50ppm. I also wouldn't ask the salt system to clear up the green. I'd shock with 3 gallons of unscented laundry bleach, absolutely no calcium hypochlorite. You'll soon be loving your pool. One more thing. Clean your salt cells exactly as per your manual. It's easy to damage the plates if you don't.
To generate chlorine, your salt level needs to be at about 2700-3400 ppm, so it sounds like you need more salt. Once you get close to that range, press your boost button and run it two or three days on boost (100% output) Your green is from lack of chlorine, its algae and algae will NOT grow with as little as 1 ppm of chlorine in your pool so get your salt up quick.
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