It can be a little overwhelming when you're staring at a green pool on a Wednesday and have company coming over to use the pool over the weekend. Or if you use the pool to help get the kids outside during the summer. It may take a couple days and a lot of attention, but we've laid out a few of the basics to help relieve some of this stress and get your pool clear.
First you want to manually vacuum out as much algae as possible to waste (See our FAQ on how to vacuum to waste). We say manually because if you use an automatic pool cleaner the algae will slip right through the bag and back into the pool. Manually vacuuming will help assure that the algae doesn't get shot back into the water. Whatever algae is left in the pool after vacuuming you want to try and brush up and get it loose in the water. Now you want to shock the pool, but you should test the water first as the shock will work more efficiently if the water is properly balanced first. You really want to just make sure the pH and alkalinity numbers are good, if not add what is needed and run the filter for an hour or so.
Once balanced, now you can add your shock. Through our experience, liquid shock and shocking at night works the best and the fastest. If you like powdered shock better, then stick with what you like but generally the rule is either one bag or one gallon per 10,000 gallons. You want to shock at night so that the sun doesn't eat up all the shock you're putting in before it can do its job. You want to constantly run the filter and you'll know that shocking worked in killing the algae if the pool goes from green to grey and cloudy.
There's nothing out of the ordinary with having to shock more than once, the idea is that you want the pool to get to a cloudy blue. Now you want to add a clarifier of your choice. You can get yours here at our online store. The purpose of this clarifier is to help your filter clear the rest of your pool. The "cloudiness" is actually dead algae floating around the pool, and it's too fine and small for the filter itself to filter it out. Thats where the clarifier comes in. It takes any small algae particles or debris that has slipped through the filter and literally bunches them together so your filter can now pick the dead algae up.
When adding the clarifier, follow the directions on the bottle as far as how much to add, and usually you want to dilute it in a bucket of water before adding to the pool. Clarifier does take time so you want to make sure you are consistently running the filter so the algae doesn't have time to settle, and you may have to add more than once. You will slowly start to see your water become clearer.
Again, this process may take a couple days unfortunately. Hopefully its just in time for the weekend party, but the best way to help prevent your pool from turning green in the first place is to shock once a week, add chlorine daily and test 2-3 times a week to make sure your water is properly balanced. If you have any other questions feel free to reach out to us so we can try and help as best we can!
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