Last Updated on June 30, 2021
Testing your water is an integral part of being a pool owner. You need to have clear, sparkly clean pool water that you can be happy with. To do this, you need to focus on your chemical levels of pool water. The three primary chemical levels you must be testing for are chlorine, pH, and alkalinity. You must check them after a couple of days by pool test strips. This isn’t a challenging task and will save you money if you do it properly and frequently. Unfortunately, you are fixing a pool’s chemistry that has not been appropriately balanced means buying or adding more chemicals and more time and energy from you. This is why you have to give close attention to the water and inexpensive and easy method of testing pool water using pool test strips.
How Can You Use Pool Test Strips?
Nowadays, test strips are becoming more common to use than photometers or liquid test kits. This is as they are faster and easy to use as you will not require to mess around with adding drops of chemical to numerous water samples, and anybody can use them.
You can get a variety of test strips that can test for different ranges and different combinations. The best thing with test strips is that you can try for 3 to 6 various fields with one pack of test strips, saving you lots of money if you want economical. For example, you should test your swimming pool a minimum of 2 to 3 times per week and must be tested if the collection has been significantly used if animals have been in the pool and after a spell of rainfall.
The various ranges that you can use pool test strips for are:
- Free Chlorine
- Cyanuric Acid
- Total Chlorine
- Alkalinity
- Total Hardness
- Level of pH
- Bromine
- Phosphate
Using test strips is very easy. All you have to do is to follow these four basic steps:
- Dip one strip into the water and wait for five seconds. Make sure your hands are sanitized and dry.
- When the five seconds is up, take the strip out of the water and wait for about ten seconds for the result to seem. Then compare the products alongside the chart on the backside of the box.
- Now you can change any of the chemicals that require an adjustment that was shown on the strip.
- Then run a filter pump to support the flow of the water. At that point, you need to wait about 4 to 6 hours to test the water. Thus, if the levels are now in the accurate ranges for that chemical, no more action is required; however, if that hasn’t occurred, you will have to repeat it repeatedly.
Test strips are regularly made of plastic, and after their use of these water pool strip, sticky pads have been dripping with a particular chemical. So, after you have dipped the strip into the water, the places will change colour, and you will match the colour to the chart on the back of the box. Every colour has a label and provides you with the ranges for every chemical in the water.
How correct are pool test strips?
They are exact. This is as they are based on the knowledge from the medical industry, so the outcomes need to be precise. Some specialists say that test strips are better than liquid test kits as there is more liable to be a human error with the drop kits as if you don’t put an incorrect number of drops, the result will not be accurate. Hence as these are easy to use and don’t re, the only way the results will not be precise is to use expired or unclean strips.
How frequently should I test pool water?
To maintain a clean, crystal clear, and stable pool, you must be testing your chlorine and pH at least 2 to 3 times per week. In addition, you must test your alkalinity once per week. Other quantities demand less repeated testing, then the more you try your pool, the more chance you have to balance the chemistry of water.
The rate of testing will also significantly depend on factors like weather and usage of the pool. If you’re throwing a great pool party, check the water when your guests have departed. If your children are spending every summer day swimming in the pool, you’ll possibly need to test it nearly daily. If a rainstorm rolls through, you’ll need to check to see if the rainfall disturbed the pH balance or chlorine levels. Chlorine is essential in protecting your pool from destructive bacteria and algae growth, so it is necessary to monitor it persistently.
What are the benefits of pool test strips?
- Pool test strips are reasonable, which is one of their utmost advantages. Their low price point is not a sign of lower quality readings also.
- They have the added benefit of being the simplest form of pool testing. All you require in the pool, the strip, and the colour-coded fable on the back of the bottle the strip came in.
- Though, you’ll need to remember that you will experience pool testing strips much faster than you will use the materials of your liquid test.
- Maximum pool test strips come in bottles, so dependent on your testing rate. You may need a couple of packs to make it over the summer.
- It’s also of great significance to check the expiry date on pool test strips. If you have excess strips from last summer, be sure they haven’t expired earlier, dipping them in your pool. An expired pool test strip will not give you with correct readings of your collection.
- Maximum pool test strips also provide a range of testing options.
- There is a wide range of strips on the market providing tests with a more acceptable focus.
Pool Water Balance Is Necessary
To have a well-maintained pool, you will have to keep checks on all these levels, though they need more periodic testing. Balance and synchronization are crucial to living. The same is for your pool water. If all is balanced, you will avoid many potential problems with your pool, containing cloudiness and algae.
Water balance is essential for several causes.
- It helps cleaning chemicals to work efficiently.
- It reduces the chance of water glitches, including cloudiness and algae growth.
- It extends the life of your pool tools.
Retain Your Pool Chemicals Working
Keeping the pH balance in your water will make sure you get the most out of your cleaning chemicals. For example, in water with low pH, your water is more acidic and will eat up the disinfectant faster. This doesn’t provide your sanitiser sufficient time to do its job correctly.
Struggle against Algae Growth and Cloudy Water
If your water is acidic, and you are sanitizing chemical, for example, chlorine or bromine, isn’t’ working other than it should, then you are opening yourself up to water problems. Your sanitiser’s job is to keep these issues at bay by constantly killing off the bacteria and debris that causes them. For this, you must use pool test strips to avoid cloudy water and algae growth.
Protect Your Tools
Low pH makes your water to be acidic. In this situation, your water will do whatsoever it takes to upsurge its pH level. Your water needs to be balanced. It’ll begin to take what it wants from PVC, vinyl, concrete, and other parts of the pool, so corroding and declining your pool and tools. Your water attempts to get free of everything that’s making it alkaline, so it leaves a film around PVC pipes, heater elements, concrete, and liners. Different scaling in your pool’s heater will cause it to use more energy to heat your pool. It’s like blocking your pool’s arteries from overeating unhealthy food.
How to Maintain Balance of Pool Water
The first step to attaining perfect water balance is testing with water pool strips. If it’s the start of the pool season, take a sample of your water to your nearby pool store to have it skillfully examined. It would be best if you did this as a minimum one time a month, and you must test your water at home, with a test kit or test strips, no less than once a week.
the pH of Pool Water
A figure was stating the acidity or alkalinity of a solution. Your pool water must be between 7.4 – 7.6 on the pH scale, which would accurately balance your pool’s water. If your bank is correctly balanced, while you open your eyes underwater, they will not hurt. The water will be as stable as your tears.
The alkalinity of Pool Water
Alkalinity is a pH stabilizer. Its advantages to keep the pH from moving up and down the scale quickly. The difficulty with pH is that all can upset it, including:
- People
- Animals
- Plants
- Weather
Maintaining your alkalinity levels between 100 and 150 parts per million will help retain your pool’s pH balance.
But keep in mind, these numbers can alter rapidly, particularly after rain. So, ensure you keep an eye on your water balance. By upholding balance and harmony in your pool water, you will upsurge the life of the pool and avoid main water problems.
