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Swimming Pool Chemical Maintenance

by Jared Brachfeld January 15, 2023

by Jared Brachfeld Published on January 15, 2023Updated on January 15, 2023

Swimming Pool Chemical Maintenance

Save time and money by ensuring your pool water is always properly balanced. You don't need a professional to take care of balancing your water. Believe it or not there is several ways to do this yourself at home with at home test strips/kits. You can also always take your water into your local pool store to have it tested and see what if any maintenance you need to do. A few minutes each week should be designated to ensuring your swimming pool water is balanced and safe for use. Ensuring proper balance will also help extend the life of your pool equipment.

Make sure you have pool water test strips or a test kit handy, then follow these pool chemical dosing charts so you will know exactly which chemicals you will need to add and how much of each is needed to bring your pool water to the recommended levels for safe and sanitary swimming in sparkling clear water.

When checking & balancing your pool water, your test strips or test kit should test the following: Total Alkalinity, pH, Free Chlorine, & Calcium Hardness. A great set of test strips to help with this would be the Pool Frog test strips or Bioguard 5 way test strips. Follow the instructions for your testing kit/strips and compare the result with the charts below and add the amounts of the chemicals listed to bring your pool to the recommended levels to keep your pool water clean and your water safe for your family to swim in.

Pool Total Alkalinity Chart

Use this pool Alkalinity dosage chart to determine the correct amount of pool alkalinity adjustment chemical to add for a desired change in total alkalinity levels. Alkalinity buffers pH, too little Alkalinity makes pH erratic, and too much makes pH resistant to change. Use pH Reducer to lower Alkalinity and Alkalinity Increaser to raise the level.

Pool pH Chart

Use this pool pH dosage chart to determine the correct amount of pool pH adjustment chemical to add for a desired change in pH level. A low pH of 7.1 is desirable for shocking and sanitation, but 7.4 is best for swimmer comfort, surface protection and overall water balance.

Pool Calcium Hardness Chart

Use this pool Calcium Hardness chart to determine the correct amount of pool calcium to add for a desired change in hardness levels. To lower pool water hardness, the solution is dilution! If your water has less than 200 ppm of total hardness, add Calcium Increaser.

Pool Shock Treatment Chart

Use this pool shock dosage chart to determine the correct amount of pool shock treatment. 30 PPM chlorine shock chart for killing algae and bacteria, and the 3.0 PPM super chlorination chart, used for cloudy water, after rain or heavy use, or low chlorine levels.

Pool Chemical Levels

These are the ideal levels for pool chemistry, or the most acceptable range for proper pool water chemistry. These are the average ideal ranges, however there are times when it can be desirable or necessary to operate outside of one or more of these ranges.