Came back from vacation...YIKES!

[SpaNE]

Before leaving last Saturday I shocked by 335 gal spa with 2oz of dichlor.  Just got back tonight after a 14 hour car ride from the Outer Banks and was looking forward to a long soak...and the water is green, cloudy and ugly.  I just tossed some more dichlor in and ran the jets for 40 minutes with no improvement.

Am I doing something wrong?  If I can't leave for a week without worrying about the water...I guess I need to think about switching to bromine or another sanitizing method. :-/

[marks]

That is why I had to switch to bromine.  I was just gone for 3 weeks, came back and water was clear.

[wmccall]

When I am gone that long, I turn my tub down 20 degrees.  Hotter water goes bad faster.  Oh, I turn up my filtration level as well.  As soon as I get home, I turn the temp back up and am soaking in a couple of hous.

[tony]

Before leaving last Saturday I shocked by 335 gal spa with 2oz of dichlor.  Just got back tonight after a 14 hour car ride from the Outer Banks and was looking forward to a long soak...and the water is green, cloudy and ugly.  I just tossed some more dichlor in and ran the jets for 40 minutes with no improvement.

Am I doing something wrong?  If I can't leave for a week without worrying about the water...I guess I need to think about switching to bromine or another sanitizing method. :-/

Generally this is something that does not happen without some kind of high chlorine demand.  I have left my spa for almost three weeks without the water turning.  Once I came back to green water but it was because some of my son's friends decided to have a party in it while we were away.

Keep your free chlorine level above three ppm and keep filtering to clear.  It will probably take a day.  You can add a little clarifier to help speed the filtering process.

[SpaNE]

When I am gone that long, I turn my tub down 20 degrees.  .

I did turn down the temp and I think that contributed to the problem.  According to page 34 in the Jacuzzi manual, "Summer Logic" is activated when the spa water temp reaches up to 2 degrees above the set temp causing the circulation pump and heater to turn off automatically.  This feature is not user-programmable.

With the spa water temp set low and high summer ambient temps, the circ pump was automatically switched off and I was getting minimal filtration.  Seems like a silly feature unless I am missing something. :-?

[anne]

I think a lot of tubs have that feature- that things shut off if it goes 2 degrees above set point. Mine does! Since I live in an area with pretty hot summers, I sometimes put tennis balls under the edge of the lid so that it is less likely to get too hot in there.....but that is clearly not a good idea for when you are away.

[bhziii]

I did turn down the temp and I think that contributed to the problem.  According to page 34 in the Jacuzzi manual, "Summer Logic" is activated when the spa water temp reaches up to 2 degrees above the set temp causing the circulation pump and heater to turn off automatically.  This feature is not user-programmable.

With the spa water temp set low and high summer ambient temps, the circ pump was automatically switched off and I was getting minimal filtration.  Seems like a silly feature unless I am missing something. :-?

I dealing with the same problem here in Texas with Jacuzzi's summer logic.  We are still experimenting with ways to get around it.  We would love to put an umbrella to help keep it shaded, but I can't get myself to spring for it.  In the meantime, we prop it open with a ball when we are home.  Good luck.

[Vinny]

Unfortunately everybody's water is different. Things that can affect water are temp, PH and chlorine. If the PH was high, above 7.5 then the chlorine wasn't doing too much killing. If the chlorine had to fight something then it would be used up quickly. Also, how old is the water, old water is difficult to manage.

I left my tub for a week and came back to clear water but I did what was mentioned here and I was surprised it worked, typically my water will cloud up after a couple days with normal doses. Something that I did try recently was the Spa Frog (similar to a Nature 2 spa cartridge) and my water lasted about 4 days between normal doses. I imagine it would last at least a week with a shock dose.

Does your tub shut it's pumps down for filtering when it gets too hot? I would imagine there's nothing that can be done if the tub is too hot and is in "cool down mode" except lowering the temp slowly with the cover lifted or replacing some water with cooler water.

Bromine may be the answer to this if you use a floater.

[Chad]

Before leaving last Saturday I shocked by 335 gal spa with 2oz of dichlor.  Just got back tonight after a 14 hour car ride from the Outer Banks and was looking forward to a long soak...and the water is green, cloudy and ugly.  I just tossed some more dichlor in and ran the jets for 40 minutes with no improvement.

Am I doing something wrong?  If I can't leave for a week without worrying about the water...I guess I need to think about switching to bromine or another sanitizing method. :-/



 
I did turn down the temp and I think that contributed to the problem.  According to page 34 in the Jacuzzi manual, "Summer Logic" is activated when the spa water temp reaches up to 2 degrees above the set temp causing the circulation pump and heater to turn off automatically.  This feature is not user-programmable.
 
With the spa water temp set low and high summer ambient temps, the circ pump was automatically switched off and I was getting minimal filtration.   Seems like a silly feature unless I am missing something.  

SpaNE,

The one time I have left for that long, I put in a 10ppm dose of dichlor the day before departure and then another 5 ppm dose the day of departure. I was gone six days and when I returned I still had a slight residual. And that was even before I started to use N2! I can't take credit for this back to back, high dose of dichlor method as I recieved it from a member who at this time I can't recall his name, sorry whoever it is but thanks it really worked well.

Another piece of advice being a Jacuzzi owner as well, is if circ. pump shut off is inevitable due to high ambient temps, simply increase your programmable filtration cycles. Although this will obviously increase water temp and almost definetly cause the circ to shut offf more frequently, atleast you will have the piece of mind while you're gone that your water is safely being filtered enough.

[Gary]

Any chance some unwanted guest used it while your were gone?

[SpaNE]

I shocked with 10ppm dichlor the night before I left, I use a proclear mineral cartridge, and also have an ozonator.  The water was only 2 months old.  I'm pretty sure the "Summer Logic" feature was the main source of the problem.  As Chad suggested, I will set my control panel for 2 hours of extra filtration (Jacuzzi Code F6).

I'm leaving on another vacation mid-month for 12 days.  Since I don't want to switch to bromine, I think I will pay one of the neighbor kids to put in pre-measured doses of dichlor every other day.  I'll probably change the water when I get back regardless because it will be 3 months at that point.

However, I think I understand now why bromine is the most common sanitizing method for spas.