Balancing the Water

[Quickbeam]

I was wondering if anyone can give me some ideas on what I should do to balance my water?

I started out with tap water with the following:

PH - 7.4
TA - 220
CH - 210

My local spa store (not my dealer) had told me I should add 1/4 cup per week of “Spa Stain Control” for the calcium hardness. I added 1/4 cup of this once and then ran the jets for about 20 minutes. The next test showed the following:

PH - 8
TA - 150
CH - 140

I have been chasing my tail ever since trying to get the PH down. I am using PH down (dry acid) to try and get it down but I cannot get it stable. It keeps jumping back up. As an example yesterday afternoon I had the following numbers:

PH - 7.4
TA - 70
CH - 130

The above numbers were taken after adding PH down and running the jets for a good 40 minutes and letting the tub sit for a while. I know the numbers aren’t perfect but after my wife and I went in the tub last night I took the numbers again this morning, and once again the PH is off the chart. It is over 8. This is what is happening on a regular basis. I keep adding PH down and after I run the jets for a good 40 minutes the PH stays down. Then we go in the tub in the evening and the next morning the PH is back off the chart.

I know I need to get the TA to a point where it stabilizes the PH, but I just don’t know how much further down I can take the TA? I read somewhere not to go below 50. Should I just keep going until the TA gets to 50? Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

[Tman122]

I say keep trying slowly to get it down over the next few weeks. Keep using it. What are you using for sanitizer?

[Quickbeam]

Thanks Tman,

I'm using hydrogen peroxide as a sanitizer. I know it's not the most common way to go, but we do want to try it.

I've just added another 4 teaspoons of dry acid (PH down) into our tub and am going to run the jets for around 40 minutes. From past times trying this, I expect the PH to come in pretty low and I am guessing the TA will come in around 60. I also expect however, that if we go in the tub tonight, tomorrow morning the PH will be back over 8.

If that's the case, I'm thinking I'll just drain the tub and start over. I'll start with plain tap water and try balancing that without any sanitizer and without any of the "Spa Stain Control" that the one Spa dealer told me to use. I know for sure my CH will be higher, but I will just try working with that. I"ll get the water balanced, after running the jets for a while, and see if the PH spikes up again in the morning. If it does not, and remains stable, then I'll add the hydrogen peroxide and see if that's what's causing the PH to spike up.

In another forum someone else also suggested adding 50 ppm Borates and although I don't have any yet, I'll get some and see if that helps.

I'm also thinking of using muratic acid instead of the dry acid, as I have put a fair bit of dry acid in the tub.

Thanks again for your help.

[Vinny]

Believe it or not you are about "balanced". If you have a Taylor kit it should have a watergram and with your ta and calcium you need a PH around 7.8. Adding borates will raise pH without raising ta. If you have the watergram play around with it as there is no one set BALANCED NUMBER but its ranges and the watergram will help tremendously. At 100 F if you want to shoot for a PH of 7.4 you can adjust the ta or calcium readings and still be balanced. So if you kept your PH at 7.4 and your ta at 70, ADUST your calcium to about 325 and you are at the same balanced level as you would be at where you are now and bringing the PH to 7.8.

It sounds confusing but once you get the hang of it, it becomes easy.

[Quickbeam]

Thanks Vinny,

And yes, I do have the watergram that came with the Taylor test kit. And I understand that by the watergram I am balanced, but my dealer told me, and I have also heard it from others, that PH needs to be somewhere between 7.4 to either 7.6 or maybe as high as 7.8, but no higher. My dealer was adamant with me that the PH has to be within range. After using the tub in the evening, the next morning my PH has been 8 or above. I would imagine, if I didn't keep adding PH down, it would continue to climb after each use of the tub. That seems to be the real problem, I just can't get the PH to stop climbing.
I just did the numbers again after adding another 4 teaspoons of PH down. The numbers are: PH - 7.6; TA - 60; Ch - 130. These were taken after running the jets for 40 minutes. We will go in the tub again tonight, and I expect that tomorrow morning the PH will again be above 8.

[Vinny]

Quickbeam,

Many moons ago there was a Hot Springs dealer here (may still be here) and he always recommended changing your water out after the first month. ALL newbies need to learn their water ... I owned a pool before owning the tub and I had to change water as well ... hot water is different than cold!

Using the jets will raise PH for a while but with you using peroxide which has a low PH that should also drop the PH as well. Since I've never heard of or know nothing about peroxide use it may be a little amount and doesn't effect PH that much. I do know that when I use MPS it can reduce the PH as it is also has a low PH.

Higher alkalinity stabilizes PH. With the tap at 220 try to get your hardness down (or up) to about 100 and don't touch the alkalinity ... you should be balanced OK - look at the watergram and you'll see that your tap PH and alkalinity at 100-104 F is OK with a calcium hardness of about 100. The higher alkalinity should lock in the PH.

[Topline Mike]

Higher alkalinity stabilizes PH. With the tap at 220 try to get your hardness down (or up) to about 100 and don't touch the alkalinity ... you should be balanced OK - look at the watergram and you'll see that your tap PH and alkalinity at 100-104 F is OK with a calcium hardness of about 100. The higher alkalinity should lock in the PH.

I'm pretty sure you just made quickbeam scratch his head with this response.  Higher alkalinity stabilizes pH?  Really?  I would say the opposite.  If your TA is high, your pH will be high also.  Quickbeam, you are very close to balancing your water, according to your numbers.  If your TA is at 60, I would bet your pH is around 7.6. 

"Try to get your hardness down (or up) to 100."  He said his calcium hardness was 130 the last he checked, right?  CH is not a big issue with balancing your water.  I wouldn't worry about this parameter, as you are right in there anyway.  Be more concerned with the pH and TA levels.  Remember though, this information is coming from a novice hot tubber.  Chem geek to the rescue. 

[Vinny]

Quickbeam's water is coming out of his tap with a PH of 7.4 with a high ta, that's it natural state. You don't want to fight it.

Alkalinity is a buffer and locks in the stability of the PH. While I will agree that maybe it is high out of the tap, I will standby my belief that there is more than one correct balanced water scenario.

I have a 2003 Taylor book and it explains what the effects of alkalinity both low and high has on the PH and general water/vessel it has on them. I'm not balancing Quickbeams water but it sounds like it has PH bounce which is a result of LOW alkalinity. At an alkalinity level of 70 you would be on the low side, it should be between 80 - 100 (or 130). And it is possible that Quickbeams  water may drift higher even with a high TA but it is bouncing all over the place now. BTW, that Taylor explanation about alkalinity in my booklet is on page 11 ... maybe something has changed since then but it worked back then. If you have a Taylor book you may want to view it.

I also want to add that Quickbeam has two different things happening to the water - running jets which will raise PH and adding peroxide which will lower PH.

I've owned my tub for 9 years ... not a newbie. But I will agree that Chem Geek knows more than I do.

[Trifecta]

Quickbeam,

I'll throw some more newbie experience your way...

My PH and TA were both off the charts out of the tap so I quickly got them both down into range. I continued to fight PH drifting up and through a host of great advice here, followed the instruction to keep taking TA down slowly until PH stays where it should, which I did. I am now sitting at a TA of 40, with my PH stable at 7.6 for several days now. Now I also understand that I am on the edge of too low and will have to continue to monitor, but hey, one problem at a time, right!

Good Luck!

[Topline Mike]

Vinny, I understand you don't want to fight it, but you really have no choice.  When you get in the tub, you turn on the pumps, which causes the pH to rise if the TA is too high.  My tap water has a pH of 7.2, with a TA of 400.  Now my TA test results may have been high because of the new test kit (static electricity causing smaller drops from the test solution), but it was still very high.  I settled in with a TA of around 60 and my pH was 7.6.  I did add boric acid to stabilize the pH also. 

[Quickbeam]

Vinny, I understand you don't want to fight it, but you really have no choice.  When you get in the tub, you turn on the pumps, which causes the pH to rise if the TA is too high.  My tap water has a pH of 7.2, with a TA of 400.  Now my TA test results may have been high because of the new test kit (static electricity causing smaller drops from the test solution), but it was still very high.  I settled in with a TA of around 60 and my pH was 7.6.  I did add boric acid to stabilize the pH also. 

Mike, I am just curious. My understanding is that with Boric Acid you want 50 ppm in the water. I am assuming that's what you put in your tub. I am wondering how you measured how much to put in to get to the 50 ppm? In other words, what do you use to test it to see how much is in the water? Thanks.

[chem geek]

You can use PoolMath to calculate dosing.  For a 350 gallon spa, it takes 13 ounces weight of boric acid to get to 50 ppm.  You can measure the level using LaMotte InstaTest Borate Test Strips, but you normally don't have to measure this since it doesn't go away until a water change (or from water dilution) and the amount to add to the water is fixed.

[Quickbeam]

Thanks Chem Geek

[Topline Mike]

I added 16oz of boric acid to my tub, which according to jacuzzi is 415 gallons. 

That pool math link that chem geek posted is invaluable.  You can learn a ton of water chemistry by using it.  On the bottom of the link, there is line, "Affects of adding chemicals".  Make sure you enter your tub size in gallons at the top of the page, then play around with adding this or that and see how it will affect the water chemistry. 

Trifecta, if you are worried about your TA getting too low, all you have to add is a little baking soda to bring it up.  Use pool math and it will tell you how much to add, around 1oz per 10ppm TA. 

Quickbeam, I bought my boric acid from dudadiesel.  It was around $19 for 5lbs with free shipping when I got mine, but I see the price has dropped to $13.75 for 5lbs.  That's less than $3 per fill for this stuff.  Cheap! 

[Vinny]

I did add boric acid to stabilize the pH also.

OK, so you weren't adding PH down or muriatic acid but did add something - boric acid and that locks in the PH. I will admit that boric acid is new to me but do use borax along with baking soda ( I have the opposite problem then you or Quickbeam). Both my PH and alkalinity go up with just baking soda in my tub ... I don't have to use borax to raise PH and the PH lasts a while ... pool does need both, I'm not 100% convinced it's all the aeration as there are times the tub didn't get used but the PH lasts for weeks.

So with that additional information and me reading what happens with boric acid and how much you need to use - OK I'll buy lowering the TA lower.

Here's a question - what happens if you add boric acid to water with higher TA - does it lock in the PH as well?