water 8 months old

[Sam]

I definitely think a system flush is good to use once per year or so for most people.  I also feel that water treatment, balance, and maintenance do not need to be nearly as complicated as some of things listed above.  While that is some good information, most people get by just fine keeping a sanitizer level near the appropriate range, shocking regularly, and keeping the PH close to the recommended ranges. 

We aren't refining plutonium here.  Our store doesn't even have a testing station and I've never wished we had one.  We just use test strips for our wet displays.  Balance the ph, stick a spa frog floater in there, shock it as needed and change the water out every few months.  Works just fine.

[dlleno]

I ran a hot spring Grande for several years by over sanitizing.  My second grande  was wet tested at  the factory, rode in trucks for a few days and then  1 week in 100 feg temps.  Doomed from day one

Would any of you particularly successful tubbers be up to the sanitizer demand test?  Its seriously instructive

1..Remove anything that autofeeds your sanitizer and shut off ozone
2.  Set a reasonable sanitizer level and  record.  for example 6ppm Bromine
3.  24 hours later , without using spa  take another reading.  lets say you get 4 ppm Bromine

in this example, if you have measured accurately, you have a 33% decay in sanitizer level, or Sanitizer demand.   This is high, especially in a bromine spa with a good corona discharge ozone generator. 

if you are unable to turn off ozone, leave it on.  Ozone will eat chlorine and make bromine, so it's influence has to be factored in. 

BTW I have personally measured my spa prior to the flush, and found sanitizer demand to be closer to 25-30%%, which is high for a bromine spa with ozone (but no issue for CL + ozone).  after the flush my sanitizer demand dropped to about 15% at  normally recommended levels, and the ozone generator would make enough bromine to maintain about .5ppm sustainable bromine over several days.  thats when you know you have a clean spa

[mrpenguin]

We just changed our water from last October too.  I think there are other factors to determine when to swap.  We have a big 450 gallon and really only the two of us use it 4 nights a week or so lets say.   We did the bleach method and I was quite religious on taking care of it - nightly checks, bi-weekly filter cleanings.  The water is definitely better now, but it really was not that different.  I actually filled up two jugs, one with old water and one with new.  It was REALLY hard to tell them apart.  I also looked at the costs of the refill.   We really did not see any spike in electricity usage for that day, and water here is not bad.  We'll probably not go as far next time, but we did go 10 months.  I agree with Jacuzzi Jim - it does feel and smell nicer, not that much though.

[dlleno]

thank-you mrpenguin for sharing!

I'm a big fan now of purging/refilling the spa at least every 6 months.  in arriving at this conclusion The first thing I did was to take photos of my spa water at 6 months old -- my water was very well maintained , clear, with no issues, etc, having used the "bleach method" (switch to bleach after you use about 1 cup of diclor per 500 gallons.  that will raise CYA to an acceptable level, and going above that just introduces more problems). 

I then purged my spa (to test various purge products) and wow was i surprised.  So lets just say that I purge more often than I used to -- sometimes every fill especially when I go 6 months between fills (low bather load as well). I used to advocate that the purge is only a rescue or problem solving effort but now I have completely come around 180 degrees to where i think the purge should a preventative thing. 

After purging and re-filing I took photos of my water again, and you can definitely tell that, while it is perfectly clear and clean it doesn't "sparkle" like new water does.  its just tired -- from TDS buildup.  we tend to forget that not all contaminants are oxidized, and that TDS is constantly rising over the the life of the water.   

thanks again for your post.