question regarding chemicals.

[boxer95]

Hello I am loving my caldera spa, its awesome... I have the martinque.. great spa.

it's so easy to maintain the chemcials, its been up and running for a month now and they water is beatiful.

the dealer reccomened I add a shock treatment each week. is this necessary? the water is perfect. with my previous tub, a coleman, I only added the shock treatment when the water was yucky. this one I am supposed to add regardless? that seems odd to me. could anyone advice? I am using chlorine,  and scale remover weekly. the chlorine I add each time I use the tub.

thanks so much!

[salesdvl]

Your dealers suggestion of adding shock once a week is meant to be a precaution against anything happening.  It will give the water a good zap and make it easier to maintain.  I wont bore you with the micro reasons to do it.
Neccessary: no....  Good idea: yes.

[Bill_Stevenson]

If you are shocking once a week and you are measuring what is happening you will notice that after shock your total chlorine value is closer to your free chlorine value.  What happens without shock is that the free chlorine gets combined with amines and the the resultant chloramine is not an effective sanitizer.  Also it is the chloramines that give off the chlorine smell.  Shocking gets rid of chloramines, well it minimizes them.

Also, after shocking you should check Ph as it could drop.  You might need to adjust either total alkalinity or Ph or both after shocking.  Chlorine is actually more effective with lower Ph, but if Ph falls much below 7.2 or so it could result in pump seal failures, or heater corrosion and so on.

Regards,

Bill

[Spatech_tuo]

with my previous tub, a coleman, I only added the shock treatment when the water was yucky. this one I am supposed to add regardless?

I always try to get people to care for their tub in a PROACTIVE manner rather than a REACTIVE one. Why wait until the water has turned on you?

[Steve]

Yep, kinda like waiting until your oil light comes on before checking your oil. I don't recommend that either!

Steve

[Gary]

Clear water does not mean you have good balance water. Battery acid is very clear but I would not recommend sitting in it.

[Steve]

[glb]HEY...THAT'S MY LINE!![/glb]

[zzaphod42]

Good advice Gary!

I always wondered where you stole that line from Steve.