Hi! I am a new owner of a Sundance Hamilton spa, which we have had for about 3 weeks now. I tried following the directions of my dealer and the materials he gave me, but not sure it was the best advice. They've offered to test the water, but we live an hour away and it's really inconvenient. I've done a lot of reading of old posts on here and bought a Taylor water chemistry test kit K-2006. I've pretty much gotten the hang of testing and realized that we have been adding WAY too much di-chlor which increased my stabilizer/CYA levels tremendously in only 2 weeks time!!
Since we're in a cold climate we were hesitant to fully drain the spa, but last night, my husband drained down to the bench level and refilled new so we could get some of the CYA levels out.
I've been using the wheel and tables that came with the test kit and for the most part have been able to balance the water, but I'm still really confused about when Non chlorine shock is supposed to be used and how you know when to use it and how much.
This morning, after the refill, I added 3 oz of metal out (we've not had our city tap water tested for metals but the dealer recommended we add some to be on the safe side...) Temp is back up to 102. My levels were:
pH: 7.6
TA: 90 ppm
CH: 120 ppm
FC: .2 ppm
CC: .2 ppm
CYA: still measuring high around 55 ppm
I believe we have just under 400 gallons in the spa. It's new, so the two of us use it about 5 times a week for 20-60 minutes at a time. 2 Kids (4 &6) are in with us about 2 times a week. I went ahead and added .5 oz of dichlor, which I was hoping would bring my FC level up 3 ppm. So--I'm still not sure I understand the non chlorine shock. Can anyone help to explain? Thanks!