Hot Tub chemical management guide

[johnlew]

We are newcomers to hot tubs and are awaiting our delivery. In preparation I have been looking for a chemical management guide that provides easy to understand and follow, a guide to managing the correct chemical balance of hot tubs. I have looked around but there does not appear to be one that is recommended by hot tub owners. In the books section of amazon, the only one that comes up is slated by reader's. Can anyone please advise

[cranbiz]

In general and there are many other opinions here is what I have seen.

Total Alkalinity between 80-150 ppm
Calcium Hardness  150-200 ppm
PH 7.2-7.8
Chlorine depends on method used. Generally 3 ppm but you also need to know what your Free Chlorine is. If using the Frog@ease system, chlorine is .5-1 ppm with normal use. Because my tub came with the Frog@ease system and a years worth of chemicals, Free Chlorine is not something I need to worry about according to the manufacturer.
Even with an Ozone system, Shock is recommended after heavy bathing load or at minimum once a week. You can either use MPS or di-chlor. Personally, I dumped MPS in favor of di-chlor. I found the MPS caused water cloudiness due to phosphate fallout where the di-chlor is keeping my water crystal clear.

Others will chime in with what I'm missing I'm sure. I don't use Bromine because my wife is allergic to it, so I don't know what levels that requires.

[Tman122]

I hate the word "chemicals" Can we call it water balance and sanitation?

[bud16415]

It is all chemistry that we try and keep in balance and sanitized mostly using chemicals.

There have been a lot of non chemical methods over the years and none of them seem to be well recognized.

Before someone can give you a management guide it is important to know what method OP plans on using. My tub came setup and the dealer pushed an inline cartridge method of bromine and minerals along with the tub producing ozone. Today I use none of those although the ozone still runs I doubt it is making any and I doubt it did much when it did work. I adopted the Dichlor then bleach method of sanitation and it went from troublesome to simple for me. It also saved me a ton of money. Others don’t care for this method.

[A.O.]

We are newcomers to hot tubs and are awaiting our delivery. In preparation I have been looking for a chemical management guide that provides easy to understand and follow, a guide to managing the correct chemical balance of hot tubs. I have looked around but there does not appear to be one that is recommended by hot tub owners. In the books section of amazon, the only one that comes up is slated by reader's. Can anyone please advise

I hope its ok here to give you this link, it explains everything you need to know on maintaining the hot tub. I keep my TA at about 50, have a CYA of 30 and the only chemicals I use are liquid pool chlorine and muriatic acid.. simple , easy and inexpensive..

https://www.troublefreepool.com/forums/spas-and-hot-tubs.15/