What does "Shocking" a swimming pool mean, and why is it necessary? Pool shock is a granular pool chemical, which should be added to your swimming pool at least once each week. You should shock more oftentimes if the pool is used heavily, after you receive large amounts of rain, or while extended periods of hot, sunny weather. The chlorine tablets or granular chlorine that you constantly dissolve into your pool water seeks out and combines with bacteria and other organics on a molecular level, to neutralize these harmful contaminants. In the process of killing these harmful contaminants the chlorine becomes inactive, and the chlorine and bacteria that have combined together is called "Combined Chlorine". The combined chlorine must be removed from the swimming pool to keep your pool water safe and clean. The combined chlorine is removed by "Shocking" the swimming pool. Super chlorinating or "Shocking" means drastically raising the chlorine level of the swimming pool for a short time, to a high sufficient level that the combined chlorine is oxidized and burnt off. Which Shock should you use? There seems to be a very wide option of swimming pool shock on the market, and each pool provide jobber works hard to make their goods seem a step above the rest. When all of the products are compared side by the side, the only real contrast on the labels is the concentration of the active ingredients in the product. The accepted pool shock that most pool owners use has the active ingredient Calcium Hypochlorite. You should expect the label to read 65% Calcium Hypochlorite. another more concentrated version of the pool shock may have as much as 75% Calcium Hypochlorite. Some manufacturers advertise a Calcium Hypochlorite based shock product, which allows you to swim in the pool shortly after adding it. Upon examining the label you will notice that the concentration of Calcium Hypochlorite is only around 47%. Although you can swim shortly after using this type of shock product, the lower concentration of Calcium Hypochlorite may not be sufficient to effectively destroy bacteria and harmful contaminants in your pool. Another chlorine based shock goods that most pool provide distributors offer is commonly referred to as "Lithium Shock". Rather than the active ingredient Calcium Hypochlorite that is found in tasteless Pool Shock, Lithium Shock contains Lithium Hypochlorite. Lithium shock uses lithium as a filler instead of the calcium, which allows this goods to dissolve in water much quicker and does not affect the calcium hardness level of the swimming pool. Although Lithium Shock is excellent to the tasteless Calcium Hypochlorite based pool shock, this goods is not used by most pool owners due to the higher cost. In addition to the chlorine based pool shock, you will find a goods called Chlorine-Free Pool Shock. This revolutionary pool chemical performs the same task of oxidizing bacteria and organics in your swimming pool water, but it does not contain chlorine or chemicals that are harsh on swimmers eyes and skin. Chlorine-Free pool shock performs just as well as a chlorine based swimming pool shock by using the active ingredient Potassium Monopersulfate. Chlorine free pool shock uses a unique chemical process to destroy bacteria, instead of raising the chlorine level of water to risky levels. You can admittedly swim in the pool only one hour after using Chlorine-Free Shock. Chlorine based pool shock (Calcium Hypochlorite) has a high pH, and will simply raise the pH level of your swimming pool water, in addition to changing your chlorine level. Chlorine free shock has a neutral pH, and will not affect any of your pool chemical levels. Chlorine-free shock is also excellent to chlorine based pool shock for normal weekly shocking because of the inert ingredients and fillers that are used in the product. Each time chlorine based (Calcium-Hypochlorite) swimming pool Shock is added to your water, you are adding calcium to the pool. This may eventually raise the calcium hardness level of the water, causing cloudiness or scaling along the water line. Chlorine based swimming pool shock should always be kept on hand, because it is the Only pool chemical that will kill algae after algae has grown in the pool. If your water chemistry is properly maintained, and you shock your swimming pool at least once a week, you will never see algae or palpate water problems of any kind! Don't use Liquid Shock! Another type of shock that is widely available at any local pool store, hardware store and many grocery stores is liquid chlorine. This liquid chlorine is commonly used as shock, and used in place of chlorine tablets. Many pool owners believe this liquid chlorine is all they need to properly say a swimming pool, and unfortunately this is incorrect. Liquid chlorine is very inefficient and costly compared to properly maintaining a swimming pool using chlorine tablets and a weekly shock treatment. Liquid shock may seem easier to use than the granular shock for some pool owners because you simply walk up to the pool and dump the liquid in. The problem is that after you dump the risky liquid in your pool, you have to dispose of all the empty plastic bottles with the risky chemical residue inside. Granular pool shock is packaged in small, easy to use 1 lb. Bags. If any children have passage to the area where pool chemicals are stored it will be far easier to have an urgency arresting full or empty bottles of liquid chlorine, than an urgency with bags of granular pool shock. Granular Pool Shock is rated at a minimum of 47% available chlorine and available in concentrations up to 75%. If you look at the label on a bottle of liquid chlorine it will say that it is Only 10% sodium Hypochlorite (chlorine)!! This means you are paying for 90% salt water with every bottle you buy. The dosage for a accepted granular pool shock is 1 lb. Per 10,000 gallons of pool water. If you are currently using a liquid shock, you should assess the cost of a dose of liquid shock to the cost of a dose of granular pool shock. You will find that granular pool shock can offer you a requisite savings. Instructions for "shocking" a swimming pool: Now that you know why you need to shock your pool and which pool shock goods to use, the next demand is how do you shock your pool. Before any pool shock is added to your swimming pool water the chemical must first be pre-dissolved in a bucket of water. All forms of pool shock are granular, and should dissolve relatively quickly. The first step is to fill a 5-gallon bucket with water from the pool and moderately pour the granular pool shock into the bucket of water (Never add water to a chemical, always add chemicals to water). Stir the bucket well and agitate the water for one microscopic or more to dissolve the pool shock. With the filtration principles running, moderately pour the bucket of dissolved shock directly in front of the return line fitting. You will see the dissolved shock water being carried out into the pool by the jet of water coming from the return line. Pour slow sufficient that all of the water pouring from the bucket is carried out into the pool, and does not resolve to the pool floor. When you near the lowest of the bucket (down to about 1/4 left in the bucket) you should fill the bucket back up with pool water and stir it again for one microscopic or more. There will be shock granules at the lowest of the bucket, which did not dissolve the first time. If you have a vinyl liner in your swimming pool you cannot allow un-dissolved pool shock to resolve to the floor, because this may bleach or stain your pool liner.
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