# Citric Acid in Pools



## Redtwin (Feb 9, 2019)

I noticed on another thread that @ionicatoms talked about using citric acid in his pool. I'd love to learn more about it as I have a saltwater chlorine generator that is constantly raising the pH as it makes chlorine. What are you all using in your pools? I'd love to find an alternative to adding so much muriatic acid to keep my pH down. Would citric acid be cheaper than muriatic acid?


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## ionicatoms (Mar 8, 2020)

I use Muriatic for pH-down. 
Citric acid for copper stains. 
Ascorbic for iron stains.

The pool was in bad shape when I bought the house. Took me awhile to get it cleaned up.

I've basically stopped worrying about correcting for "high" pH since the pool seems to naturally go that direction and fighting it isn't worth the benefit. I use trichlor over the summer and liquid clorine over the winter which allows the CYA levels to come down.

I'm a lazy pool owner, but not as lazy as the previous owner.


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## Redtwin (Feb 9, 2019)

@ionicatoms My pool was a hot mess when I moved in as well. It took me the whole first summer to come to the realization that I will never be able to keep the pH down. I grew up with a pool but we used chlorine tabs that had the acid sort of built in. Using liquid chlorine or a salt generator doesn't have that added acid. I guess I will stick with the muriatic for now. Thanks for the insight!


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## pjt (Aug 3, 2020)

31.45% MA is the best option for pH control. Let your TA drift down and your pH will stabilize.


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## bernstem (Jan 16, 2018)

^^^this. Look at your TA levels if the pH is unstable. I have a hot tub rather than a pool, but when I lowered TA, the pH creep went away.


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## pjt (Aug 3, 2020)

Most pools have acid demand. It's easy to manage with MA. For my pool, I use about a gallon of MA every month and dose every week.


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## Redtwin (Feb 9, 2019)

Does TA = total alkalinity? When I first started caring for my pool the Pinch-A-Penny would tell me that my Total Alkalinity needed to go up but my Ph was already too high? I swear it was a way for them to sell me more chemicals. I finally told them to stop testing that factor because I didn't want to hear it. I now only go to have them test my stabilizer levels (very rarely). What @bernstem talked about totally confirms what I was thinking. How can my total alkalinity need to be raised when I can't keep my pH down?


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## pjt (Aug 3, 2020)

Redtwin said:


> Does TA = total alkalinity? When I first started caring for my pool the Pinch-A-Penny would tell me that my Total Alkalinity needed to go up but my Ph was already too high? I swear it was a way for them to sell me more chemicals. I finally told them to stop testing that factor because I didn't want to hear it. I now only go to have them test my stabilizer levels (very rarely). What @bernstem talked about totally confirms what I was thinking. How can my total alkalinity need to be raised when I can't keep my pH down?


Yes, TA = Total Alkalinity

Join the community at troublefreepool.com if you haven't already.


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## ionicatoms (Mar 8, 2020)

Maybe the advice is solid for salt water pools, but in general, I think this may be a little more complicated that it appears at first glance. For one thing, measures of TA should generally be "adjusted" due to the presence of CYA; so telling someone to just lower the TA could result in some undesired outcomes if their CYA is high.

For example, there is a minimum amount of (corrected) TA needed with respect to the quantity of acidic substance being added to the pool or else 1) the pH won't stabilize by reacting with the bicarbonates, 2) you get a large pH bounce, which in turn could cause etching or corrosion.

I already mentioned I'm not a salt water guy, so maybe I'm being overly cautious here, but I'm pretty curious about pool water.

I wish I had an automatic monitoring system to measure the key parameters for my pool. Would be neat to see pH bounce on a chart.


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## Redtwin (Feb 9, 2019)

I have a saltwater pool so maybe they weren't just trying to sell chemicals but every time I would test my water, they would tell me that I needed to raise my TA even though I struggled to keep my pH down. I got an A+ in Chem101 but I'm not a chemist so I would ask them to explain how TA works in conjunction with the pH. I would get the blank stare. After I stopped chasing it and just routinely hit it with a splash of MA, the pH swings settled down and now it just creeps up slowly. From what I have read on the "interwebs", the action of splitting NaCl to make Cl automatically raises the pH so it is just part of the process.

It's on the internet so it has to be true, right?


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## pjt (Aug 3, 2020)

TFP addresses all these questions and more. It's the gold standard resource for pool owners.


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