You may have heard of muriatic acid and wondered what the use of it is for swimming pools, well there are a few and this post will help you understand why pools need it. The PH in chlorine pool water can increase over time naturally due to the use of chlorine, the weather and other variables. When the PH becomes too high it needs to be brought back down to the correct levels which is between 7.2-7.8. Adding muriatic acid to pool water will lower the PH level. Depending on how many gallons of water are in your pool will depend on how much acid you need to add. In general you add about a quarter of a gallon of acid per 10k gallons of water to lower the PH let the water circulate for at least an hour then retest the PH level to see if more is needed. Always add acid to water and not the other way around and never add more than the recommended amount.
Swimming Pool Muriatic Acid
Another use for muriatic acid is if you’re acid washing a pool to clean the pool’s surface. Doing an acid wash will take a thin layer of plaster off the pool which in turn removes stains and marks that can build up over time. Pebble tec pools can be acid washed as well.
One more reason is if you have a salt water pool you can use muriatic acid for cleaning a salt cell as over time these cells can accumulate calcium hardness build up and muriatic acid can be acid to remove the hardness. Only use small amounts of acid to water when cleaning a cell as per the manufacturers recommendations.
Muriatic acid can be very dangerous and should be handled with great care and always read the manufactures label for instructions before using.
If you need any help with pool service in the Las Vegas and Henderson NV area please feel free to reach out to us as we shall be happy to help!