The Pool Recovery Playbook

A pool doesn’t turn cloudy for no reason, and it rarely gets fixed by “just add more chlorine.” When water looks dull, hazy, or starts showing algae, we use a simple three-step reset that gets results fast because it treats the whole pool system: filtration, sanitation, and circulation.

We start where most people don’t: the filter. A dirty sand filter, DE filter, or cartridge filter can choke off flow, kill circulation, and trap the very debris you’re trying to remove. We talk about knowing your clean starting PSI, what high pressure is really telling you, and the real-world signs you’ll see at the skimmer or spillway when water isn’t moving. If you skip this step, you can shock all day and still watch the pool stay cloudy.

Then we get specific about shocking to the right level and why “err on the side of more” often makes sense when algae, combined chlorine, or heavy organic load is present. For saltwater pools, we cover when to hit boost or superchlorinate, when to dial output to 100%, and how a dirty or failing salt cell can quietly be the reason chlorine dropped to zero. Finally, we dig into the underrated move that ties everything together: running the pump 24 hours (sometimes 48), how to do it with an Intermatic timer or automation, and how to explain the electricity cost versus chemical cost to customers.

If you want a practical playbook for fixing cloudy pool water, improving pool circulation, and delivering better results as a pool service pro, press play. Subscribe, share this with a pool tech who needs it, and leave a review with your go-to method for turning a pool around.

We walk through the three-step process we use to turn a cloudy, algae-prone pool back to crystal clear blue without wasting chlorine. We focus on filtration, shock-level dosing, and nonstop circulation so the water actually has a chance to recover.
• Spotting early signs of poor pool water quality like cloudiness and algae  
• Cleaning or backwashing first so flow and circulation recover  
• Using filter PSI and visual flow clues to diagnose restriction  
• Sand, DE, and cartridge filter actions that “move the needle”  
• Shocking to the right free chlorine level based on severity  
• Setting expectations with customers about no-swim windows  
• Using salt system boost and turning output to 100%  
• Troubleshooting why chlorine hits zero and preventing repeats  
• Running the pump 24 to 48 hours using timers or automation  
• Explaining electricity cost versus chemical cost to customers  
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Transcript

Why Pools Turn Cloudy

SPEAKER_00 0:14

Hey, welcome to the Pool Guy Podcast Show. If you notice the water quality of a pool that's not great, maybe there's some algae, maybe the pool is cloudy, or it just doesn't look great. And you can tell usually by looking at the pool, these issues with the quality. I'm gonna give you some tips beyond just raising the chlorine level in the pool. That's gonna help move the needle and turn this pool back to a really crystal clear blue state. Are you a pool service pro looking to take your business to the next level? Join the pool guy coaching program. Get expert advice, business tips, exclusive content, and get direct support from me. I'm a 35-year veteran in the industry. Whether you're starting out or scaling up, I've got the tools to help you succeed. Learn more at swimmingpoollearning.com. So, whatever the reason behind the pool not looking great, and this happens sometimes if there's a pool party, a lot of people in the pool, the pool starts to turn a little bit, or maybe the pool was neglected before you took on the service account, or maybe for some reason the pool was not turned back on after using the pool. This does happen during the season where the customer will leave the pool, maybe in spa mode or leave the pool off, and the pool will turn on you during that week. Again, regardless of these reasons, there are certain things you can do besides, of course, raising the chlorine level and shocking the pool. That's gonna really help move the needle. One of the first things that you have to understand is that if the water quality has been suffering that week, the pool's

Step One Fix Filtration And Flow

SPEAKER_00 1:47

cloudy, there's some algae in the in the pool. A lot of times the filter is also affected. It kind of goes hand in hand and it becomes a vicious cycle where if you don't address the filter, the pool will not clear up. So, regardless if you have a sand filter, cartridge or defilter, the first thing is to check the filtration of the pool. Now it's good to have an idea of when the last time that filter was clean. You can keep a log in an app, or you can just take a Sharpie and write on the filter tank the last time you cleaned it. It's old school, but it's somewhat effective in just having a quick visual of the filter. You'll see the date on there, you know, like 320-2026 or something like that. And you'll know when you clean that filter last. The filter PSI is also good indicated with a San and D filter if the filter has been affected by the water quality. You have to know your starting PSI. So if you clean a D filter and the starting PSI is 18 and the filter pressure is at 30, you know that that filter definitely has been impacted by the water quality. Now, depending on when the last time you took it apart and cleaned the grids, would be if you can just backwash that D filter and return the pressure back down to 18 or 20 psi, and that will help tremendously with the water quality once you do that. Usually when it's at 30 psi with a sand filter and or a D filter, the water is not flowing very rapidly. You look in the skimmer, you don't you're not gonna see much movement. And if you have like a spa spillway or water feature, it'll just be trickling into the pool. That does definitely make the water quality even worse at that point because it's not circulating, so it's not gonna clear up. So with a sand filter and a D filter, I suggest backwashing it and then with a D filter recharging it with a fresh D at that point. If it's a cartridge filter, the PSI is not going to be a huge indicator of the flow. You just have to kind of look at the pool and see if you notice the automatic cleaner not moving fast or the spa spillway or the skimmer has very low suction, then you know the cartridge filter needs to be taken apart and hosed off. With a single cartridge filter, the pool pressure definitely will be an indicator. You'll see the pressure rise on there. So if the single cartridge filter is clean at like you know 15 psi and you're at 25 or 30 psi, you definitely know that that cartridge filter is dirty and you have to hose it off. The reason why I start with the filter is because again, the poor water quality, all that water is going into the filter, making the filter dirty as it's trying to trap all the particles and organic material that's in there, and that raises the filter PSI, which affects the flow of the pool, which means that the water is not moving rapidly, which means that the water is not going to clear up if it's not actually flowing. So the first thing I do when I get to a pool that's kind of looking a little under the weather is check the filter, clean it up I need to, backwash it, and then at that point I move on to step number two, which of course is bringing the chlorine level up to a shock level. And the reason why this is step number two is because if you just shock the pool and call it a day, that the chlorine is not going to circulate in the pool water properly. The pool filter is not gonna be able to pull out anything that the chlorine destroys, and it's one of those things where it doesn't do any good if you shock the pool and the pool filter is clogged up or not running effectively, and the PSI is high in the filter. Believe me, this is really important, and so you're just wasting your time in a lot of respects if you just shock

Step Two Shock Chlorine With Intent

SPEAKER_00 5:30

the pool and don't address the filter. So step two would be bringing the chlorine level up to shock level, and this really depends on how bad the pool is, how much chlorine to add to the pool. As you get more experience, you're gonna know you know, I'll add this amount of chlorine to the pool, and this will turn the pool around in that case. And as you're learning, I would say err on the side of adding more chlorine than less, and bring the chlorine level up to 30 to 40 parts per million. A lot of that's gonna be used up in the first few hours anyway. If there's algae in the pool, or if the water is cloudy, or if there's chloramines in the water, combined chlorine, that 30 parts per million is not going to maintain itself over the course of three or four days, so it's gonna drop pretty rapidly. So just be aware that you're not overdoing it with chlorine. You're and if no one goes in the pool during that treatment period, you can just let the customer know that oh, the pool turned a little bit. Maybe you can tell them the reason why that happened and that you're addressing it, and don't go into the pool for three or four days. That's kind of a fair warning, and the chlorine level should drop down to a pretty good level at that point. You can always go back and check it if you needed to to make sure that the pool is rebounding, and making a second stop during the week may be something that does help as well. It's not always necessary, and sometimes you have to stop back by two or three days later anyway to bring the chlorine back up and to check on the pool. You'll kind of know again with experience, okay, if I do this here today, this pool is gonna rebound and it'll be fine for a week. And you'll know that while this pool is in really pretty bad shape, I'll do what I need to do today, but I'll come back on Thursday or Friday before the weekend to make sure that it's gonna make it. And again, with experience, you're gonna know the certain level of how the pool has turned and how much more attention that's gonna need from you. There's a couple other things besides shocking the pool that needs to be done if you have a salt water system. If you have a saltwater system and it's not running at full capacity, you can hit the boost button on the salt system usually that's going to or superchlorinate, sometimes it says superchlorinate, that basically just puts the salt cell output to 100% for a period of time, I think 24 hours on a lot of systems. It's probably a good idea that if you have a salt system that's running at like 50% and the pool has turned a little bit, to turn it all the way up to 100% for that week and let the and get the full chlorine production out of it. Again, the boost button only works for a short period of time, whereas I think if you needed to, you should dial that salt system up to full output for that period of time, for that week at least, or

Salt Systems Boost And Troubleshooting

SPEAKER_00 8:11

till you get back there two or three days later, to make sure that pool has plenty of chlorine being produced, and of course make sure the salt system is active and working. Sometimes a salt system will fail the week prior, and that's what caused the pool to turn. So if that's the case, if you see like a light flashing saying dirty cell, clean cell light, then go ahead and take this salt cell off and clean it. And that could have been one of the factors that caused the pool to turn the week prior. If the chlorine level is at zero and this is what kind of caused the pool to turn, it's a good idea to kind of analyze it, put on your detective hat, and figure out why did the chlorine zero out here? Is it because of high phosphates? Is it because of a heavy bather load? Is it because I don't put enough chlorine in the pool the week prior, which does happen sometimes? Was there a heat wave? All these things are something to really consider and think about because the pool doesn't just turn by itself and the chlorine level doesn't zero out without some factors that contribute to that. So find out why, in fact, the chlorine level was at zero that week, and that would kind of help you to prevent that the following week, and it'll give you a blueprint of going forward and how to treat this pool to bring it back to its normal state of crystal clear blue. So, again, the first step was checking the filter, make sure make sure that everything is fine with that. And with that step, also you want to make sure that the PSI isn't too low in the pool. That could indicate something clogged in the in the pump impeller or an air leak or a suction leak. So the PSI should be at the normal clean level, even a pump O-ring, sometimes the O-ring lid wears out, you change that, and you're gonna get a good PSI. So not only are you looking for high PSI, you're also looking for a very low PSI indicating a problem with the pump or something in the line itself. So basically, step one is just addressing the filtration to make sure that you're getting the flow and the circulation in the pool. Step two would be bringing the chlorine level up to a shock level, and that is basically determined by how bad the pool is and how much chlorine you need to add to the pool. And step three is really important, and this is a step that if you neglect this step, step one and two can fail, and the whole thing could just you know go back to the way it was, and there's no improvement in the water quality three days later or a week later. And step three is running the pool 24 hours and sometimes 48 hours, depending on how you want to do this. Now, 24 hours is pretty easy if you have an intermatic timer. Basically, what I do to run the pool 24 hours, if I'm not coming back the next day, is I'll take that dial and I'll pull it out towards me, and I'll make sure that it's gonna be right after the off tripper, and that means that you're gonna have like 23 and a half hours of runtime. You can also move the dial. So if let's say you get there at 10 in the morning and you want to run the pool 24

Step Three Run The Pump 24/7

SPEAKER_00 11:14

hours, go ahead and you know make sure that the on dial has already you have it running, of course, and that the off dial is gonna be somewhere you know 20 hours later. You could take the off tripper off and just run that pool 48 hours or 72 hours if you want as well. As long as you have the off-tripper off, the on-tripper can stay on, or you can just take both trippers off and leave the dial empty, and that'll just keep running 24-7 until you turn off the little switch on the enomatic timer. However, you want to do it, you want to run that pool for at least 24 hours to get that run cycle going. If you have an automated system, you can't put it in service mode. Just be aware that the customer is going to see that on their app or screen in the house that it's in service mode. Let them know that you put it in service mode and you're running the pool for a couple days. You don't necessarily have to explain too much to them. Just let them know that, just let them know that it's gonna be in service mode and you'll come back and put it in auto mode in a couple of days, two or three days. And running the pool 24 hours really does make a huge difference in a lot of cases. And this is one factor that if you don't implement, like I mentioned, number one, step one and two don't work as effectively. Now, I'm not saying that it's not gonna work fairly good. If you run the pool for 12 hours or 16 hours, you're pretty much gonna see a difference. As long as you run it longer than the cycle that it's running, you're gonna see a substantial difference. But if the pool really has turned, you really want to run it 24 hours or 48 hours and just run that pool. The pool pump is designed to run 24-7. Don't feel like, oh, you're gonna burn out the pump. Now, the only time that I worry about this is when the pool motor is like super old. You know, I when I used to do a lot of green pool cleanups, I would get there and the equipment was just really substandard, and the pump, you know, it was like an old duroglass pump, you know, or maxi glass, and I was like, oh man, this thing's probably gonna stop somewhere middle of the night, it's gonna overheat. And it's one of those things where most pool pumps, if they're newer or normal, especially variable speed pumps, you can run those 24-7. They're designed to run all the time. They're just they're the same motors, basically, that are on businesses that are running swamp coolers 24-7, factories running swamp coolers 24-7. So it's really not a problem to run that pool 24 hours, 48 hours, 72 hours straight. It's not gonna damage the motor in most cases, and it's really part of the design of the pool pump to run continuously. If you have a commercial account, you know that you're running that pool pump 24-7 without ever turning off the pump. And that's kind of the standard with commercial pools that are large. Those pool pumps run continuously without any downtime at all. So get that out of your mind that you're gonna damage the equipment. And if the customer is worried about it, just let them know that they're designed to run 24-7, there won't be any effect. I've had customers get panicky and turn off the pump on me because they're afraid they're gonna burn it out. I've had customers turn off the pump as well because they feel like it's using too much energy. But I like to explain to them that yes, I'm gonna run the pool 24 hours or 48 hours. There may be a little bit more electricity usage, but it has to be done. Otherwise, I'm gonna have to come back and shock the pool and add $50 of chemicals. So it's better if you spend $15 in electricity than spend $50 in chemicals or $10 electricity. It's really not gonna really affect the bill too much, running it for a couple days straight, and it's gonna really help the pool recover. So be transparent with those customers that are kind of you know, kind of picky and overbearing and wanting to know everything that's going on, explain to them that it's not really a big deal, and you do this all the time, and it's something that's gonna have to be done to turn this pool around. So, really, the point is you can't just add more chlorine, shock the pool, and think that that's gonna be enough. And a lot of cases it needs to be this three-step or sometimes four-step if you add the step of coming back to the pool two or three days later. But really, it's a a process that kind of is all encompassing with the pool system, shocking the pool, having the filter clean, running the pool longer, and maybe making a return visit in two or three days. All of this goes into turning that pool around, and it's not something that you can just do one thing. You can't just increase the runtime without cleaning the filter, you can't just clean the filter without increasing the runtime, you can't just shock the pool without cleaning the filter and increasing the runtime. All these things are factors that are connected

Putting It All Together

SPEAKER_00 15:54

to each other that are going to make the pool turn around, or if you don't do these things or these take these steps, it'll make the pool not turn around, and you're gonna have the same problem or even a worse problem the following week when you return to that pool. Looking for other podcasts, you can find those by going to my website, swinging for learning.com, and clicking on the podcast icon and the banner. That'll take you to a drop down menu where I have over 1900 podcasts. And if you're interested in the coaching program, you can learn more at PoolGuyCoaching.com. Thanks for listening to this podcast. Have the rest of your week and God bless.