Balancing your water chemistry is the ultimate insurance policy that guarantees swimmer safety, protects your pool equipment, and keeps your water crystal clear, but it is a constantly moving target.
The chemistry of your pool is constantly changing. Heavy rain, sunshine, pollen, and bather residue can alter your pool’s chemistry.
So, how do the pros do it? What do we use when professionally treating pools? Here is a list of what we rely on to keep pool water safe and our clients enjoying their pools all season long:
Sanitizer for Salt or Chlorine Pools:
Mursatt Chlorine Pucks – Chlorine acts as a sanitizer to keep pool water safe and clear. It’s necessary in every pool. This is added to your chlorinator weekly.
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Mursatt Salt – Used to produce chlorine via the salt cell. We maintain the proper salt level to generate the required chlorine for your pool.
OR
Mursatt Brom’N8 – This (chlorine alternative) sanitizer is usually used in spas, due to its higher temperature threshold. Like chlorine, bromine sanitizes water by killing bacteria, destroying viruses, and eliminating organic contaminants.
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Backyard Brands Solei – An eco-friendly, liquid two-in-one pool water treatment that acts as both a continuous solar-powered oxidizer (shock) and a chlorine stabilizer. When UV hits open water, it causes a chemical breakdown of free chlorine molecules, causing them to evaporate. Pristiva & Solei use the sun’s UV as an activator, helping to hold chlorine in the water.
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Pristiva – An eco-friendly, liquid solar-activated two-in-one pool water treatment that acts as both a continuous solar-powered oxidizer (shock) and a chlorine stabilizer. It is engineered specifically for saltwater swimming pools. While most types of chlorine evaporate in the sun, Pristiva & Solei use the sun’s UV as an activator, helping hold chlorine in the water.
All Pools, All Season Long
Buffer – Buffer increases total alkalinity of pool water. It prevents pH change, corrosion, and surface damage. It helps maintain the pH at the proper level preventing “pH bounce.” pH bounce causes pool water chemistry to become unstable, making chlorine less effective and potentially leading to cloudy water, scaling, corrosion, and swimmer irritation. It also increases chemical costs and can damage pool equipment over time if not corrected.
Mursatt Easy Down – A granular acid used to lower high pH & TA; It serves as a simple and safe alternative to muriatic acid. We’ll add this when your PH is above 7.6. Unbalanced pH can cause bather discomfort; pH decreasers help maintain a healthy pool environment.
Mursatt MOR-CAL – Increases calcium hardness levels of pool water. It prevents corrosion and surface damage when added within the correct parameters.
Mursatt Super Shock – A chlorine-based shock to get rid of combined chlorine, eliminate bacteria, and prevent algae growth. We generally use this weekly, as a preventative.
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Mursatt Shock N’ Shine – a stabilized, blended weekly shock treatment that combines oxidizing properties with the water polishing benefits of a clarifier.
Pools With High Foliage
Natural Chemistry PhosFree – A highly effective liquid treatment used to eliminate phosphates from your water.
Natural Chemistry Pool Perfect Max with Phos Free – A premium, triple-action weekly maintenance liquid that combines broad-spectrum enzymes, a preventative phosphate remover, and an advanced water clarifier.
Specialty Products
Specialty pool chemicals are designed to address specific water quality challenges that standard sanitizers and balancers cannot solve on their own. When used as needed, specialty chemicals support overall pool health and make routine maintenance more effective.
Natural Chemistry Pool First Aid – Cleans the pool of dead algae, pollen, oils, spills, anti-freeze residue and other forms of non -living organic water contamination. Frees clogged filters of oil and other forms of non-living organic buildup.
Mursatt MBA-60 – Algaecide – Green pool problem solver – It is Mursatt’s strongest algaecide formula designed to target even the most resilient and stubborn algae.
TWO TIPS on how to tell the difference between Pollen & Algae (Algae is a living organism that consumes chlorine; pollen is dead organic matter.)
1. The Overnight Chlorine Loss Test:
Test your free chlorine (FC) level at night after the sun goes down. Test it again first thing in the morning before the sun hits the water. The Result: If your chlorine level drops by more than 1.0 ppm overnight, you have algae. If the chlorine level stays exactly the same, it is pollen.
2. The Touch and Texture Test
Feel the yellow or green substance with your bare fingers on the pool steps or walls. The Result: Pollen: Feels slightly gritty, coarse, or dusty when rubbed between your fingertips. Algae: Feels distinctly slimy, slippery, or velvety to the touch.
To mitigate these issues we leave our clients with a box of individual shock pouches to add after a big weekend, as instructed by your pool care professional.
Why Professional Chemicals Are Best
The primary differences between professional-grade pool chemicals and big-box store products are chemical purity, active ingredient concentration, and the presence of fillers or binders. Bulk stores appear less expensive upfront, their products are often heavily diluted, requiring you to buy and use significantly more volume to achieve the same result. For example, a professional cal-hypo shock often contains 65% to 73% available chlorine, whereas a budget brand at a department store may only feature 40% to 50% available chlorine, filled out with add-on ingredients. To manufacture inexpensive chlorine pucks, budget brands often use binding agents (like animal fats or stearates) to hold the tablet form. As these dissolve in your chlorinator, they leave behind a gummy residue that can clog equipment, cloud the water, and coat your pool liner. Professional tablets are bound using high hydraulic pressure and heat, leaving zero residue.
At the cash register, big-box products promise quick savings—but the real cost shows up later. True pool care longevity starts with professional quality.
