I have a slight problem with foaming in the spa pool.
It’s no big deal except when it’s windy.
Some quick research on Google revealed that it’s probably nothing important but could be a sign of something going majorly wrong with the water chemistry (which is pretty much par for the course for any problem I look up online, to be fair.)
So, with some spare time on my hands yesterday, I took a sample to the local pool shop. I did this with some trepidation, as the owner is quite scary and has lambasted me in the past for various spa pool crimes and misdemeanors. Luckily, he wasn’t there (I don’t want to sound uncaring, but he may have died: he doesn’t look like someone who takes great care of himself and he wasn’t looking too well the last time I saw him.) His replacement on this freakishly warm Saturday was a young man, but if I was expecting kinder treatment, I was sadly mistaken. He took a sample of my spa water with his small glass dropper, placed it on the testing panel, looked on his computer at the results, and started shaking his head. Everything was out of wack, apparently. I could try to save it by adding loads of different chemicals, but I’d be better off emptying it and starting again. It needed ten caps of this, two cups of that, and a whole bottle of something else.
I was dismayed. The water had really seemed absolutely fine, and the flash inbuilt diagnostic system hadn’t picked up anything like this number of issues. I think the young man sensed my turmoil, and he tried to be a little gentler on me as he accepted my payment for the exorbitantly overpriced product I had decided to buy to avoid the cost of water testing. ($60 for a bag of pool salt! What a muggins!)
When I got home, I emailed the above photo to the man who sold me the spa in the first place. Within minutes he was phoning and texting.
It turns out, the testing results were completely wrong. As I understand it, the young man in the shop had “inadvertently” inputted the spa as a swimming pool. Why would he do that? To sell you more chemicals, muttered my spa man, darkly. Apparently also, the foam is no big deal. I should encourage guests to shower before getting in the spa, not wash my togs with detergent, and clean the filters more often. If it really annoys me, I can buy an anti foam agent, but I’ll keep the nuclear option up my sleeve for the future. In any event, I won’t be going back to the local dodgy pool shop. A close escape!