I have stains in my pool, what do I do?

I have stains in my pool, what do I do?

How to treat stains requires some initial education in order to identify what kind of stain you have.
All stain treatments are pricey and all have the potential of not working, so you want to do all you can to pick the right stain treatment for your stain.

Some pools can have multiple types of stains.

Rust Stains are caused by physical metal in the pool for example a screw driver or a screw not stainless steel accidently falls in the pool.
The pool has oxidizers to break down the algae and bacteria, so when a metal is put into the pool, the solution immediately breaks the metal down and causes a rust stain.

Organic Stains are caused by dirt, leaves, etc.,  that fall into the pool and or not removed in a timely manner.
As they lay on the pool bottom and break down from the sanitizer, they leave a stain on the pool surface.

Metal Stains are caused by copper, iron or some other metal in the water source that finds its way into your pool, these metals under certain condition will come out of the pool water and stain the pool surface.

All of these stains can be covered by scale and this scale will protect the stain from any type of removal treatment. In this case the scale must be removed first before trying to remove the stain.

Stain removal products are dry acid, muriatic acid solutions, absorbic acid, and chlorine tabs.
Dry acid can be sprinkled in shallow water and put in to a sock for deep water treatments.
Muriatic acid can be put into a solution for acid washing where the pool is drained down and thoroughly cleaned or it can be put into some under water products that can be lowered to the stained area with a pool pole.
Absorbic acid can be sprinkled around pool edge and or applied for specific deep areas with pool and sock.
Chlorine tabs can be lowered to the stain and rubbed on like and eraser. Also pumice stones can be used in this manner on plaster pools, not liner pools.

All of these products have certain chemistry requirements, so be sure to educate yourself on that. In addition when metal stains are removed from surface they go in to the water where you need to sequester them and remove them from the pool. This process will effect your sanitizer levels, so it needs to be done with a plan of close chemistry monitoring for a couple weeks. The biggest challenge is no shocking the pool and the pool will have to work on very low Chlorine levels. So algae blooms can be a concern to consider. Two products that fit well for this situation are Pool Rx and Culator. Pool Rx will address the algae concern by killing the algae and Culator will remove the metals from your pool, so they are not able to re stain your pool surface again. Don't spend the money to pull metal stains off your surface only to let them come back because you didn't remove metals from water. Culator also is a product that will continue to remove metals from your water if for some reason your fill water has high metal content.

Before you try any of these methods ask yourself if you have a scale problem and if so address that first. The least intrusive way to do this is through Easy Care products like scaletec and beautec.
If your scale trouble can not be resolved through these means your will have to drain the pool.
You can pressure wash a drained pool, but that will most likely not remove the scale protecting coating formed. At this point, the next step is to acid wash the surface. This removes a layer of plaster. The cautions here is not to remove to many layers and to remove the layers evenly so that the finish product looks good. When the pool is drain down you may want to sand it to remove scale in places also. Scaling is a product of neglected pool maintenance, so if you maintain proper chemistry this will not be an expensive repair you will have to make.

Jacks magic stain identification kit
Watch this video to see how this kit will aid you in making the right decision on treatment that is for your pool stains.

How do you acid wash a pool?
Muriatic acid and water solution poured strategically on pool along with scrubbing and rinsing.
Is it dangerous?
(fumes and slip hazards)
(concrete damage and pool float if water table rises while empty)
What is actually happening?
(You are removing a layer of the plaster off)
Does it remove all the stains?
(Maybe not)
Acid Wash Ex. 1
Acid Wash Ex. 2
Watch these video for what acid washing look like.

I will probably edit this and improve it as time goes on.
But for now it is a general guide to stain removal considerations