I know summer is rough on tub chemistry but this is getting ridiculous. I'm testing and adjusting every couple days and it still turns cloudy again within 48 hours, especially after we use it in the evenings when it's still 90 degrees out. My sanitizer levels look fine when I test, so I'm wondering if the heat is just burning through the bromine faster than I think, or if there's something else going on. Anyone dealt with this during a heat wave and figured out a routine that actually keeps up with it?
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Hot tub water keeps going cloudy every few days in this heat
- Thread starter soaklife
- Start date
High bather load in hot weather produces a lot of organic waste fast, and bromine alone won't keep up if your free bromine is dropping below 3-4 ppm between soaks. What most people miss is that the cloudiness is usually a filtration and oxidation issue, not just sanitizer depletion. Run your filter longer, shock after every use with a non-chlorine oxidizer, and see if that changes things before you assume you need to keep adding more bromine.
Same thing was happening to me last summer and it turned out my filter was the culprit more than anything else. I kept chasing the chemistry and adding stuff but the filter was just not moving water fast enough to keep up, especially after two or three people used the tub at night. I ended up cleaning the cartridge way more often than the manual said to and that helped a lot, but what really made a difference was adding a mid-week rinse and soak for the filter even when the water looked okay. One thing I'm still not totally clear on is how much the water temperature itself affects how fast bromine breaks down, because my tub sits in direct sun and I wonder if that's making things worse before we even get in.
poolmom_sarah
New member
the 90 degree evening soak is really working against you. when the water temp is already elevated from the ambient heat and then body heat gets added on top, you're burning through sanitizer way faster than your test strips or reagents can capture in real time. by the time you dip a strip and it reads "fine," the free bromine has already crashed and the damage is done.
what worked for us was shocking immediately after getting out, not the next morning. even a quick non-chlorine shock right when everyone climbs out makes a noticeable difference in how the water looks the following day. also worth checking your water temp setting - we dropped ours from 102 to 99 in summer and it helped slow the chemistry churn down a little, which felt like less wear and tear on everything overall.
what worked for us was shocking immediately after getting out, not the next morning. even a quick non-chlorine shock right when everyone climbs out makes a noticeable difference in how the water looks the following day. also worth checking your water temp setting - we dropped ours from 102 to 99 in summer and it helped slow the chemistry churn down a little, which felt like less wear and tear on everything overall.
The part NC_Nick mentioned about oxidation is worth zeroing in on. A lot of people think cloudiness means their sanitizer is low, but what's actually happening is that combined bromines are building up faster than free bromine can keep pace with. The free bromine test reads "fine" because you're measuring total, but the water is full of used-up sanitizer that isn't doing any work and is actively clouding things up.
What helped me was being more consistent about shocking after every single soak, not just when things looked off. I was doing it once a week and that was clearly not enough during July and August when we were using the tub four or five nights a week. Once I started shocking the same evening we got out, the cloudiness stopped coming back every couple days. The filter runtime piece matters too, if yours is set to a short cycle during the day, bump it up and see if that helps carry some of the load.
What helped me was being more consistent about shocking after every single soak, not just when things looked off. I was doing it once a week and that was clearly not enough during July and August when we were using the tub four or five nights a week. Once I started shocking the same evening we got out, the cloudiness stopped coming back every couple days. The filter runtime piece matters too, if yours is set to a short cycle during the day, bump it up and see if that helps carry some of the load.
What the others have said about oxidation is correct, but I want to add one thing that tends to get overlooked when heat is involved - your total dissolved solids. When you're losing water to evaporation in 90 degree weather and topping off repeatedly, TDS climbs faster than most people expect, and cloudy water that keeps coming back despite good chemistry numbers is often a sign the water is just exhausted. Test your TDS if you haven't. Anything above 1500 ppm over your fill water baseline and you're fighting an uphill battle no matter how much you shock or how often you clean the filter. The fix at that point isn't more chemicals, it's a partial or full drain and refill. I know that's not the answer anyone wants to hear mid-summer but it's usually what finally breaks the cycle.