As the pool swim season rapidly approaches it’s time to get your pool back into shape.  One of the most important steps in sanitizing your pool water and getting rid of any algae that may have developed on the walls and floor of your pool is “shocking” your water with chlorine. This simply means to add enough chlorine to your pool water to oxidize any bacteria that may exist in your pool water. Shocking your pool with chlorine also helps to make your pool water sparkle as the chlorine dissolves or oxidizes tiny organic particles that exist in the water. However, before you add chlorine to your pool it is absolutely necessary to balance the PH of your pool water by adding the proper amount of muriatic acid if the PH is high, or adding a PH product (available at your pool store) to raise the PH if it is low. An important fact that few pool owners know is that it takes nearly 10 times the amount of chlorine to shock or sanitize your pool water at a PH of 8.0 than with a PH of 7.2-7.4. So do yourself a favor and save money as well, balance the PH of the pool water before adding any chlorine. Keep in mind that chlorine shock or granular chlorine, as well as, liquid chlorine have a high PH from the manufacturing process. Therefore, when you are lowering your PH it is a good idea to add a little extra muriatic acid to compensate for the amount of shock/chlorine that you will be adding to your pool.