Priming intelliflo VS+SVRS and setup question

[loweran]

All,

I have two separate questions:

1. My pump always starts up at full speed. I set the prime speed with the controller (intellitouch) but the pump still kicks on at full speed, then ramps down to set speed. Do I understand the prime feature correctly? I thought the prime speed set the speed in which the pump kicks off, and parameters of how to prime the pump.

Just answered this one myself. RTFM! lol
2. PB replaced my ET8 with an Intellitouch system. I noticed the pump was set up as an Intelliflo VS, and when I go into the pump setup it says it will change this setting to the Intelliflo VSF+SVRS. Should I do that, or leave it as it. Pump seems to be working fine.

 

[mas985]

I am not sure but it is possible that the setting might have an impact on the SVRS capability so just to be safe, I would set it to the proper pump type.

 

[loweran]

Got the pump type figured out as per the comment in the post. I am still trying to sort out the max speed start on the pump.

 

[loweran]

Alright, I answered question 1 myself as well. Seems that the pump has to be disconnected from the controller to set the priming parameters. Anyone have any ideas what I should set it to? I am thinking I will start with increasing the percentage of prime sensitivity and see if that cures it.

Anyone know what the priming setting in the Intellitouch controller do?

 

[loweran]

Well, I played around with it tonight and could not get the pump to not start up at full speed. I moved the percent all the way to 100 and it still went to full speed. The only way to get it to not do that was to turn off priming.

Any ideas?

 

[mas985]

I believe that is the way it is suppose to work. With priming enabled, the pump will start at the maximum speed when the pump is turned on. Eventually, it should drop to the RPM setting. What are you expecting the pump to do?

Page 19 of manual:

The Default setting for Priming is disabled. Enabling this feature allows the pump to use its "Flow Technology"
to make sure the pump is primed when it starts. This feature will not override the "Max Speed" setting. The
priming feature ramps the pump to 1800 RPM and pauses for three (3) seconds. If there is sufficient water flow
in the pump basket the pump will go out of priming mode and run its commanded speed. If the flow in the
pump basket is not sufficient, the pump will ramp to the "Max Speed" setting and stay there for the priming
delay time, which is defaulted at 20 seconds. If there is sufficient water flow in the pump basket at this time, it
will go out of priming mode and ramp to the commanded speed. If there is still insufficient flow in the pump
basket, the pump will try to prime at the "Maximum Speed" for the amount of time set up in the "Maximum
Priming Time" menu.

Maximum Priming Time: The Maximum Priming Time can be set from 1 minute to 30 minutes. The default
setting is 11 minutes. This is the maximum amount of time the pump will try to prime before giving an error.
However if the pump does not see a sufficient amount of water in the pump basket this can cause the pump to
report a Dry Priming Alarm within seconds of the beginning of the priming cycle.
Priming Dry Alarm: An insufficient amount of water in the basket during priming will cause the pump to report
a Priming Dry Alarm. The basket should be filled with water and the pump restarted when this alarm occurs.
Note: When a Priming Dry Alarm takes place it will try to restart after 10 minutes, unlike a pump which
will not restart after a Priming Dry Alarm.

Primed Sensitivity: The primed sensitivity can be set from 1% to 100%. The factory default setting is 1%
meaning that the pump is at its most sensitive setting in regards to determining if the pump has attained a prime
or not. Increasing this number will decrease the amount of flow needed for the pump to sense that it is primed.
Making this number too high could cause the pump to think it has attained a prime and evacuated the air from
the system when it has not. If the system is such, that the pump has trouble coming out of the priming mode and
it is evident that the pump basket is full of water and flowing then the Primed Sensitivity number can be
increased.

Priming Delay: The priming delay can be set from 1 second to 10 minutes. The default setting is 20 seconds.
This means the pump will ramp to 1800 RPM and stay there for three (3) seconds which it will always do in the
hard Priming Mode. If there is sufficient flow in the pump basket, the pump will then go out of priming mode
and ramp to its commanded speed. If there is insufficient water flow in the pump basket the pump will ramp to
the Max Speed Setting and stay there for the default time of 20 seconds. It may be necessary to increase the
prime delay to allow the system to stabilize before the pump goes into running mode. If the pump errors out
immediately after priming, then increasing the Priming Delay time may correct the issue.

 

[loweran]

I expect it to do this:

The Default setting for Priming is disabled. Enabling this feature allows the pump to use its "Flow Technology"
to make sure the pump is primed when it starts. This feature will not override the "Max Speed" setting. The
priming feature ramps the pump to 1800 RPM and pauses for three (3) seconds. If there is sufficient water flow
in the pump basket the pump will go out of priming mode and run its commanded speed.

The pump is full with no air when it starts up. I would expect the pump to "sense" that and run at the speed for the given program. I really only have two issues with the way it starts up at 3450 RPM.

• 1. In the winter when it's cold, the freeze protection cycles the pump on and off. The darn thing starts off every time at 3450, which is quite loud.

• 2. When I am backwashing the pump fires off at 3450 which puts a lot of stress on the rubber backwash hose and sometimes snaps them.

 

[JeffJeff]

I have the same issue. I tried everything in the panel and on the pump to try to get the pump to not start at full RPM. I have the same pump on my water features and it never starts at full RPM.

 

[JasonLion]

Have you tried setting "Max Speed" to something below 3450 RPM? That is supposed to limit the max speed in all situations, including priming.

The pump can't really tell directly if there is air in the system or not. I relies on an indirect measure of the current drawn by the motor. For that to work, it has to run at a somewhat high speed for little while accumulating an average current draw reading. It is supposed to be able to do that at 1800 RPM, but if the reading doesn't stabilize quickly enough it will proceed to the Max Speed setting and try again at that speed.