30 min. of hose flush and still nasty water (sand filter)

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D

DougieFla

0
Mar 27, 2012
30
I'm resurecting the green, neglected pool at my new house. I have gotten the water cleaned up, all chemicals adjusted and just replaced the noisy leaking pump with a 1hp two speed Whisperflo.
The pressure at the sand filter was 19psi (with new pressure gauge) even after backwashing. The previous owners had the 1.5" backwash plumbed down to 3/4" that they could attach a hose to for water the lawn (I'm guessing).
I redid the inlet plumbing to the filter and the backwash plumbing, staying with all 1.5".
I backwashed the filter and only clean water came out. The pressure may have only dropped .5 psi.
Decided to pull the top cap and do the hose flush trick.
Instantly the water coming out was discustingly brown with lots of large particles flowing out. After 30 minutes of flushing and gently moving the hose to different spots the overflow water cleared up a little but still had LOTS of large paint chips/dead algae/hair/brush bristles/other random dirt-like stuff pouring out. I put the cap back on and purged the air out. Pressure was down to 16.
Should I continue flushing it or just wash the sand out and replace?

The filter is a Pentair Triton II but I'm not sure if it's a 50 or 60. All my measurements are just a little off from what they have posted.

50lbs bags of sand from the PS are about 10 bucks. It would be about 40-50 bucks for replacement sand... and the peace of mind that all is good and clean. I would also add some DE to help the filtering.
 
Re: 30 min. of hose flush and still nasty water (sand filter

The previous owners had the house for 12 years and I highly doubt they did much of any maintenance on the pool other than dump 4+ gallons of bleach in a week... and make sure the auto feeder was full of tablets running WFO.

I would guess the sand is origional and from the early to mid 1990's
 
Re: 30 min. of hose flush and still nasty water (sand filter

If that's the case I would just replace the sand. A least then you know what you got. Is the pool at least getting better looking? Can you limp it along until it get clearer before you replace the sand or is it to far gone?
 
Re: 30 min. of hose flush and still nasty water (sand filter

Actually the filter is Pre Dec. 1, 1991. According to the manual and threads on the cap. So the sand may be over 20 years old...

Water is clear and balanced.
 
Re: 30 min. of hose flush and still nasty water (sand filter

I'm normally of the opposing opinion on changing sand, but if it's that bad it may be easier, and it appears that it will definitely be quicker, to change it rather than waste time and water trying to get it clean.
 
Re: 30 min. of hose flush and still nasty water (sand filter

I changed the sand. It took 275lbs of sand... so it looks like I know which filter I have, TR-60. While draining the sand out, it was non stop chunks of some rather large matter (maybe lint?) floating on top of the sand.
The pressure before change (but after 30 minutes of flushing) was 16psi, after the change it dropped to 15psi. I also picked up some DE and added it to the filter until I reached 16 -16.5psi.

Now we sha'll see if the pool gets any more sparklier.
Thanks for the input guys/gals!
 

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