Hi everyone.
I am the head of maintenance for two hotels and about two years ago we converted our pools and spas to salt water. Since then we have been losing heat exchangers to the tune of one every 6 months or so, in each heater! I thought this was due to the salt water but after several hours of combing through the posts here I am seeing that this shouldn't be causing me any additional problems so now I'm wondering what might be wrong and I am hoping you guys can help!
Here are the details of the pool that is currently giving me problems:
Indoor pool
Fiberglass wall, concrete floor
16,000 gallons
87 degrees
PH is kept pretty steady at 7.5
Chlorine residual is kept around 4.0 - 5.0 ppm
Salt residual is kept around 4000 ppm
Intellichlor IC60 SWG with Intellichem controller
Hayward H250ASME boiler
70 - 75 gpm flow rate
If there are any other details you need just ask.
We had been using the non ASME boiler prior to switching to salt and were replacing heat exchangers in those every 1 1/2 - 2 years. After the first couple failed after the salt conversion my sales guy told me the ASME model was rated for salt and that running salt through the other ones automatically voided the warranty. I switched all of my boilers over to the ASME and within 8 months all four had failed. Now I have one failing again and to make things worse, the ASME exchanger has been on backorder with no estimated date of delivery available.
So, are there any ideas what may be my problem if not the salt? Is Hayward just a crappy boiler? Please help!!
On a secondary question. We are looking into switching to a different brand boiler or even an indirect heat exchanger system since Hayward can't seem to get me the parts I need and have had such a bad track record so far. Any advice on what would be better for me?
Thank you in advance for any help you can give me!
I am the head of maintenance for two hotels and about two years ago we converted our pools and spas to salt water. Since then we have been losing heat exchangers to the tune of one every 6 months or so, in each heater! I thought this was due to the salt water but after several hours of combing through the posts here I am seeing that this shouldn't be causing me any additional problems so now I'm wondering what might be wrong and I am hoping you guys can help!
Here are the details of the pool that is currently giving me problems:
Indoor pool
Fiberglass wall, concrete floor
16,000 gallons
87 degrees
PH is kept pretty steady at 7.5
Chlorine residual is kept around 4.0 - 5.0 ppm
Salt residual is kept around 4000 ppm
Intellichlor IC60 SWG with Intellichem controller
Hayward H250ASME boiler
70 - 75 gpm flow rate
If there are any other details you need just ask.
We had been using the non ASME boiler prior to switching to salt and were replacing heat exchangers in those every 1 1/2 - 2 years. After the first couple failed after the salt conversion my sales guy told me the ASME model was rated for salt and that running salt through the other ones automatically voided the warranty. I switched all of my boilers over to the ASME and within 8 months all four had failed. Now I have one failing again and to make things worse, the ASME exchanger has been on backorder with no estimated date of delivery available.
So, are there any ideas what may be my problem if not the salt? Is Hayward just a crappy boiler? Please help!!
On a secondary question. We are looking into switching to a different brand boiler or even an indirect heat exchanger system since Hayward can't seem to get me the parts I need and have had such a bad track record so far. Any advice on what would be better for me?
Thank you in advance for any help you can give me!