hayward s244t with intex pump?

[mdp2146]

Hey guys and gals,

I just got an intex 22'x52" pool. I was lucky enough to have someone give me a hayward s244t sand filter - closing a pool and didn't need it. So my question is: can I temporarily use the 2500 gph pump that came with the pool with the sand filter? My plan is to get a good 1hp motor in the near future but I would like to get the filter running asap. Anybody have any idea if this is feasible? I can handle the piping and connections, just wondering about the pump size/flow.

Thanks for all the great info you share here. This site is awesome!

 

[JamesW]

That should work just fine.

Also, I wouldn't go to a 1 HP pump on that pool. Even a 1/2 HP pump would be more than enough.

 

[mdp2146]

Thanks for the reply James!

I was able to hook the sand filter up yesterday and everything seems to be working perfectly. I just wanted to update this so anyone searching in the future will know that this will work. I can't speak to how long the pump will hold up, but using the s244t and 300 lbs of sand I have a little over 4 psi and great flow. I'll try to post a few pics when I get online with something other than my phone.

Thanks again to everyone here who shares their time and knowledge!

 

[jblizzle]

The only issue you may have is inadequate flow when trying to backwash with that pump. Although you can always open up the filter and do the Deep Cleaning

 

[Charlie_R]

This is what you have for a pool pump wet end:

The shaft and seal end:



The impeller:



The housing:



Great for moving large amounts of water, not so great with building any sort of pressure.

As anyone that works with fluid prime movers will tell you, this style of pump will have a huge amount of "slippage". This means that when called on to supply higher pressures, it will recirculate internally more than actually moving fluid to build pressure.

 

[JamesW]

When backwashing, there should not be much pressure. If the pump can do the rated flow, then it can do about 13 to 14 gpm per square foot of sand filter area, which should be pretty good.

 

[Charlie_R]

The Intex 1500 and 2500 gph pump appear to me to have been designed for low head loss systems, thus the cheap style of impeller. For their sand filters, they went with a more traditional volute for moving the water, so it can still function properly with the higher resistance to flow from a sand filter.

 

[mdp2146]

So when my sand starts clogging with particles and my pressure starts climbing, I may see a reduction in flow fairly quickly? This means I will have to backwash more frequently than with a better pump, right? Are there drawbacks to doing this? I had hoped this setup would make it though this season but I don't want to make this whole pool experience any harder than needs to be. I'll be keeping a close eye on it. As of this morning I'm still holding a little over 4 psi. The pool is not being used much this week, but next week I'm sure the kids will be in it every day.

I plan to keep my water level below the return nozzle this season so changes in return flow should be noticable. I'll try to take a few pics as the pressure increases and show the return flow. I'll keep you updated.

Thanks again!

 

[jblizzle]

Regardless of the pump, you should backwash when the pressure rises 20-25% over the clean pressure. So once you hit 5psi, you should backwash ... and hopefully the little intex pump will not stop moving the water with only a 1psi increase.

 

[scooperhsd]

And if the little Impex pump is not up to it - there are a number of smaller regular above ground pool pumps that would work nicely. Hayward Powerflo series, Pentair Dynamo series are both fine pumps and by no means an exhautive list of pumps that would work.

 

[mdp2146]

Here is the setup, without the SWG


I took this after running the pump 48 hours. My pressure has climbed from 4.5 to 5.5 psi


This is the flow I have at 5.5 psi. I'm gonna let it build up a little more and take another set of pictures for reference. After backwashing, I will repeat the process. Stay tuned to see how the little Intex pump performs...

 

[jblizzle]

Looks kind of funny to me with that little pump. You might want to consider getting one of the gauge from tftestkits that only goes to 30 and will be easier to see pressure rises.

 

[JamesW]

I think that your current setup should work fairly well as long as you follow good maintenance procedures like not waiting too long to backwash and never allowing the FC to drop below 7.5 % of the cya.