Getting sand in the pool

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T

Tek

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Mar 20, 2015
39
Louisville, KY
So it seems that I'm getting sand in my pool. My robot cleaned the entire pool yesterday and I noticed there was sand in its filter. After running the pump overnight I came out to find the bottom of my pool was dirty again so it has to be sand. The pool installer told me that the sand hasn't been changed out since the pool was installed in 2009. I just bought this house last month. So should I change the sand or am I looking at another problem?

I also can't seem to find sand locally. Leslies has something called Natural Zeolite Sand for a 25 pound bag for 25.00 each. That seems high...there are some other pool stores I can check at but I wanted to check here. I was planning on adding 4 gallons of bleach this morning but I really don't want to keep running my filter since it is losing sand.

Any thoughts?
 
Sand doesn't wear out, and there are generally few reasons to change it other than profit for the guy dong the job.

Now, a cracked lateral inside the filter can allow sand to be returned to the pool, but are you sure you get sand from the filter or is it blowing in from outside the pool? My robot gets sand almost every time he runs and I use him almost daily.....

I'm a believer in plain old sand, not the expensive fancy schmancy stuff.
 
You may have a crack in the laterals or other component inside the sand filter. You can check this by putting a sock over a return, preferably the one closest to the filter. Zip tie or otherwise fix the sock to the return and let the pump run. If you're accumulating sand in the sock, your filter is letting sand pass. This means you'll need to drain the sand filter and investigate. Perform this test and post results and we'll guide you from there.

The sand itself shouldn't need to be replaced. You can deep clean the sand but normally there's no reason to replace sand unless it's extremely gunked out and replacing is just easier than a deep clean. See this thread for how to deep clean a sand filter: http://www.troublefreepool.com/threads/73192-Deep-Cleaning-a-Sand-Filter

Zeolite is an expensive sand alternative. It works fine for some people, horribly for others. I believe it's dependent on the construction/make of the sand filter itself so it's a maybe it will work, maybe it won't. If you go down the road of replacing sand, check local big box stores (Home Depot, Lowes, WalMart, etc.) for pool sand. Brand doesn't matter just that it's pool sand, properly sized for sand filters.
 
Ok I have a sock over the return so I let that run for a bit and see. I'm pretty sure its coming from the filter because there isn't any sand around my pool deck. Both returns have sand near the bottom and then along the edges of the floor where it meets up with the wall. I've checked my local Lowes, Home Depot and Walmart, none of them had sand which is odd.

If this does have a broken lateral then I would definitely need to replace the sand right? I couldn't reuse it? Not that I have anywhere to store 325 pounds of sand. What about the lateral where could I get that from?

:( this is frustrating being my first pool and already having issues like this. I know I've seen much worse around here, but I feel pretty intimidated by resolving this myself. I don't have a shop vac so I would assume I need one to suck out the sand.
 
Best place to find parts for your filter is online. Amazon probably the best and since you have a Pentair, should be able to find parts.

Shop vac is fairly necessary to remove sand you'll at least need to do that to investigate the laterals. You could reuse the sand too. You could try to scoop it out manually and that can certainly be done, will just take a long time. If you do go the shop vac route, drain the filter by opening the drain on the bottom, then remove the top of the filter and let the sand dry during the day (HOPE FOR SUN!), easier to remove when sand is drier.

Check with your local Ace Hardware. I know they have the HTH brand pool sand and if they don't have it in store, they can order it in for you.
 
Thanks, I'm hoping this local store has them in stock. They are checking for me now, I want to make sure I can get the replacement sand and parts needed on hand before I start this repair. Even if the lateral is not the problem it would still be nice to have these on hand. If it wasn't the lateral what else could it be?
 
I buy my sand at the local sand, gravel, concrete or masonry supply. I think it's quite common for those places to stock #20 Quartz Filter Sand, and at the place I go to, it's $12 for a 100lb bag. It's high quality Unimen brand material. Make a few phone calls to those type places.
 
Thanks, I finally found a source for sand. Well I let the sock run over the return closest to the filter for a few hours. Zero sand inside so I've moved it to the other return. I did backwash yesterday but I rinsed as well...I really do not want to take this thing apart only to find out everything is okay. Maybe I should let my robot clean the pool again, check that sock in a few hours and go from there. I called a bunch of service places and everyone is booked until June so this sounds like I will need to do this myself if I want it done quickly and not affect my pool.
 
Progress. You know it's not coming from that return, may be the other but usually you'll get some from both of it's a filter problem. Stick with it and check the other returns, as you are.

# Sent from mobile device. Beware of brevity and spelling errors!
 

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All last year I had sand build up on my pool floor. It was because I hadn't aligned my lateral hub over its large rubber sealing washer, and there was a peep of a path for sand to escape into the return flow (old style Stainless Steel sand filter). It would blow a plume of sand at start up, but after that, it would settle into a happy state and not pass any more sand. I'm assuming the initial shock of the pump turn on was enough to pass the sand, but after that, the sand was stable enough to stay in place.

So...in the event you have a similar situation, I suggest you include some start/stop cycles to your testing. Just flip the pump switch on and off a few times.
 
Update: I didn't catch really any sand in the sock over the other return. So I was thinking well I did backwash the day before yesterday...maybe I didn't rinse enough. I let the robot clean the floor and let the pump run overnight. Came out this morning and sand again in the pool....So maybe my sock just wasn't catching it. I mean its not a huge amount...you can just see it build up in certain parts of the liner.

So I have 7 bags of sand, I ordered 8 laterals that will be here Saturday, I'm borrowing a shop vac to get the sand out and just go from there. At first I only ordered 3 laterals, but then I thought well if I'm going to remove all this sand then I better replace them all while I have the access. I just hope that solves the problem.

One other thing that I hope can get answered here as I didn't want to start a new thread. My manual air release valve started leaking water out of the area where the water/air normally comes out. I've turned it to tighten it, but a small trickle of water seems to continue to come out. If I open it up then of course some air but mostly water comes out. Is this a bad valve? Bad o ring?
 
JVTrain said:
Also, you may have found it already but here is the manual for your filter. Has all parts listed. If you do need repair parts just search google or amazon for the part number. http://www.pentairpool.com/pdfs/TagelusTopMountFilterOM.pdf

For instance, the laterals for your filter are part number 152290, searching on amazon, here's the top result and your proper replacement part: http://www.amazon.com/Pentair-15229...ie=UTF8&qid=1430921852&sr=8-1&keywords=152290
Click to expand...

Turns out these are not the right parts...ugh this is frustrating. I got all the sand out and then took out the laterals to learn the replacements don't even fit...

It seems like the parts for the model TA100 are in my filter. Look...So I would need PN 152202

Tazn65w.jpg


The black laterals are what was inside my filter and the white ones are what I ordered...It doesn't make sense, its almost like someone used the wrong standpipe in the filter.

So at this point I'm not sure if I should order this standpipe

http://www.amazon.com/Pentair-15506...t-Tagelus/dp/B004UHFLAS/ref=pd_bxgy_lg_text_y

Which looks totally different from the one I currently have in there....

This is the one I have

4600-5063.jpg


So should I be concerned that my water is at a standstill since yesterday? I can order the right laterals for my standpipe or order this other standpipe, but either way I'm down until Tuesday. No one local carries any parts.

Is it worth it to put the multiport back on the filter and just run it in recirculate mode to get the water moving?
 
If it's not the en of the world to put the multi port back on, recirculate would be best. Second would be to add liquid chlorine and give,the pool a good brushing to move it around/mix it up.
 
That is what I ended up doing, I figured that was better than just letting the water sit there. Hopefully replacing these laterals will fix the problem. They all seemed to look okay though. I didn't notice any broken pieces on them...
 
I'm still getting sand in the pool!!

I've replaced the laterals and the standpipe, I filled the tank half full with water and then added the sand back to the filter. Then I backwashed for about 4-5 mins and rinsed afterwards for another 40 seconds or so.

What else could it be? The multiport?
 
How much sand are we talking? I get about a teaspoon in my water after I backwash and rinse. What I do now is I hook a skimmer sock to the return line before I backwash and rinse. Then when I turn the pump back to filter the sand goes in there. I take it off after a few mins and then I am fine.
 
Backwashing and rinsing will get clean the majority of sand dust and undersized particles from your sand bed but you will still see some small amount of sand expelled into the pool for the first 10 minutes or so of operation. Just run the system and it should diminish in that time frame as the sand beds in. That may repeat to a lessening degree for subsequent backwash cycles.
 

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