Need help opening for the first time

[stillios]

Thanks to this awesome forum and the TFP app, I am confident handling the water once the pool is opened, but I have never physically opened the pool before. Our pool guy is swamped, and we can't get him here soon enough for the kids to stop begging, so I want to try to do this. I think I can handle the cover, skimmer, returns, and ladder, but I need help to make sure I don't screw up the pump/filter/heater set up. Here is the equipment, including photos of the three things I found stored inside the pump basket and some plastic rings (?) that may have been sitting on top of the heater all winter. Could you please help me figure out where these pieces go? Feel free to provide ANY advice! Thank you!

 

[ajw22]

The two wing nuts in your hand are the pump drain plugs that go on the lower side of the pump.

The round plug in your hand is the filter drain plug that goes in the bottom of the filter.

Get some Pool Lube - Further Reading and put it on every O ring you handle. Including the pump lid O ring.

I am not sure where what look like unions on the top of the heater go. Show me pics of a side view of them. And post daylight pics of your equipment.

Pull on all of your pipes and see if anything is loose.

 

[ajw22]

 

[ajw22]

Close this drain valve…

 

[stillios]

Thank you so much! I am attaching daylight photos (sorry about that -- we decided last night we wanted to tackle this today). I figured out what the big plastic rings are for in the light of day. It looks like the pool guy also left the top valve to our old sand filter when he replaced it with a cartridge filter last spring. Found it in the landscaping, and those rings fit on it. I closed the drain valve. I do have some of that lubricant and will be sure to use it on the O-rings. We are getting ready to take the cover off. Thanks again!

 

[ajw22]

Interesting setup you have with dual iChlor 30's. I have not seen that before.

Having them plumbed in parallel means you need to run a higher pump speed and flow to make their flow switch happy then if they were plumbed in series.

 

[stillios]

We moved into this house in 2021, and supply chains were still atrocious due to Covid. We really wanted a salt system after learning what a disaster maintaining with chlorine tabs is and discovering TFP, but we couldn't get an iChlor 60 at the time. iChlor 60 may have been overkill, but I was afraid 40 wouldn't be enough. So our new pool guy installed two 30s in parallel. And, yes, the pump has to run at a higher speed, but it has been working out pretty well!

Everything seems to be working appropriately out there now. Thanks again for your guidance!

 

[ajw22]

There is no iChlor60. There is the IntelliChlor IC60 cell which is a different and more robust system then the iChlor system.

When your iChor30 cell fails, which it will as a consumable, replace the two iChlor30's with an IC60. It uses the same Power Pack and will just take some PVC adjustment.