LisaBgame said:

I think I could access it that way but I can’t unscrew the unions. It’s really tight. Is there a special tool I can get for that?

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Just want to offer support for your effort. Good job.

For now or the future: you should have a small, portable pump for such occasions, when your pad is out of commission. I have this one:
And I always forget which one @Newdude recommends.

You can use these pumps to exchange water better and safer than your main pump. And they can keep your pool circulating enough to keep the green at bay should your pad ever stop working. At least well enough and long enough for a spare part or repairman to show up. In this case, you could probably keep your SLAM going well enough while you deal with your filter.

Obviously, you'll lose the filtering aspect of a SLAM while your filter is down, but the little pump would keep your FC at SLAM level, so you wouldn't lose ground.

If you can't wait for an Amazon delivery, these types of pumps are readily available at Lowes, HD and Harbor Freight. You could probably even rent one for a few days, if you don't want to decide right now which pump to get, or don't want to spring for it just now.

If you end up with your own, you break it out for emergencies, then pack it away in your garage for the next one. I've used mine to empty my pool a bit for a water exchange, but now it's up on a shelf awaiting its big hero debut. It's cheap insurance, especially considering (as you know) how expensive the chlorine is to perform a SLAM.

Great. Let's get 30ppm of stabilizer in socks. Hang in front of returns, carrot on a stick style. Let it dissolve. You can squeeze the sock to help it dissolve.

Once the sock hits the water, assume your CYA is 50 (your test looks like *maybe* 20, and you are adding 30, so 50 for now). Add enough liquid chlorine to get your FC up to the top of the range for your CYA of 50. See here. Link-->FC/CYA Levels
Turn your chlorinator up to 40%. Will likely be too high for this time of the year, but that is ok. Remember, FC up to SLAM level is ok for people and equipment. Better to be high, than low. You may be switching your cell between 20/40/60, to keep your FC in range. FC is consumed by UV primarily. Shoulder seasons (April/May and Sept/Oct) UV is lower. June July Aug, UV is higher. You just need to adjust your %output up and down to maintain FC in range for your CYA.

Once the CYA is dissolved, wait 24-48 hours and retest CYA.
CYA - Cyanuric Acid Test

The pump side is more difficult.
The easiest would be to set your pump speed at 2200 for all three programs and forget about it. 2200, with a superflo should give you the 30GPM the heater needs. Gas heaters are better at heating quickly, HP do better when maintaining a temp. The best strategy may be to just run the 2200 and HP on all the time to maintain temp.

The alternative is to test the RPM to run the SWG. Use the down arrows to lower the RPM, until the low flow light comes on the SWG. Then add 200 RPM and program your pump to run at that speed 24/7. When you want to heat, and you turn on the heater, you will need to re-program your superflo to run 2200 RPM 24/7.

We are pinching pennies with the pump and the HP. Running a low speed, like 1400 will be $20/month electricity cost, 2200 will be like $60/month. Being a teacher with an infant, (*I don't know*??), $$ is important. Programming/re-programming the pump to run SWG at low flow 1400 vs. 2200 when you want to run HP is a chore. The trade-off is yours to decide. If you have the funds, set the pump to run 2200 24/7 and forget it.



Use muriatic acid to lower your pH to 7.2 to 7.4. Do it in .4 increments. Add enough to lower pH by .4, wait 30 minutes, and test, add again until you get 7.2 to 7.4. Then leave pH alone. It will rise naturally. When pH gets over 8 (purple hues), repeat the process to lower to 7.2-7.4. When you add acid, pH and TA drops. pH will rise naturally. Over time your TA will come down. When TA gets to 60-80, STOP lowering pH to 7.2-7.4, pH should stabilize around 7.8-8.0, which is just fine. I would test your fill water for TA.

At this point, other than maintaining FC for your CYA, and maintaining a pH in the range of 7.0 to 8.0, you are golden.

Good Job!

PoolStored said:

You can get the kit for +£125.

Amazon.co.uk

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We Would go through the standard taylor kit in like 3 weeks... we do multiple chlorine tests a day usually, we get 250 tests for the palintest system for around £18.

when i got a quote from the pool shop linked to this forum to the UK, the price, including the extra re-agents was well over £300 including import tax.. Definitely not worth it but still cheaper than the amazon kit

Its a shame its only produced in the states and we cant get a reliable source over here..

H

Thank you everyone, problem resolved. USPS found my package.

Lake Placid said:

That’s what I was afraid of. If you unscrew the unions to the filter, can you access the broken piston through the bottom port that connects to the filter?

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I think I could access it that way but I can’t unscrew the unions. It’s really tight. Is there a special tool I can get for that?

You can get the kit for +£125.

PoolStored said:

This is a new product. Any reviews and insights you have would be valuable.

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I will report back when I have the data.

Morning reading:
FC: 4
Cc: .5

So I passed the overnight test. Ok. So what’s next from my reading above? Stabilizer? More muriatic acid to bring TA down?

Also, what should I modify my pump schedule to be. 24 hours at what RPMs?

Or do you recommend a different schedule? I plan to have one of the three options to be 2200 rpms for when I run my heat pump.

Oh, and Intellicenter probably works the same as my EasyTouch: it can analyze which heat source can best heat a pool for current conditions, and control both solar panels and your heat pump to get you to temp and maintain it in the most cost-effective way. I've never tried this, as I've never turned on my gas heater once, but that's how the manual describes it.

Have you considered solar heating? Is that a thing in AZ? I'm in Central CA. I get about 5-10° extra each day during swim season, and maybe a couple extra weeks on each side of swim season. It wouldn't heat the pool enough in the winter though. I installed it myself and saved $7K. And now it costs me nothing to heat my pool.

It's not the the best way to get a pool warmer, but the price is right! And it allows me to swim more days and hours than without it. It was a good ROI.

PoolStored said:

Clean your test vial with rubbing alcohol and retest FC and CC. Let us know results.
Use a 10mL sample and each drop is .5 FC/CC. Will save reagent.

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We are currently using a PalinTest 6 kit, DPD reagent with a Photometer, the kit recommended to us on here is solely in the USA and the struggle is a +£300 kit… but cleaning it is a very good suggestion with IPA as I haven’t done that, it gets a scrub and dunk in pool water lol!

JamesW said:

6,000 people in a 20,000 gallon pool is very high use.

Can you explain the nature of the bather load?

Is this a hotel, gym or what?

How much "Chlorine" smell is there?

How much dilution do you get?

What is the water clarity?

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Sure - we are a private home swimming pool but allow locals to use the pool & pay by the hour. It’s a domestic pool which we have oversized the chlorinator & filter for this reason.

Chlorine smell is actually minimal, sometimes we have a “busy” period with up to 150 people in the pool over 12hrs, in which there is a mild chlorine smell but the bather is unaffected, we have received no complaints to water quality nor “over chlorination“ as swimmers tend to call it (Chloramines)

Dilution is not huge but more is done naturally by the deposition of water out of the pool and sides and back flushing the filter, I’d say 3-5m3 a week?

Clarity is crystal clear!!! - that’s the irony and part of the problem, the owner of the pool just goes “ah, it’s clear, we are getting no complaints and our chlorine levels are sanitary” (we also have ORP readings live to check for sanitation as a guide) - which is part of the problem..

But I’m just trying to make sure we are doing everything to ensure the maximum comfort to our swimmers & protection of our liner etc.

Lake Placid said:

To add to the others commentary what are you using for air exchanges for the pool area? Indoor pools without proper exhaust/outside air exchanges can suffer from high CC because the offgassing of CC has nowhere to exhaust to.

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Every night we open the doors slightly, and leave the cover 50% off to allow off gas, especially during a SLAM after a busy period. We do notice a reduction in CC after the Slam, but it never seems to reduce to a level that we class as “normal” hence why I believe we are in Perisitent CC’s and trying to figure out how to get them out..

Thanks to everyone for their feedback so far, I will do some digging into commercial UV. Does this same UV also reduce levels of FC as well as CC?

Let me know what you think

Just received my EVO 604 today. I'm holding a lot of optimism for it.

For the life of me, I could not get the buttons on the power unit to respond. Neither the Mode nor the Start/Stop were working. It was in the pool but I could not get it to start.

Out of frustration, I starting forcefully hitting the Mode button in rapid succession and it started switching modes.

Then I did the same thing to the Start/Stop button. At some point the robot started moving, so I haven't touched any buttons since. It is about to stop its first 2.5-hour program as I write this. I hope they start working more consistently soon.

Is this common? Do the buttons need to be "broken in"?

I noticed that it stirs up a lot of fine dust as it is trying to vacuum it up. Pool is pretty cloudy now. This is my first robot, so I am assuming this is just normal. Tomorrow I'll do another run to get any missed spots and get whatever was stirred up today and settled.

Vandenburg said:

I've never had any problems with the remote connecting to the base station. However, recently I had to replace the water temperature sensor. Now the system is sensing the temperature just fine (so that now the heater is coming on like it should), but since then the remote says it cannot connect to the base station. Strangely though, if I switch from pool to spa, or to spillover, when it is taking the 30 seconds to switch valves the remove connects just like always. As soon as the filter kicks in, the remote can no longer connect to the base station. When I replaced the water temperature sensor it was only two simple wires and I didn't touch or change anything else. I've tried removing the new temp sensor but I still get the same behavior with the remote. I've also tried disconnecting the base station receiver and power cycling the entire system by shutting the breakers off for about 30 minutes. My first thought was that I needed to re-train the remote but it would not and obviously not needed since it will communicate while the valves are cycling.
Any ideas?

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Don't be afraid of your system. Do a re-train, you lose nothing. Change the channel the parts use to communicate. It sounds like perhaps electrical noise is interfering with the radio signal. It is amazing how just starting from the beginning can solve so many problems with those systems.
Are there any high-voltage and low-voltage wires running together in the same side of the control panel? That can cause the issue and should never be done.

I'd be concerned that the free gas heater was "free" because it's on its last leg.
How old is the gas heater?
What condition is it in?
Any rust?

Have you checked local codes yet about burying a propane tank in the front yard in a residential neighborhood.
What kind of permitting will be required?

squampool said:

Previous owners covered this with a sheet of vinyl and filled one in with calk. I’m on a mission to fix it. However, I scoured the Internet, looking for six screw return fittings and couldn’t find anything. They could be pretty old. Also, the inner part is cracked so I’m going to see if I can replace it

The outer dark ring is 8 inches in diameter. The inner jet is 1.5 inches.

Thanks in Advance!

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The fittings and the "six-screw" pieces are separate. Those appear to be Waterway spa jets. The missing piece is a trim ring, probably chrome-plated plastic that the spa manufacturer used to make it pretty. Have never seen the trim screwed into the vessel, they usually are press fit or bayonetted onto the jet. May have to contact the spa manufacturer to find what they used.
As old as that spa appears, it was probably built at a time when "everybody" thought they could manufacture a spa shell, throw some equipment into it, sometimes special order, and go broke two years later. It has taken decades for there to be at least some "normal standard" in spa and spa equipment manufacturers. Then you run into Sundance or old Jacuzzi and its DC system.

Alexr54 said:

If speeds are the only benefit then i dont think it matters to me.
Ive been going with a single speed pump for many years.
Im not even sure what the benefit is by having a variable speed.

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Single-speed pumps are no longer legal in the US. Single speed pumps waste energy. Slow water gets cleaner, is easier on the equipment. There is virtually no noise at the low speeds a VSP can and should run in most cases. With a VSP and SWG the cost to produce chlorine in terms of energy use are less. Filters don't need to be cleaned as often and the cleanings are easier. You enjoy the pool, work on it less, pay less for filtration.

What exact test kit are you using again? Add your test kit to your signature.
You'd be better off with the K-1766 (or equivalent) drop based salt test instead of a salt meter.
Use the drop based test for pH as well - not the meter.

5 days ago you reported CYA of 30. Today you reported CYA of 20 - and zero FC.
Don't add any CYA quite yet. First do an Overnight Chlorine Loss Test to rule out a nascent algae bloom.
Most likely, you're already settled in for the night so first thing in the morning, add 1/2 gallon of liquid chlorine to get FC to the 4-5 range. You will also need to add more chlorine later in the day as thesun will burn off the FC at a low CYA. You may need to add more chlorine in prep for the OCLT as well.

If you pass the OCLT, then bump up the CYA. If you don't pass thr OCLT, you will need to SLAM Process - and that will be easier at a CYA around 30.

You need to get your pH down into the 7's. But I think you need to redo theTA test first and be sure to take the TA test to its end point. Continue to add drops until the color doesn't change and then subtract the last drop. Report the result in multiples of 10. Once you have a new TA number, we can discuss the next steps to adjust pH and possible the TA as well. If you need to SLAM, you will need to lower the pH prior to starting.

Let's discuss the CH after we know a bit more about all of the above.

Wow - I am surprised the TA isn't higher.
Do you happen to know the source your city uses for tap water?
Are you in Phoenix proper or one of the 'burbs?
Likely the TA will be higher late summer thru early fall.

In Phoenix, even if you can't swim in it, it still needs to be maintained. 5-10 minutes once weekly to check FC and pH is about all it takes. FC usage is minimal in winter here. With our mild temos this past winter, I only used 1 gallon of liquid chlorine all winter as my SWG produced chlorine except for a few weeks.

Get your drain/refill done, pool balanced and look into plumbing the water softener to the autofill.

Keep us in the loop as you progress.

Cannonballish

Bperry said:

I don’t know enough about liner pools to advise on that portion. Some nuts have metal walls with seemingly not much bracing and I’ve seen others that pour a giant concrete footing around the base of the walls. Maybe someone more knowledgeable than me can comment on details.

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Yeah I'll have to look up photos of vinyl pools and their footings and maybe just have to dig down and explore myself in the next few days. I have an appointment with call before you dig to tell me were all the electrical and other lines run and they come in 5 days so I probably have to wait until that time to explore deeper down.

PoolStored said:

That looks more like a fiberglass pool that was retrofitted with a liner. Might search TFP for fiberglass pools with vinyl liners.

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Interesting. Hummm I'll take a better look at it tomorrow for sure. If I take down the vinyl then I should see the fiberglass underneath correct? As I feel like I just see the metal framing.
Bit I'll look more tomorrow and report back.

Welcome to TFP.

Maybe @1poolman1 is old enough to have an idea.

See "No drain water exchange" here to get your CYA to a manageable leve:

Welcome to TFP.

What model pump and heater do you have?

Vandenburg said:

.As soon as the filter kicks in, the remote can no longer connect to the base station.

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Filter kicking in? The filter is a passive non-electrical device. Please explain.

Welcome to TFP.

You say you jumpered the Fireman's Switch to run the heater from its control panel?

Does the heater run properly in standalone mode from its control panel?

Get the heater running standalone before working on the EasyTouch problems.

What part number heater PCB board did you install?