We currently have an 18' round above ground pool that came with the house and are interested in getting a bigger one at some point. I found a listing for a 16x30 above ground pool on marketplace. The owner says it's an Esther WIlliams pool from the mid 80s, it's already disassembled, and he says there's no holes or corrosion. Comes with a sand filter, a hayward heater that may or may not work (was worth $3k when purchased), and needs a new liner. He doesn't have the assembly instructions but says he took photos from when it was disassembled. He wants $6,500.


Are these pools even worth buying since it's almost 40 years old? And is $6,500 a reasonable price.

?

Seeing as this is a new pool robot was wondering if there are any reviews of performance,,

New to SoFL area and new to pool ownership. Realizing it’s coming up on the rainy season here. Any suggestions on what to look out for besides the weather forecast and gunite shooting timing? Very nervous. Thanks to all suggestions.

If anyone is finding this 16 years later trying to find replacement screws I think I solved it. The new screws are 1/4"-14 x 1 1/2" sheet metal screws. They used to be 20 tpi, but they changed them. After realizing you cannot get machine screws (they style with the blunt end like these are) with 14 tpi. I looked closer at the set of screws I had from pentair (CVASCRJ) and measured them. They come in shy of 1.5" around 1 3/8". By the looks of the end, they are taking standard sheet metal screws and grinding the point off of them to make them flat. Instead of buying their overpriced ones, I will be doing the same. I hope this helps someone in 2025!

I'm in the process of ordering a new stack flue sensor for my MT400 and the tech that was out today suggested I upgrade my control board as well. He spoke pretty highly of the new 6 button panel over the older model. I installed my current MT400 in late 2020, so just before the cutover to the new RS-485 enabled heaters. Is the upgrade really worthwhile, or should I just keep humming along with what I currently have?

I keep having problems with my CYA levels. Two weeks ago it was 180. I drained my pool over 5 days and got it down to 50. Then 4 days later I tested an it is up to 180.
How could it get so high again so fast? I am using chlorine tabs. Should I stop temporarily and use liquid chlorine? Thanks as always for all the help from the community!!

Hi there, a Pool amateur here. Bought a house with a pool that uses a silica sand filter. The previous owners mentioned the sand may need replacing soon. There is no pool supply store in town, so trying to figure this out on my own. wondering if anyone can give me their thoughts on the picture attached and whether or not the sand needs replacing.
Thanks for any help you can provide.

Does anyone know if this device is waterproof? It's right in the line of sight of one of my lawn irrigation heads. Thanks!

Hi,

I have been reading as many old threads to try and understand why my heater kicked the bucket. I just found my multimeter and am going to dig around inside more based on the electrical flowchart.

While I am doing that I thought I would post my specific failure scenario to see if it can give a clue on what to hone in on.

Heater was working then disconnected for 2+ years during a messy reno.
Previous system was Easytouch, current system is Intellitouch.
Heater is connected 220v with the proper plug and the firemans switch currently jumpered.
On initial power up, heater came on and started working for a couple of minutes. Then the fuse blew.
After replacing the fuse, heater boots up normally ( r13 on display) then does nothing. No buttons elicit any response.
There are no lights on control board or on ignition control board.

Thanks in advance!!

-Kevin

I have to issues with Pilot looking for guidance. Gas Knob must be depress to sustain Pilot- when I release the Pilot goes out. With knob depressed Pilot stays with over 500++mv reading with both leads disconnected from valve. Attach one thermopile lead to valve sustain 500mv; when I attach both thermopile leads to valve I get ZERO mv reading.

Thermopile is fairly new; all leads/connections have been cleaned.
TDAH

Hi, We need a new SWG. We have an inground 35k gallon with vinyl liner pool.
Our set up is variable speed pump- sand filter- heater- one way valve- SWG- to pool.

Should i get the replacement i60 cell?? Or buy a newer, or diff model.

Thanks for any help

Hello everyone!

This is my first post here and also my first time being a pool owner. We just finished construction about a month ago on a pool and spa combo (salt water). I am unsure how these valves are supposed to face but I know I have had issues dealing with the spa draining before and today we turned the spa “on” in the Pentair app to be heated and it quit refilling the water. I tried to turn the spa return valve to open (I believe?) and it still did not fill. Anyone have any advice? And also-how should these be facing in general when I just want my pool to run normally? The spa is a ‘champagne or 360 spillover’ spa so ideally that water level is at tile edge or overflowing all the time.

Afternoon,
Question about, Intellichlor IC40 Chlorine Salt Cell. Switched from salt cell to chlorine tabs (via Pentair Model 300 Chlorine feeder) a few years ago after we changed our vinyl liner. Salt cell was never removed. Was told by team that opens our pool that removing would be difficult considering where it sits in tubing and recommend just leaving it as is which we have done the last couple of years. My primary concern with leaving cell there unused is possibility of corrosion/ metals leaking into pool water (and flow/ pressure of water through system). Is this ok to leave as is?
Thanks

We’ve lived with this indoor pool for twenty years. It is well maintained, just off the family room, so visible from inside. We have a WYBOT robotic pool cleaner which works very well, except for the fine silt and dirty DE which collects in the bottom mostly during the winter when we rarely use it. But some is always there. The filter just doesn’t get it out. I am wondering whether I could line the basket with cheesecloth for a finer filtering job. Anyone ever tried this? Or pool specific cotton balls?

Have a customer with a Hayward Aqua Plus panel that wants to add wifi. From my research, the Aqua Connect system is discontinued and no longer supported so probably not something I would recommend to him which leaves the OmniPL upgrade kit.

We just install and service way more Pentair sytems than Hayward so I have limited Hayward experience. Customer's pool consists of a white/single color light, pump (superflo VS), salt cell (Hayward Turbo) and heater (Raypak). Very simple.

To move to an intellicenter with load center is going to be a big jump in price, and I'm guessing not worth the extra cost.

I'd consider an intellicenter lite, and moving the breakers on his hayward panel to the electrical panel feeding it right next to it, but the way the electrical is routed (all the panels are inside his house), would not be a simple endeavor, so intellicenter lite doesn't really seem like a feasible option.

Are most of you Hayward owners pretty happy?

Thanks in advance for helpful replies.

Hi I'm FJ from Austin!

My pool is in progress and should be ready in 30-45 days.

We are building a SWG 20 x 30 pool plus a 10 x 20 Spa / tanning ledge off to one side. Something like this but wider.

Looking forward to learning along with this group.

Bought a house with a large in ground pool in Delaware US.
Its got some age on it, but then again, so do I.
Has a MiniMax 400 heater, and a nature2 mineral system (which does not appear to have been used recently). Apparently the previous owners were just doing straight up chlorine.

Doing my first opening right now and trying to learn as much as I need to in order to properly maintain my system.

Cheers

Hello,

I just moved to a new house with a pool that has pop ups and QuickSkim, my previous pool had a pool cleaner vaccuum and a skimmer and it was easy to clean. This new pool is a completely different system for me and it would be great to get some direction on how to take care of it:

1. Some of the pop ups are missing which I know I need to replace. Those have lifetime warranty so Iḿ in the process of getting those fixed
2. There is no return jets only pop ups and a single return stream below the QuickSkim as part of the system. Where do I pour the liquid chlorine?
3. RIght now the floor of the pool is full of dust mainly because the pop ups are not working properly, any tips on how to get the floor of the pool clean in the meantime?

Thanks in advance for the advise,

Hello everyone, I'm perplexed I have a leak on one of my panels that i was going to repair. The problem it's still spraying even with actuator to the closed position and the shutoff valve going into the panels also closed. I assume its being pressured through the return side. I'm wondering if that's normal?

Hi everyone. Last summer, I spent days trying to find the slow leak in our vinyl liner with dye, a syringe, a weight belt, a mask, and a snorkel- and no luck. It's not a hose or connection point. Over the winter, the pool water level dropped to about half-full, and it's now hanging steady. The liner hasn't even had 2 full seasons yet, we installed in July 2023. I just got a quote from a local company for leak detection/repair, and it came in at $500. Do we pay the $500 or just spring for a new liner?

Current test results from Taylor tf-100
Fc 10 (coming down from slam)
Cc .5
Ph 7.3
Alc 80
Cya 40
Should I just leave my ph alone and let it raise/stabilize on its own?
Vinyl AG

How far down can you drain a fiberglass pool in Western Arizona? I am drawing due to the water being about 5 years old and am struggling with balancing the water chemistry. Is it better to drain halfway and then refill?

I have a ~15,000 gallon pool (pebbletec) that I began maintaining myself last fall. We recently had a pretty heavy calcium scale line (12-year old pool) blasted off and I was hoping the draining required to do the work would help with CYA, but it wasn't really enough to make a dent.

Chlorine tabs have been used exclusively, but I am planning to make the switch to liquid. CYA has basically stayed at 90 since I started doing my own testing. Just did fresh testing and also realized my CH was higher than I realized, likely because I was not initially getting to the final blue color before stopping the drops/counting.

Based on these numbers, should I consider doing a partial drain and refill to gear up for the summer? While on the high end, it seems like these are manageable and that the CYA may come down over time if I stop using the pucks.

FC 9
PH 7.3
TA 90
CYA 90
CH 550

My pool had a leak that required draining to repair. I'm in the process of rebalancing my water and am targeting 70 Alkalinity - where my pool sat before the repairs. However, I can't get it to drop below 80. I'm using MA to take the Ph down to 7.0 - 7.2, but Alk just won't go below 80. 80 isn't that far from 70 and is within the margin of error of my Taylor kit. Should I just ignore this?

My spa is draining into my pool, but I can’t figure out how or why.

The spa main drain is closed, the spa return valves are closed. It should be isolated.

For giggles, I’ve also closed the skimmer suction and cleaner valves as well.

What am I missing?

I had some plaster work done in my spa today, and the light doesn’t seem to be working correctly anymore. This light has been having issues - it stopped making blue - but it was plenty bright yesterday.

Thoughts? Could the bulb just be dying? Did they possibly crack the housing and water is inside? Could plaster be blocking light?

I’m calling the building back - plaster was warranty work - but trying to get a sense for possible problems.

We are in TX and when the wind kicks up in the summer, dust! And it is a clay like dust so it settles fast. Looks like mud.

We have a Pentair Racer LS w/ booster pump and it does a good job at what it does. It stirs the dust off the floor of the pool, but then the dust ends up on the stairs and ledges. Which eventually look like they are covered in mud.

Whatever vacuum/cleaner we choose, I don’t need to be able to schedule it. I need something I can pull out every 2-4 weeks and hit the stairs/ledges/spa. It needs to have a filter to handle the dust.

Any ideas? I see some cleaners that look like stick vacs. That would work. Just need the filter……..

Looking for advice on which method I should use to drain my pool. (Current CYA level is 70. Goal is to reach roughly 40ppm. Unfortunately my pool service was using trichlor tablets.. I have since cancelled their service and switched to liquid chlorine thanks to TFP).

I have a DE filter with a two port valve so I won’t be able to direct outflow to waste. Would it be okay to attach my vacuum to skimmer port and backwash until water line level is acceptable? Siphoning with a hose seems a bit mundane but if that’s the preferred route I suppose I’ll go with that.

I’m sure it’s me, but need someone to tell me why! I have used the app for several years with my old pool, moved houses so new pool (new build). I must have a setting wrong.

My pool gallons are set to plaster, 38000. My Test Kit is TF-100, and the reagents are about 6 mths old.

I needed FC to go from 0 to 12 (SLAM). 4 gal of 10% got me to FC5.5, 6 gal of 10% got me to FC7, 9 gal 10% to FC11.
The app, when I was initially at FC0 with target FC12 it recommended I add 4 gal, 2 qts (the sanitizer type is set to liquid chlorine, 10%, 128oz jugs). That is far from the 9 I added. (my chlorine expires 1/6/26)

Also, Calcium Hardness. Current is 275, target is 450. It recommends adding 62 lbs (setting is Calcium Chloride). 62 lbs? It took @25 lbs to get it to 275 (super soft fill water).

So, the FC target recommended addition was too low, but then the Calcium seems really high? I tracked my SLAM numbers because I wanted to use them to verify the # of gal in my pool, but this isn’t making sense.

I don’t understand the chemistry of how all this works, I’m just appreciative of the smart people who gave me the tools and the instructions on how to use them! Smart people, help me out

Our pool is now 2 years old and we’re getting quite a bit of build up in one corner. Best I can tell we have a very small amount of ground water that’s running into the pool from this corner and causing a lot of scale to build up above the water line. The issue is that’s it’s not waterproofed/tiled here because it’s where the track for the cover is built in.

I’m looking for suggestions on how to handle this long term, is there something to prevent the water from leaking in? Or do I just need to manage the scale and deal with it?