Interested in this Confer Curve step system, including the add-on. Does anyone know if it will work in the short end of my pool? I'm worried that the curve of the oval will keep it from being flat against the wall. Any experience with this? Thanks!

Hi all - we've got our heat pump being installed shortly and taking the opportunity to upgrade to an IntelliCenter and IC40 replacing our existing non-Pentair chlorinator. The current chlorinator controller powers the pump on a schedule. All is good, albeit dumb. The IntelliCenter will obviously become the brain, including schedules, heat set point, calling for heat from the heater etc.

The new salt generator transformer in the IntelliCenter is wired into the filter pump relay's second load side as per the manual so that the pump and IC40 switch together.

The heat pump is going to have to have a longer daily runtime than the chlorinator to maintain the desired heat. How does the IC40/IntelliCenter/etc prevent over chlorination if the heater needs the filter pump on for hours longer than needed for chlorination?

Does the IC40 have smarts that sets the output to 0% once a desired chlorination level is reached? Or do you need to wire the teh transformer on its own relay and program the schedules together so that the chlorinator is powered during the filtration phase, but off during other pump activities like heat?

Hello, my cartridge filter is leaking at the top where the clamp (locking ring) holds the lid onto the housing. Water is leaking at the hinge points of the clamp. This has been an intermittent problem since I moved into this property and inherited the pool. In the past 2 months it has leaked some days, while other days not at all. Sometimes when have I reattached the lid and locking ring, the leaking stopped. But yesterday and today I cannot get it to stop leaking quite a lot of water. I am having to top up the pool it has leaked so much. Any advice most appreciated. (I have added photos now; thanks for the suggestion @PoolStored . I do not know what the model number is. It looks old and the previous owner was not the person who installed it.)

how should I aim my return jet? The skimmer is directly across from it.

Hi I have a 30000 gallon pool the old liner has been removed and they have a well point going and 4 sump pumps but can’t stop the ground water in 4 holes in the bottom. The pool company says they aren’t coming back until it dries. I don’t see this happening. Is there something I can do to stop the leak through the holes

I’ve been open for a week now and water temp with heater got up to 75-80. I usually just use liquid chlorine first couple of weeks because outside temps are in 70s but we had 2 mid 80s so kids wanted to hit the water. With that I decided to start up SWCG. Since FC already 5-6 with liquid I kept SWCG in 25% range for last 2 days.

Now the confusing thing is the difference between SWCG screen is more than the usually 300-400 between my liquid test. For instance screen keeps reading 3000-3100 while k-1766 with new reagent is reading 2400. Am I too far off? Should I just ignore panel and follow my tested result? SWG was inspected before my opening and completely clear as I usually am and it’s only 4 years old this year.

I tend to over think some of these things but just wanted to get some thoughts.

I started the slam process yesterday bcs the pool was turning a little green and recently have noticed some yellowish stuff on the walls and corners that easily brushes off.

Some background. I’m in central Texas and we just went through our yearly pollen bloom where literally everything outdoors is covered in a fine yellow powder. Keeping the pool clean and debris free is a daily challenge around this time of year. I have to clean out fully packed skimmers (tree pollen debris) twice a day for a couple of weeks. Glad we are past that now!

Also this pool is severely affected by ASR. This is likely our last season with it. We have cracks everywhere, hot tub hasn’t been able to hold water for two years. Just trying to keep the pool going for at least one more summer for my kids.

I’m following the SLAM protocol page. Removed debris. Brushed everything. Etc.

When I started yesterday:
Chorine was 0.
CC was also 0.
pH 7.5
CYA 50.

Per the calculator sLAM level for chlorine was 20.

Put in chlorine and it resulted in chlorine level of 32. Kept it above 20 all day (only had to add once). And had no chlorine loss overnight.

Water was cloudy and could still see a little yellow in a couple of spots this morning. Brushed it. Vacuumed some new tree debris off the bottom and ran the robot vac.

But now there is a fine debris all over the bottom of the pool. Kind of powder like but you can’t feel it. It’s kind of a tan color. I assume this is dead algae? When we brushed this morning it stirred up and made the water cloudier.

My pool vac (robot) does NOT pick this up. We can see evidence of this stuff in the pool skimmer socks. My biggest question is how to get this out of my pool? Am I expecting all of this to go through the filter?

Hey Everyone,

The pool was finished about 2 years ago. I keep the pumps going year round, so no closing or opening. Just adding liquid chlorine over the winter.

Last year right before it was warm enough to swim, chlorine levels looked good once I got more salt in the water. This year that hasn't happened.

1. What am I missing that I should be doing to get the chlorine up? I'm assuming I need to get it higher than 0.5 or 1. The SWG is set to 100% and the pump is going 24 hours a day.

A couple of less important questions:

2. We've had a lot of rain but my overflow drain isn't draining as fast as last year. It's barely a trickle and taking days to go down 1/8 of an inch. What can I do about this?

3. My Polaris EPIC 8640 vacuum seems to be flipping a lot and not sticking to the walls as well even though the basket is empty. Is it just getting old or is there something I can do about it?

Here are my logs from the Pool Math app. I missed logging a lot of the chlorine / pH tests and the additions related to those two, but hopefully it helps to see the numbers.

• New pool opened in May 2023
• 5/22/23 – 5.5 FC, 0 CC, 7.8 pH, 120 TA, 200 CH, 40 CYA, 3200 Salt
• 7/2/23 - 3.0 FC, 0 CC, 8.2 pH, 100 TA, 275 CH, 20 CYA, 2400 Salt
  • Added 120lbs Salt
• 3/5/24 – 3.0 FC, 7.8 pH
• 3/23/24 – 0 FC, 0 CC, 8.2 pH, 90 TA, 250 CH, 20 CYA, 1600 Salt
  • Added 320lbs Salt
• 3/24/24 – 3200 Salt
• 3/29/24 – 4.0 FC, 8.2 pH
• 4/14/24 - added 7 lbs dry stabilizer
• 4/16/24 - 3 FC, 7.6 pH
• 4/17/24 - 50 CYA
• 4/18/24 - added 3.5 lbs dry stabilizer
• 4/19/24 - 55 FYA
• 6/8/24 - 2 FC, 7.5 pH
• 7/17/24 – 1.5 FC, 0 CC, 7.3 pH, 110 TA, 375 CH, 60 CYA, 2800 Salt
• 9/10/24 – 10 FC, 8 pH
• 9/11/24 - 7.5 FC, 7.8 pH
• 12/8/24 - 4.5 FC, 7.8 pH
• 1/18/25 - 0.5 FC, 7.8 pH
• 2/2/25 - 0.5 FC, 7.8 pH
• 3/2/25 - 0.5 FC, 8.4 pH
• 3/4/25 - 4 FC, 7.8 pH
• 3/12/25 - 1 FC, 7.8 pH
• 3/22/25 - 0.5 FC, 7.8 pH
• 4/4/25 - 0.5 FC, 7.8 pH
• 4/18/25 - 0 FC, 8.2 pH, 74 F
• 4/19/25 - cleaned the filters
• 4/20/25 - 1800 Salt
  • Added 240 lbs Salt
• 4/21/25 - 2800 Salt
  • Added 80 lbs Salt
• 4/22/25 - 2.0 FC, 7.8 pH, 3300 Salt
• 4/26/26 - 0.5 FC, 0.5 CC, 8.2 pH, 60 TA, 450 CH, 30 CYA, 3000 Salt

Folks, I have ants in my Aqualink RS box!! How do I clean them out?? Can’t spray because of electronics..

Just checking in on how you guys like this system so far? I can't find much info online about it, what information does the bare system display on the app without the future addons. Does it have ability to control VSP, and does it use the same replacement cell as the regular core 55? Thanks!

I bought a pressure gauge from TFTestKits and want to replace the existing pressure gauge in my Jandy DEV60. The new gauge is bigger than the original one and I can’t use the original plastic cover and am not sure I’m getting enough threads installing the new one. Can this new gauge be used on this filter without the plastic cover?

Having some issues on intex above ground pool buckling/bowling in. What's probably the cause

I had a small leak coming off of the seal plate on my Sta-Rite Dura-Glas pump, so I replaced the shaft seal. My seal plate is old. It's probably the original. One of the threaded inserts was sticking out which caused the seal plate to be uneven. When I started it up, I heard the impeller scraping on the diffuser. After taking it back apart,I found a couple shavings from the impeller. There are no gouges, and it still feels smooth. Is the tolerance between the impeller and diffuser important? Should I replace the impeller? It's only a few months old so I feel bad replacing it.

I've seen a few discussions of this idea, so I thought I'd share my wacky project (mods move if I picked the wrong spot).

I have a 23k gallon in ground vinyl liner pool with a Circupool salt generator. I love it.
One of the things I love about it is the Autocover I added. It keeps my kids safe, keeps the heat in, keeps the sun off the pool, and keeps junk out of the pool. I leave it closed except when we are actually swimming.
The autocover also keeps rain out of the pool. Although this makes chemical maintenance simpler (no dilution), it also means that I have to add water from a hose to make up for evaporation.

The water from my hose is hard. Like 100+ppm hard. This means that, over time, the hardness in the pool slowly goes up. I'm over 400ppm now. I have so much calcium in the water that it precipitates out as flakes that the pool robot vacuums up.

This is probably bad for things.

The last time this happened, I did a water exchange. I was nervous about draining the pool, so I pumped water in and out at the same time from opposite ends of the pool.
This is expensive. Due to mixing, I have to pump out (and replace) far more water than I actually want to exchange. Plus, the water I am putting in is hard anyway.

My genius(???) solution was to use a water softener instead. I would get a softener, put it on a wheeled base, attach a little 5gpm pump I have, and pump all the pool water through the softener. It would replace the calcium with salt, which is fine since I can deal with another several hundred ppm of salt in the pool (that already has several thousand ppm).
Once the calcium is removed, I can keep the softener around just to pipe the hose through when I need to add water to the pool.

After a bunch of comparisons, I bought a Whirlpool WHEC46, which was $600 at Lowe's. I put it on piece of plywood, added some casters and wheeled it over to the pool. I didn't want metal fittings on the hoses running to the pool, so I used irrigation hose (which is also cheaper). Several fittings convert from the 1/2" NPT on the pump to the irrigation hose and the 1" NPT fittings on the water softener.



Plugged it in, set up the water softener, and turned on the pump. It's running!


There are still some details to work out.

1. I need a longer drain hose so that the softener can live under my deck (which has a "ceiling" with a water collection system) -- this will keep the rain and (most of) the sun off of it.
2. I will eventually need to see about winterizing the unit.
3. I'm doing this at the start of the year since I read that chlorine can damage the resin beads... but there's still 7ppm of chlorine in the pool (I guess I overdid my boost at the end of the year).

My drop test this morning said 400ppm of calcium. I'll check it every day and see.

Hello. Is the main tank supposed to have a seal? My tank is leaking quite heavily out of the main tank and the only thing I can think of is a seal is missing. We have tightened the lock ring on the tank cover, and still leaking. If it is supposed to have a seal, I cannot find how to order parts specifically for Evajoy tank EJ-HF050. Any thoughts appreciated.

Hi all! Need some guidance here. I’m a pool newbie. We got our pool a year ago. We live in SC and never close the pool. It’s an 11k gal fiberglass I ground pool.

In Feb I started noticing dark spots on the walls and would scrub it off and then it’d come back. Every weekend I’d clean out the pool and scrub the walls. And now I’m at the point where every other day it comes back worse than before. So I’m aware (now) I have an algae problem and I’m trying to get the pool healthy. Be gentle as I’m a newbie here and know that I’ve not done anything right. But I want to learn so I can keep it nice going forward.

4/22
pH: 7.7
FC: 0.62
(never occurred to me to check CYA) until I started admitting I had a problem and started researching and realized this is a key component of a healthy pool.

4/26 12pm
pH:7.17
FC:0.62
TA:108
CYA:14
Added 2 lbs stabilizer

4/26 8pm
CYA: 24

4/27 8am
FC: 3.9
CYA: 27
Added 1.25 gal liquid chlorine

4/27 12pm
FC: 3.8
CYA: 23
Added 1.25 gal liquid chlorine

4/27 145pm
FC: 2.91
CYA: 24

I’m not sure what to focus on. CYA or FC. And why do they keep dropping even though I’m adding chemicals.

I watched the TFP videos and read the forums and documents.

I just want to make sure I dont send myself into a counteractive spiral where I’m fighting myself and spending tons of money on chemicals because of my lack of knowledge.

The SLAM process makes sense to me but my pool is t reacting in a way that makes sense (to me).

What am I doing wrong?
Thank you in advance!
Dawn

Hi. I have a Hayward Aqua Plus system with SWG, installed around 2012. Unfortunately, several local "pool professionals" have not done right by me and my system, so I've completely taken over. I'm on my 4th Salt Cell and my 3rd circuit board. Also, my Hayward Intelliflo pump's controller died, so I replaced the pump with a Century Vgreen 270. I have the Aqua Plus monitored and controlled through Home Assistant via an RS485 to Wifi adapter and the Vgreen is monitored and controlled through Home Assistant via ESPHome. Since the Aqua Plus is not directly communicating with the Vgreen pump (since they don't speak the same RS485 "language"), I basically have the Aqua Plus set up to have the Filter relay turned on 24/7 to provide power to the Vgreen however/whenever I decide to run it. So, the Aqua Plus is unaware of when or what speed the Vgreen is running at, if at all (except for maybe via the Flow Sensor).

So, after all that, my question is: How does the Aqua Plus know when to turn the SWG on or off? Will it claim "Chlorinator Off, Percentage Met", thinking the pump has run from midnight to 1000, when the Vgreen doesn't even start till 1000, just because the Filter Relay has been ON since midnight but with no Flow? Or will it only turn on the SWG when there is Filter Relay=ON AND Flow Sensor=FLOW, and then start calculating Percent Generated? Is there a better way for me to be managing the system I have?

Sorry it's kind of convoluted and I hope I've explained the situation adequately. Thanks in advance for any insights.

Pool guy is out of town for 10 days, I'd rather prevent too much water loss here. My initial thought is that I'll need to tighten this connection, but obviously I can't because the PVC is glued. So I'm guessing I cut it just behind the glued joint, screw in a new connector, and use a a coupler to put a new line of PVC in the middle portion. Is that correct or am I missing something?

I can't get the Youtube embed to work, here is a link to the setup.

Always wanted a pool since I was a child. So far, I’d rather clean the pool than my house … looking forward to learning how to maintain it.

Long time listener, first time caller. Searched but have found no detailed answer yet. Hope someone can help. Pentair Racer (360228) stopped moving (5 years old, salt pool) Good pressure in the line, filters clean, no debris appears to be blocking line or wheels or gears. Took the top off of the cleaner and ran the pump. Prodigious quantity of water shoots out of the spot where the drive shaft passes out of the turbine housing. Normal water flow at tail and all other ports. Drive shaft does turn, although intermittently Took the turbine housing off. All looks cool in there. I see minor wear on drive shaft but not major. I guess I can try replacing the drive shaft/bearings but that's just kind of a guess at this point or just do the whole rebuild kit and see if that solves. Anyone else have/solve this problem? Many thanks!

I opened up my pool and the water was crystal clear. Recently the water has turned murky. I put in clarifier and ran the pump for over 48 hours. I used an automatic pool cleaner and was able to get some debris out, but still cloudy. Then I tried Shock and that doesn’t seem to help. I read on another site to use clarifier and don’t run the pool pump for 8 hours and then vacuum. I am
In the process of trying that. I have a salt water pool with a cartridge filter. Salt level is good, PH is good, and filter is clean. What am I missing and what should I try next?

I'd like to change mine but am afraid it will wipe out all the settings and configurations? I have never changed it before but likely need to. I also have the 9-volt changed with fresh battery already in place.

The title is pretty self-explanatory here. I had my water tested at Leslie’s at my copper is at 1.6, which even TFP says is too high. The article I read said that the only way to remove copper permanently is to drain and refill, but I also have a well and I’m worried that is contributing to the copper levels. Leslie’s recommendation is either drain and refill or a “no metal” chemical.

Does the “no metal” actually work to reduce levels? Should I just bite the bullet and drain/ refill?

Last winter, the wind managed to blow off the winter cover on my pool, dumping all the "tea" from the cover into the pool. We decided not to empty the pool because we had a particularly cold and long winter (for our region). I removed the cover and drained the pool finally and the mucky water has left a brown/yellow ring around the pool. Any suggestions for cleaning? Would a bleach or ammonia-based household chemical be damaging? I'm concerned about weakening the liner, but also about getting those chemicals completely out of the pool so they will not interfere with the water chemistry when i fill it up again.

This is an Intex liner, slightly faded from the sun after the 5 years it's been in service. I can take some pictures for you, but I think you can imagine the damage :-(

Hi pleased to be a new member !! Looks like a great place for me to get good advice

I have a 10ft diameter Cowboy pool with Mastertemp 125. It’s coming up to 4 years old, and I’m starting to get HLS errors as the pool approaches 90deg, for the last couple of degrees. It does eventually get there.

I just replaced the pressure, and 3 sensors on the manifold. It’s better, but still giving HLS just before reaching set temperature of 90deg.

Any advice welcome …

New liner is being ordered this week for my in ground pool. If anyone recalls, it split in the fall last year and we got a pool company onboard to change it now that the season is upon us. So, here's my question...

What brand of pool liner to get? We've been looking at Latham, Merlin, and Legacy (Imperial). Does it really matter what brand? Any tips for my first time liner replacement (I'm not installing it)?

As always, thank you for the advice!

Enjoy as I briefly share my concrete pond return to a beautiful pool by following the guidance of TFP. (I'm not even one of the experts here, and I was just blessed to inherit this pool at the end of last summer (no it did not look like this then, but it was not sparkling either). Thankfully, I found TFP quickly in my search then and have been grateful for all the awesome folks and material here. Yes, it can feel a bit overwhelming at first, and yes, this will be my first battle with a swamp... but I'm confident this will end in my favor - so if you're new and feeling unsure, feel free to follow this little thread--it's meant to boost confidence, encourage, and demonstrate what goes on here at TFP! If I mess up at some point, you'll see me shoot up a flare and call in support, and you'll see great folks virtually jump into the muck with me.

With the right knowledge and some diligence, this pool will be opened and sparkling without all the craziness and costs of excess chemicals, trips to the pool store, or even pool service. Oh yes, there will be a good bit of regular old liquid chlorine...bottles and bottles of it. But that's pennies on the dollar compared to the endless cycle I could end up with if not following the principles here. The real challenge and enemy will be time - I was unfortunately unable to begin this Friday afternoon or Saturday morning. So I'm stuck with this one day before the weekly grind returns. Challenge accepted.

Here are my initial pics (a valiant effort will be made to transport all creatures big or small to a habitat of their choice):

I have an above ground pool that had all flexible piping, and I'm replacing with pvc. The guy that assembled our pool used a ton of silicone/caulk to seal all the fittings. When trying to remove the current fitting from the bottom of the skimmer basket, about 1/2" worth of the threaded portion broke off and is stuck on the threads inside the basket. I cannot budge it and I can't get any leverage on it whatsoever due to the flexible nature of the stainless steel panel/skimmer and the weird location of the broken piece.

Does anybody have any tips or things I could try to get this pieece out of here? I started to try to snip it and break it out in pieces, but I don't want to ruin the threads.

Picture attached.. Not the best view but this is from the top down, you can see the little piece stuck on the threads at the bottom.

GM currently I have 2 of the gva 24 to control when I turn the unground spa on and off and was looking to purchase a 3rd to wire to on of the Aux controls on my Hayward on command. To turn the water fall feature on and off

I’ve looked in the internet and there seems to be another generic make out there called

TORK TPE24VA Valve Actuator Control, NSI 24v

Any suggestions ,

Will adding another Hayward work leveraging the AUX connection on the on command ?

Thanks
Pics below

Ok I've posted this before - and no one seems to have experienced this but when I pull my Dolphin S200 out of the pool it releases a bunch of dirt. I hate it. My pool is clean today but I put the robot in to pick up the dirt IT RELEASED yesterday. not that that will help. anyway, Last year I texted marina pools and sent her photos and she told me to buy some replacement parts, did that, didn't fix it. I took it too my local pool store, and he had no idea. I finally decide to check the maytronics FAQ and this is what it says. If I have to remove it UPSIDE down, then I'm releasing all the water it's holding onto my deck? How is that reasonable? this makes me want to go back to my Polaris 280 but I've never had good luck with my booster pump and that's a lot. plus the 280 isn't a lot cheaper than the 799 I paid for my S200.

When I remove my Dolphin from the pool, dirty water and debris escapes back to the water​

When you remove your Dolphin from the water, gently pull it towards you using the cable. When it reaches the edge, remove it with the handle, never lift the robot out of the water by the cable.
Tilt the robot while placing it on the edge of the pool, and let the water drain out. If debris is still falling back into the water, try removing the robot from the water upside down.