Hello all, we're just starting the process of installing a new pool. We live near Tucson, Arizona, and would appreciate any advice. We would like a pool basically for relaxing and entertaining grandkids (ages toddler up to teenager).

We're thinking about 15x30 with a baja shelf for the little guys. Probably would like it no more than 5 feet deep, with the deepest part in the middle, so it could be set up for volleyball or basketball. We probably want a pool cover. I'm leaning toward SWG. Not sure about decking. Not sure about lights, water features, etc. We don't have an unlimited budget but since this will be a major part of our home, I don't want to cheap out either -- I don't want to wince when I look at it, or have regrets that I missed something important.

Just about everything else is still up in the air. I'd love to talk to knowledgeable folks who can help me decide!

New to this community. Had some algae problems last month, had to drain and refill then to Leslie's to get water tested. I know, invested in a water testing kit after reading tons of posts in the forum, the pool school threads and browsing around. The pool is clear but FC (.3) is not staying in and TC is about 2.5. This all after last week it was
FC 3.95
TC 3.95,
PH is 7.5,
TA is 86,
CH is 127 (little low),
CYA is 42

This week I had no FC in it so something is eating it. Guessing the algae is still around, even the pool looks great. I have been putting in 2 lbs of trichlor a day until I can get some liquid chlorine. I know I have to SLAM it, waiting on my test kits to arrive especially the FSA/DPD so I can get accurate readings. Until Then I plan on keeping the chlorine high (about 2 gallons to get it to 17 and add daily until those tests arrive. Anything else I should be doing besides brushing the walls, vacuuming and running the pump 24/7?

Thanks in advance,

I need help with getting the chemicals right to start the saltwater system

I have been struggling this year with algae, about every other week it seems. At the beginning of June I took a sample in and CYA was like 3. I added some stabilizer and a week later it was 10. I added more and on June 21st it was 41. On June 28th it was back to 11, and I just had them test today and it was back to a 3.

I have only had to add water maybe 3 times to get it back to the middle of the skimmer basket, but each time it is like maybe a half an inch of water. We have not had a lot of rain and are down several inches so far this year.

The store today suggested that I could have a leak. I would think if I did have a leak I would lost more water faster. Further, even if it is a leak, how does that affect CYA? I would figure if losing water, I would proportionately lose CYA. I think it is just evaporation, and would assume that the CYA stays in the pool.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

I am here because I have a big problem with my pool .

Anyone know how to read their code? They only print a letter followed by four numbers. Not Julian like I am used to.

Just recently got a pool installed dnd working my way through understanding the upkeep.
I have a Hayward cartridge filter swimclear c100s I believe is the model.
Having trouble getting the builder back out so sort of on my own at the moment. They left it so dirty that I have had to take the cartridge out and clean it multiple times. Today I took it out and cleaned it and when I put it back and rotated the top back to lock it, water just gushes out of the top between the top and bottom pieces. I have undone it and screwed it back on several times. It was working reasonably well(at least not gushing water out) prior to me cleaning it. Just a sudden change within five minutes to all of the water from the filter flowing out into the yard.

Any thoughts on what could be the issue?

da-waterboy said:

Concrete Overlays , spray , stamp , ect. is what i have done in my business since 2002. So i can lend some insight and also a professional opinion if needed.

In the short tho:

Both materials are essentially the same thing. Both a "portland" based material, both have acrylics/resins for movement and bonding. Both will require re-sealing at certain times. Both have unlimited colors to choose from. The big difference between the two are basically the look you can achieve and also of course the cost of each. Stamps being the most expensive. I personally love the look of a stamped overlay done correctly as opposed to just a "spray" pattern. However the durability is fine with both but you mention having a lot of kids running around.... the stamp pattern is MUCH more slippery then the Spray. The safety of your kids and the neighbors kids, ect usually come into play when thinking about which direction to go.

As far as a contractor/ MAnufacturer i can help you with that as well. Obviously I have nothing in this cause im from PA but i have used alot of different materials over the year and can at least help you locate the proper things you will need and the proper people you nned to speak with .

Hope this starts helping a little bit.

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We have a typical brushed concrete in south jersey, I’m looking to possibly do a “sundeck” material type overlay that’s stamped. Do you have any installer recommendations?

Afternoon everyone, thank you for having me here. First time to post on the site, just found this place after trying to troubleshoot my issues.

I’ve had my pool for 7 years now. I have all Pentair equipment on salt pool, Easy touch controller.

Recently my Pentair Whisperflo High Performance Pump 011775 went out (suspect the motor locked up, but we did have a storm the night before) and I got just the motor replaced from local pool store with a Century brand replacement motor.

Now the pump will not turn off without shutting it down with the breakers on the easy touch panel on side of house. Nothing on the panel or my phone app will make the pump turn off. All other functions on the app and panel will operate (spa controls, lights, air pump etc) I did go into the settings and make sure pump was on setting 1 and speed was set but nothin helps.

Anyone have a clue??

Thank you in advance

Hey all,

I called Marina, and they quoted me $899 out the door for the Active 20 and $1099 for the Active 30, which comes with a Caddy ($150 value) and has WiFi (Which I don't care about, but for an extra $50, it's worth it IMO). The Active cleaners come with a 2-year warranty, and my CC has the benefit of an extra 1 year on top of the 2 years.

Now to the internet-sold cleaners: CC Plus and the DX4 are available on Amazon, and both, to the best of my knowledge, come with a 2-year warranty.

My question is, are the Active 20/30 cleaners better than the other two sold by Amazon? Is there a real benefit to buying from Marina versus online? I mainly ask this for the warranty piece; if my cleaner breaks, do I have to ship it to Marina to get it repaired? And what about the ones from Amazon? How do warranty claims work in case of failure?

Appreciate you all.

Hi all! We bought a house a couple years with a fiberglass pool. We enjoyed a couple great seasons and unfortunately this year we developed a sizeable crack where the slant meets the edge of the deep end. We found one company to repair it. The guy came out the day after we called and he said he could fix it. It's now been three weeks and we can't get a hold of him or find anyone else to fix it. We are in Michigan, what can we do?

I normally use liquid bleach and muriatic acid routinely to maintain my pH and chlorine levels. I'm going to be away for three weeks, and I'm wondering if there's some way I can keep my water chemistry in an acceptable range without trying to find someone to test it for me.

On a typical day this time of year, I add 8 oz muriatic acid and about 28 oz of bleach to the pool. I keep a couple of chlorine tablets in the feeder shown, open only slightly, primarily to keep my CYA up above the recommended minimum. Each tablet lasts over a week at the current consumption rate.

I'm thinking of loading up the tablet feeder and hoping for the best while I'm away. If anyone has thoughts on a better approach--I'm not going to ask my neighbors to add chemicals--I'd appreciate any advice in terms of pH and chlorine management during time away. Thanks!

Bought an old house that we love and side effect is that the house has a 25k vinyl lined in-ground pool. We weren't looking for a pool, but my wife will use it, it will attract family to visit, so not a bad thing necessarily.

I found out about the forum via some posts on the Bogleheads forum about pools before we committed to buy the place. I've read up on TFP forum and howto articles, bought a TF100 kit which we got a few days ago. Ran some tests, which seemed to work correctly. and now have some what next questions.

Looking for some help on what to fix first.

Prior owner gave use the rundown on their pool maintenance regimen. Opened and closed by the pool company. Other than that they maintained by manual skimming and running the Polaris Robot. Chemistry wise guidance was, "Run the pump an hour or two a day. More if you are using it a lot. 1 cup of dichlor a day in the baskets at the start of the pump cycle running. That's always worked for us. DE filter doesn't typically need to be flushed if pool is kept skimmed by you and robot"

We've only been in the house about two weeks. second day we were here, there was a huge rain storm and pool level went up 2 inches, maybe 3 inches. overall pool still seems very clean and water is clear

based on tests kit:

FC around 1 n the mornings
CC is zero
CYA 80 if doing the test right. might be a bit lower since I wasn't doing the test in full sun (not surprising it is high since they were using Dichlor)
TA off the charts low. test turns pink/red immediately
PH also off the charts low. 3 using the digital meter. lighter yellow than the window on the two tube color chlorine/ph tester

punching that into old school pool math web site, for TA saying to add 33 Lbs of baking soda. Which seems like a LOT.
and for PH, if I assume more conservative estimate of 4ph, vs 3ph, also saying add around 33lb of baking soda.

Having half a bucket of dichlor and some trichlor tablets, and with the amount of liquid chlorine seemingly needed to keep FC up, not sure switching to liquid before closing for the year makes economic sense.


so need some thoughts on what to tackle first ? Off to Sam's/BJ Club/Costco to get some 13lb bags of baking soda and raise the TA? Then aerate to fix PH more? and just live with the high CYA for a while?

We're in Southeastern PA near Philadelphia

This box in the photos below makes me a little nervous.
This prior thread also does not inspire too much confidence. T S Pools
There are a number of one star reviews on Amazon, because they are ugly on returns.

On Amazon, T S Pools say for unopened box returns:

30 Day Return Window FOR UNOPENED BOXES ONLY

Item must be unopened, unused, uninstalled, and re-sellable condition. Customer responsible for all shipping charges to and from.

Customer responsible for all shipping charges to and from TS Pool Supply. This will be deducted from any valid returns.

Click to expand...

The story is I found online that cleaning my existing SWG should be a piece of cake, and I could have better control than relying on my pool company. However Orange County Pools made the hand tightened unions so tight the threads of one union were stripped, two strong men could not open it with a crescent wrench and a plumber had to use a 2 foot long wrench to get it off. Meanwile I had broken a PVC elbow in my attempt. So I had my plumber repair the piping so I could keep using the pool. Amazon seemed the fastest way to get a replacement. I did not check out the seller before ordering.

So now, I can open the box, gambling that the unit is good. If not, I would have to rely on Pentair to solve any issues.

Or, in the alternative, I could return this unit through Amazon. Seller will deduct freight, no doubt overcharging and delaying payment. And order from a supplier with more integrity.

There is no perfect choice at this point. What do the gray beards advise?

I have a 7 year old salt water pool with a jacuzzi saniclear 20 swg reading 2400ppm salt with lights flashing but just had the water tested and it’s 3500. I tested it as we had significant rain, I drained water and added salt but did not get a change at all on the meter and so felt something wasn’t right. The water is 82 degrees, voltage is 27.3, current is 2.33 and instant salinity reads -1900 (what is this number compared to 2400 it shows, I’m unclear). Ph is fine, need to raise alkalinity but nothing to lose interesting in the water report.
Is there anything this could be besides an expensive cell replacement fix? I have cleaned it and there was no obvious problems.

Adding spa to a pool, circulating mode and spa mode. Gas heater. Do you think a 2.7 HP variable speed pump (Intellipro 011018) enough for a 8-jet in-ground spa. I will use Omni logic automation to control the variable speed pump. I have a 2" pipes, and spa will be on a corner of the pool, about 55 feet from the pump (see pic below, heater and spa still to be added).

We are in our third season with our pool, and I recently noticed some wrinkles forming on one side of the pool where the skimmers are located (see photo). They are "squishy" when you push on them. We do have a high water table in the area where the pool is located, but I have a well point that collects water from a french drain in the deep end as well as from the gravel around the walls and pumps it to the woods. I double-checked that, and it is holding the level below the bottom of the walls. Any ideas on what could be causing these bubbles? Is it possible that water is entering behind the liner at the skimmers and I just need to tighten the screws on the skimmer plate? Anything else I can try to diagnose? Will they go away on their own? Any help is sure appreciated! -Wes

Videos of the pump failing to start

Ordered from Pool Supply Unlimited in February.

Installed end of April.

Turned it off today to switch the filter to backwash and it will not come back on normally now. Just continually starting up for a few second, then shutting down.

Submitted an RMA request to Pool Supply Unlimited.

New to the pool world. Just installed ours last week and looking for tips.

Hey everyone. We just finished building our 30ft round Above Ground Pool. we have a slight slope going into the pool where we had to dig down the highend. Just had my first heavy rain and my gut tells me I need to do something about the water that was filling in where we dug down to level the ground.

Should I just backfill the ditch around the pool and slope it all the way around or is there a better way to do this?

I have attached pictures. if you would like more please let me know.

What's your pool temp? This isn't the highest it has ever been. Hit 94 years ago when my parents still owned the house.

Thanks in advance for your advice.

I am doing the Intellitouch i7+3 to Intellicenter I10PS tomorrow (intellitouch board is failing) and I have researched this forum, pentair manuals and the web and cannot find an answer on the programming of the new Intellicenter. Namely, can I migrate my existing programming from the Intellitouch to the Intellicenter? If migration is not possible, is there somewhere that I can record what has been programmed and how since the Pentair rep did it all?

Also to compound my issue, I do not have any computers that can run Pentair software except maybe an old iMac 5k that I can put back on Catalina. Going to try that tonight and see if it will work.

Also shout out to @MyAZPool because your information and images posted here is invaluable and makes me confident I can do this upgrade without much issue.

Quick note on my system:
48,000 gal
All pentair equip
Intellitouch i7+3 with screen logic migrating to Intellicenter i10PS (ethernet hardwired)
Screenlogic (not communicating due to board issue)
Sand Filter
Intellichem
IC60
Intelliflo VS
Gas Heater
5 intellivalves
3 motorized valves (swim lane on / off and pool to spa)
2 hand valves (fountains)
Del Ozone generator (dead right now)
Nature 2G Mineral

Thanks,

Chris

Hi, I have a 24x24 round AGP and have a question about connecting bond and ground wire to pump lug. There's a bare copper wire already connected to the lug that's coming from the GFCI outlet box that I imagine is for grounding , but I'm planning on bonding the pool, can I connect the 8 gage bonding wire to the same lug on the pump? Thanks

Pool Care Basics
I shocked pool , scrubbed and vacuumed, then shocked again . I have a floater with chlorine also. Pool is light green . My pool man /husband passed away and he always maintained it . Where do I begin ? I bought a test kit but no clue what to get to balance the pool out ?

So we’ve been chasing a leak all summer. The pool people said it’s probably time to get a new liner, because ours is 7 years old. I can’t believe something so expensive has such a short life span! They told me that environmental regulations changed what liners are made of now, so they will better degrade in landfills.
Is this true?
Is there a liner out there that will last a long time?
The person telling me this doesn’t make money off of me getting a new liner, so I don’t think he’s trying to sell me something.

Nice to meet everybody here. First pool ever for us; we have 3 months of maintenance as part of the build contract. After that, well, that's the reason I'm here now Maybe we can do it.

Gunite, 16x25, combined pool / 8x8 spa, maybe 12-13 K USG total, salt water with chlorine generator, autofill with water from our whole-house water softener. It's a loitering/party pool, so we claim it's not a pool, but a Roman Bath. It's also a way to lower body core temperature when 3-digit weather strikes. 3' deep shallow end, down to 5 1/2' for the deep end.

Pentair equipment, and I'm climbing my way through Pentair's fine print. It seems there's a logic board, and most peripherals of consequence attach to an RS485 bus. Bus discipline for RS485 is either daisy chain or repeater/duplicator for Y connection splits BUT grrr... there is always that common-mode ground problem. 4-wire Pentair's connection feeds carry A wire, B wire, ground and +15V.

I suppose that if you share the ground, the +15V power can be independent from the panel feed?

But I guess this is not the place to ask this or other Pentair automation related questions =:O -- which is the right place, please?

Anyway, here we go: another total n00b on board.

Cheers, and (soon enough) party on everybody!

We are on our 5th season with a gunite pool that came with our house. Our current setup is a SWG, full sun, variable speed pump & sand filter. Filter, pump and salt cell all replaced 2 years ago.

We have been battling black algae. We have slammed, scrubbed, vac'd, etc., nonstop for MONTHS. It is minimal at this point, but that is the issue. During all of this, our pool is cleaner from debris than it has ever been. So we were able to better notice the condition of our plaster and have realized it is time to replaster or we'll never win this battle against the algae. Too many small areas where the plaster is starting to flake. There are too many areas for it to latch onto and continue to keep coming back.

So my husband asked me to get quotes on a replaster job as well as converting it to a vinyl liner pool. I'm looking for feedback on pros, cons, what else we would have to convert (pump, filter, SWG, etc.) and whether or not we would regret it.

I just used up the last of my stabilizer I bought a couple years ago. I was going to order from Amazon, but noticed online that my local Wally-World has Clorox brand in stock for about the same price. No 2-in-one or anything; just says Pool Stabilizer. Priced about the same as Amazon for the 4" bag (around 20 bucks.) What say you?

Thanks!
G.

Both gentlemen who help me around the pool say I can use a pressure washer to clean the dirt around the perimeter of my fiberglass pool. Recently we noticed the dirt in the enclosed photo. We tried a 550 psi battery-operated washer and it didn't touch it. Does anyone have an idea on how high a pressure I can use? Obviously readily available gas-operated ones are around 3000. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated...short of draining the whole d**n pool and acid washing.

silly me, but I cannot find out how I should search the forums for a particular subject (message header or content).