New F/Glass build DownUnder - Adelaide - What have I let myself in for?... :)

[riley00dog]

That is so exciting! I love my heater already and we’re not even using it yet [emoji23] I bet your daughter is looking forward to the weekend?!

That is excellent information re the orp probe. I have the ph probe and yes find the read out very handy on the chlorinator. I don’t have any orp read outs though (I can’t remember the units of measure they use for it). Screen shows chlorinator % generating and then flicks to ph (was and goal). Sounds easy enough to disable it anyway. My pb harps on about the fc / cya relationship so I can’t see him providing as standard a system that doesn’t believe in cya.

Photos of your heater when it’s in please!

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

That is so exciting! I love my heater already and we’re not even using it yet [emoji23] I bet your daughter is looking forward to the weekend?!

She has been looking fwd to every weekend, although the weather has now started to turn and this weekend looks partly cloudy - max of 18 on both Sat/Sun. Today is a nice clear sunny day - perfect for burning off some of my excess chlorine - I'll measure it around lunchtime to see if it has dropped much.

I don’t have any orp read outs though (I can’t remember the units of measure they use for it). Screen shows chlorinator % generating and then flicks to ph (was and goal). Sounds easy enough to disable it anyway.

Mine is the same, so I suspect you don't have an ORP probe fitted.

Photos of your heater when it’s in please!

Yes - but not much to see - Some black poly pipes on my shed roof and a simple pump...

I'm having them cover the whole roof which will result in around 38 to 40 Sq m of coverage - Hopefully this will be usable in extending the swimming season for the family.

 

[riley00dog]

She has been looking fwd to every weekend, although the weather has now started to turn and this weekend looks partly cloudy - max of 18 on both Sat/Sun. Today is a nice clear sunny day - perfect for burning off some of my excess chlorine - I'll measure it around lunchtime to see if it has dropped much.



Mine is the same, so I suspect you don't have an ORP probe fitted.



Yes - but not much to see - Some black poly pipes on my shed roof and a simple pump...

I'm having them cover the whole roof which will result in around 38 to 40 Sq m of coverage - Hopefully this will be usable in extending the swimming season for the family.

That is so typical with the weather. Of course our pools are ready just when the weather turns. We are down to about 22/23. We had a couple of nice days earlier in the week but back to being a bit too cold to think about swimming. Well for me anyway. My six year old is really bugging me to swim and although pb said it was fine there is no way I will let him swim with high ph, not being able to see the bottom and non existent chlorine! Maybe on the weekend if I think the pool is ready or early next week.

Your heater will definitely extend your swimming season. It’s the least we can do for our kids given we chose to build a pool that is ready to go in autumn lol. Seemed like such a good idea in October [emoji23]

I’ve just checked and no orp woo hoo!

A couple of other things I noticed. One is that the chlorinator is now saying dosing acid. I have never seen it do that before and the other is that the pump basket is no longer full to the very top with water. It’s high but no longer overly so. I’m guessing someone has been out today, possibly Astral as yesterday plumber did say he will call them out but thought maybe he thought things were ok as it did seem to be ok. Anyway, I’m finally happy with how my equipment is working and that it is set up how it should be after 2 very stressful days.

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

My six year old is really bugging me to swim

At least my daughter is still completing her swimming lessons every Friday - so she sort of gets a swim, just not in our pool...

I’ve just checked and no orp woo hoo!

Yep - looks like identical setup to mine.

the other is that the pump basket is no longer full to the very top with water. It’s high but no longer overly so. I’m guessing someone has been out today,

Acid dosing is probably just kicking in - I am sure it is operating on some delay or algorithm to ensure that it does not overshoot, hence the delayed action.

As far as water in the pump basket is concerned - what RPM/speed have you noticed this occurring. I note that with mine if I run at say 2850 RPM it will keep the basket full (water above white basket but large air pocket becomes trapped under clear plastic housing due to the bulbous design of the clear lid). This is quite normal and some air will get trapped at the very top as it will not have anywhere to go.

At low speeds - say 1200 RPM, I do see the water level drop slightly to just below the top of the white basket but it does take a couple of hours for this to occur (eg 4 to 6 hours of running), so I may have a very small suction side leak or more than likely it is due to my pipework design. Reason I state this is that if I stop the pump and open the lid, water actually runs from the pump into my filter due to vacuum created by water trying to run back into the pool. So I suspect that this is the cause rather than an form of air leak. It was this effect that actually helped me clean up the CYA powder stuck in the cyclone filter the other day.



Measured my FC today and its still quite high even though running with SWGC switched off and had a fairly sunny day. Only dropped approx 1.5 ppm (from 10 to 8.5).

Might have to throw some algae in there to speed up the process...



On a lighter note - Solar heating system has been installed.

Fairly simple setup, throw some plastic pipes on the shed roof (both sides of roof), connect via some PVC, add a separate pump, add controller and it's all done...!


Still need some further tiling (and running silicone in corners etc) to be completed in the pool equipment room now that almost all the PVC pipes have been run and then I can sort out and neaten the wiring runs etc.

 

[riley00dog]

Simple but effective the solar heating. I love the compact control panel. Very envious of the deluxe accommodation your equipment has.

I haven’t run my pump on low sped yet. It’s still on 2850. Will keep an eye on the basket and see how it behaves. It’s almost full now, just before it was almost overly full I would say. You’re probably right about the acid dosing being slow and steady. It was just good to see a downward trend today after nothing fit two days. We will get there.

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

Speaking of 'full'...... my water level has been rising the last two days due to heavy rainfall.

Was at just above half way on the skimmer but this morning it was getting close to the top of the skimmer.

So out with the submersible pump (still need to connect filter to backwash pipe after tiling is completed) which brought it back to a more nominal level.....

Added some more CYA (via sock in front of return method) which drove my PH down to 7.2 by the evening.

FC is slowly reducing - now at 7.5 with '0' CC present.

 

[riley00dog]

That’s a fair bit of water the rain added. That sump pump has well and truly paid for itself. I didn’t know that cya lowers ph so will have to keep that in the back of my mind.

What settings do you have your chlorine output on? Just turned mine down yesterday as it was on 6 with fc through the roof. Turned it down to 1 for now and will test and adjust tomorrow. Just curious what level you run yours on to keep a good fc level? I know you have the bigger model so won’t be all that comparable.

 

[riley00dog]

Btw I can’t get over how beautiful and clear your water is!

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

I didn’t know that cya lowers ph so will have to keep that in the back of my mind.

Being an acid, adding CYA has a similar effect to adding Hydrochloric/Muratic acid - so I let my PH rise a bit before hitting it with CYA.

What settings do you have your chlorine output on?

It is currently on '0' ie. switched off. I did the same as you - pretty much had it set to around 5 or 6 when I was using the basic 4 in 1 test kit. It wasn't until I received my Clear Choice Labs test kit that I could measure FC correctly.

Mine was up at 10, so my SWCG has been switched off for a number of days now with my FC dropping around 0.5 to 1ppm per day depending on whether it is sunny/overcast or raining. I'll let it drop to around 5ppm (was 7.5 last night) or so before engaging the SWCG again. By then my CYA will be up around 50ppm and I'll adjust as necessary.

I'll need to wait for the CYA level to come up a tad before dialing in the SWCG.

Better to be on the high side of FC rather than Low for a short period.

Btw I can’t get over how beautiful and clear your water is!

Yeh - I have been surprised as well - It really is crystal clear, even at night with the lights on I cannot see any particles in the water directly in front of lights.

Probably due to my pump running at low speeds for the majority of time which aids in filtration performance.

Now to get my coping done and then have the PB remove all the crud off the floor...!

 

[riley00dog]

Being an acid, adding CYA has a similar effect to adding Hydrochloric/Muratic acid - so I let my PH rise a bit before hitting it with CYA.

Of course!


It is currently on '0' ie. switched off. I did the same as you - pretty much had it set to around 5 or 6 when I was using the basic 4 in 1 test kit. It wasn't until I received my Clear Choice Labs test kit that I could measure FC correctly.

Yeah going to retest mine today and see where it’s at and adjust if needed.

Mine was up at 10, so my SWCG has been switched off for a number of days now with my FC dropping around 0.5 to 1ppm per day depending on whether it is sunny/overcast or raining. I'll let it drop to around 5ppm (was 7.5 last night) or so before engaging the SWCG again. By then my CYA will be up around 50ppm and I'll adjust as necessary.

Are you aiming for FC of 5? That’s sort of what I’m thinking for FC. 4 or 5.

I'll need to wait for the CYA level to come up a tad before dialing in the SWCG.

Better to be on the high side of FC rather than Low for a short period.

Good to know.


Yeh - I have been surprised as well - It really is crystal clear, even at night with the lights on I cannot see any particles in the water directly in front of lights.

Probably due to my pump running at low speeds for the majority of time which aids in filtration performance.

Ok this could be part of my problem. They have two cycles both running high speed. I might fiddle with that today.

Now to get my coping done and then have the PB remove all the crud off the floor...!

Good luck! I’m sure you have plenty to keep you busy in the meantime.
[\QUOTE]

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

Good luck! I’m sure you have plenty to keep you busy in the meantime.

Decided to check the power consumption for my main pump today as I had nothing better else to do....

Here is a quick rundown of my pump's current draw at various speeds.

Note that this is specific to my plumbing's restriction and the results will vary slightly in other installations due to differences in restriction of your plumbing.

Also note that the pump's maximum speed is listed at 2850 RPM - However it does have a Boost/Overdrive function where it will drive up to 3500 RPM depending on individual plumbing restrictions. So the 3000 RPM figure in the graph below is only an arbitrary maximum RPM value as the display simply shows 'O/D' when in Overdrive mode and no RPM figure is actually displayed on the pump.

Check out the exponential increase in current consumption as I push the pump's RPM above 2000....! You can see why single speed pumps are no where as flexible and efficient for general pool pumping duties these days.

The kicker is that this pump has no built in PFC (Power Factor Correction) so the wattage drawn (ie actual running cost to user) works out slightly less than if using the above current figures as all old school household meters (no digital) measure only 'Real' power and not reactive power (which is generated when the power factor is not = 1).

Power factor for this pump was measured at around 0.63....

 

[riley00dog]

Decided to check the power consumption for my main pump today as I had nothing better else to do....

Slightly disturbing but mostly impressive! That is great data. I’ve had a fiddle today with my pump run times and speeds. I think that and the fact that the ph is finally down has improved the water clarity. Of course not to your level! I actually think I want to run my pump low speed for 18-24 hours a day. Who knows how much it’s going to cost me for the pump to be running high speed all this time? Oh wait a minute - you do lol! Not that cost is a huge factor but reading the instruction manual today it seems it should be on low speed anyway.

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

Taking in the Power factor Correction I mentioned earlier, at 1350 RPM it will cost around the same as running a 150W light globe.

So if you run it for say 6 to 7 Hrs straight, that will equal to around 1KW Hr worth of electricity consumption.

Take a look at your recent electricity bill and it should have a figure for cents per KWh or similar on there somewhere.

Approx. 34c here in SA for 1x KWh. So around $10 a month for my main pump. Solar pump adds to the cost as well but only during swimming season!

Don't forget the chlorinator can draw a fair amount of power if running flat out - I'll measure this another day...

 

[riley00dog]

We are at around $.27 per kwh here. I can definitely live with those figures. I have the breakdown for our heat pump from the individualised monthly break down the company did for me when they did up the quote. The chlorinator data will be interesting. I wonder if it will use more than the pump? Taking all into account I can probably run my pool including year round heating to 32*, chemicals and power to equipment for around $300 a quarter or $1200 a year.

Really happy with those figures as the deal with the pool was that hubby sold our boat and we put in a pool. The money from the sale to go towards the cost of putting the pool in and money that we would usually spend per year maintaining the boat would now pay for the running costs of the pool. I would say between registration of the boat and trailer, servicing etc we spend about $3000 on the boat each year that we are lucky to use twice a year now that we don’t live near the water. So all considered we will be ahead... just one problem... he is yet to advertise the boat [emoji31] Anyone you know in Qld looking for one? [emoji23]

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

just one problem... he is yet to advertise the boat [emoji31] Anyone you know in Qld looking for one? [emoji23]

LOL...

I sold my sports bike but kept my sports car - mainly to make some further room in the shed....

Electricity is reasonably expensive here, but both myself and the wife are still working and have paid off the house so we can afford the electric bills - Our remaining budget stretches to our day to day running costs plus my 8Yr old daughter..

 

[needsajet]

I'll take a wild guess at 380 watts for the EQ45 SWC, only during the % of time it's operating. Standby on mine is only 2 watts which is nice, and no idea for yours.

And 300 watts for the EQ35 on Riley's pool.

- - - Updated - - -

The power curve for your pump is cool!

 

[riley00dog]

plus my 8Yr old daughter..

Expensive little things they are! We have x 2. Mins you we probably wouldn’t have got a pool without them here to use it.

 

[riley00dog]

I'll take a wild guess at 380 watts for the EQ45 SWC, only during the % of time it's operating. Standby on mine is only 2 watts which is nice, and no idea for yours.

And 300 watts for the EQ35 on Riley's pool.

- - - Updated - - -

The power curve for your pump is cool!

Ok so I’m not all the switched on with this but I take that to mean running it for 3 and a bit hours will cost me around $.27 given my electricity price? So depending on how many hours I run it I would roughly be looking at $1 or so a day.

 

[Costas > DownUnder]

I'll take a wild guess at 380 watts for the EQ45 SWC, only during the % of time it's operating. Standby on mine is only 2 watts which is nice, and no idea for yours.

Standby will be the same for all units I guess as the chlorinator itself is identical.

I'll perform a current consumption test for all 8 levels on my EQ45 (probably next weekend) and post up the results.

The power curve for your pump is cool!

- - - Updated - - -

Ok so I’m not all the switched on with this but I take that to mean running it for 3 and a bit hours will cost me around $.27 given my electricity price? So depending on how many hours I run it I would roughly be looking at $1 or so a day.

Correct...!

 

[Dirk]

THAT was amazing! Talk about instant pool. Very cool.

I couldn't help but think about the outriggers and counterweights. Seems they take a lot for granted in what is under the outrigger "feet." (Are those called "skids?") There's only four, right? And they have to support not only the pool and counterweights, but the entire truck as well!! Especially the two on the sidewalk, it would seem they have to take the brunt of it when the pool was over its hole. Did they do anything to test that concrete, or what might be under it (like a sink hole)?!

Glad it all went well. Thanks for the pics.

[Oops, just now finding your thread!]