Ray can you speak of brands? I thought I saw one that had a wider return. It was more of a slim rectangle so it was more of a "curtain" of water pushing out and up. Have you seen those?
Construction Plans, We may be digging soon so we are down to the wire...
- Thread starter IcemanK2
- Start date
Paraskim V’s work well. We have 4 of them in our pool. They do take their own 1.5” return line as well as the 2” drain line, so it is a bit more plumbing but the Venturi really does move a lot of water. When I shut off the drain line and just have the return running, water is still falling at a pretty good clip into the skimmer. It effectively makes another distribution point for injected chemicals as well (so I have 6 distribution points instead of just the 4 return ports on each system.)
I don’t like to speak of brands because I have not spent equal time with them all.
It will all be reflected in the flow tech sheets,
Slots and shapes differ because of patents, performance is relatively equal with white goods.
If OP builder is a Pentair dealer use Pentair, if paramount use paramount..
I am very familiar with paramount founders and their products in the field. , a top shelf family biz & products.
Incidentally Paramount founding family recently sold the business to hayward.
It will all be reflected in the flow tech sheets,
Slots and shapes differ because of patents, performance is relatively equal with white goods.
If OP builder is a Pentair dealer use Pentair, if paramount use paramount..
I am very familiar with paramount founders and their products in the field. , a top shelf family biz & products.
Incidentally Paramount founding family recently sold the business to hayward.
Ok so ParaSkim Venturi sounds like it is definitely worth talking to the PB about using. I know he is a Zodiac Dealer primarily so I will have to find out about Paramount.
So a few points I need some clarification on for optimizing cleaning...
Do I want to have returns directly across from the skimmers to optimize the cleaning?
How effective would a “lower wall return” for pushing towards my A&A Channel drain be?
So a few points I need some clarification on for optimizing cleaning...
Do I want to have returns directly across from the skimmers to optimize the cleaning?
How effective would a “lower wall return” for pushing towards my A&A Channel drain be?
Returns right across from the skimmer will move only that stuff in to them. You also want returns to keep all areas such as the corners. The thought of the V skimmer is the water will cause the water to hit the walls and "bounce" the water back to the skimmer.
Return on the bottom of the wall to move stuff to the main drain-I am rethinking the placement. I am thinking one on each end to push anything to the drain.
The key to all of this is being able to have full control on the power/pressure of all of the returns and suction strength of the skimmers and main drain. That will happen with the use of good valves.
I am also going to lean on Ray to give some input.
Kim
Return on the bottom of the wall to move stuff to the main drain-I am rethinking the placement. I am thinking one on each end to push anything to the drain.
The key to all of this is being able to have full control on the power/pressure of all of the returns and suction strength of the skimmers and main drain. That will happen with the use of good valves.
I am also going to lean on Ray to give some input.
Kim
Oh - one more plus for the paraskims is they have a knockout for an overflow. I think it was some oddball size like 1.25” but we hooked all 4 skimmer overflow pipes up to our deck drain system, looping them up and back down to set the max water height. (The drain openings sit below the water line so you have to make a reverse p trap of sorts to dictate max water height.) It’s a lot cleaner look than the grate style that usually get set into the water line tiles.
They drain water surprisingly quickly when submerged; Even with 2200ish square foot of surface area in the pool, the 4 drain lines were able to keep up with Harvey rains until the bayou swamped the pool.
They drain water surprisingly quickly when submerged; Even with 2200ish square foot of surface area in the pool, the 4 drain lines were able to keep up with Harvey rains until the bayou swamped the pool.
Returns right across from the skimmer will move only that stuff in to them. You also want returns to keep all areas such as the corners. The thought of the V skimmer is the water will cause the water to hit the walls and "bounce" the water back to the skimmer.
Return on the bottom of the wall to move stuff to the main drain-I am rethinking the placement. I am thinking one on each end to push anything to the drain.
The key to all of this is being able to have full control on the power/pressure of all of the returns and suction strength of the skimmers and main drain. That will happen with the use of good valves.
I am also going to lean on Ray to give some input.
Kim
Thanks Kim, I have to admit I may be more confused about the correct placement of the returns than when we started this conversation. Kim I appreciate you trying to help teach this newbie about optimal return setup.
The only thing that seems clear at this point is that if we can get the V skimmers we should and we should have a return at each end. However I am not sure which side or which direction the end returns should point for optimal flow of debris to the skimmers. Plus the V skimmers will take up 2 of my 5 returns if I am understanding correctly.
The more input the better if Ray wants to chime in.
I’ll chime in on the return heads. Not saying by any stretch that this is the right answer, but it seems to be working for us.
At the bottom of this thread is a rough napkin sketch of my pool.
7ft x 70ft lap pool water circulation design
We decided that it would be futile to try to get a coordinated rotation around the whole pool so we subdivided it into several zones using a combination of straight heads and angles Venturi heads. To basically stir the water up and keep the chemicals mixed up (no dead zones). It doesn’t seem like the jets do a lot to influence surface debris for us (the wind seems to do a better job of that) but the water does move around pretty well.
I’ll hunt down a picture and attach it below in a minute. It shows some of the swirl created by the jets (just after flocculant - during storm clean-up).
At the bottom of this thread is a rough napkin sketch of my pool.
7ft x 70ft lap pool water circulation design
We decided that it would be futile to try to get a coordinated rotation around the whole pool so we subdivided it into several zones using a combination of straight heads and angles Venturi heads. To basically stir the water up and keep the chemicals mixed up (no dead zones). It doesn’t seem like the jets do a lot to influence surface debris for us (the wind seems to do a better job of that) but the water does move around pretty well.
I’ll hunt down a picture and attach it below in a minute. It shows some of the swirl created by the jets (just after flocculant - during storm clean-up).
Thing is I am not 100% sure of what the best placement would be as your pool is outside the norm. I am REALLY liking lap pool's idea about zones!!! Since there is no way to really make your water "circulate" like is done in a wider pool then we make zones to concentrate on each area to help keep them clean is the way to go. Back to the drawing board 
We will keep working on this until we have a solid plan based on science and gut LOL
Kim
We will keep working on this until we have a solid plan based on science and gut LOLKim
These decisions are best left to the builder.
Changing the plan can lead to large expenses & no reassurance of desired performance.
Changing the plan can lead to large expenses & no reassurance of desired performance.
