wow 12 hours pump time seems a lot, i am running only 6 hours at slow 1600rpm and pool looks sparkling,
Before I had my VS pump, I used to run my pump for as short as possible. But I get so much pollen, bugs, leaves and dirt blown into my pool, that the surface always looked dirty. Now, I'm running my VS pump throughout the day, and the pool always looks clean, and my SWG is down to 25% to 50%. There are many on the forum here that run their pump for 24/7.
i think in the end i will try a robotic,
If that's in your budget, I would definitely recommend that. They seem to do a much better job, and your pump speed and runtime is not determined by the needs of a suction cleaner. A suction cleaner does the job (my one does), but there is always this "maybe I should have..." In the back of your mind. And a lot of fiddling to get the hose length right, the pump speed, etc. When leaving the cleaner in the pool, you always have find an arrangement for the hose where it doesn't bother swimmers too much, when taking it out, you also have to find a good spot for the hose. If you leave the hose curled up in the sun, the hose will remain curled up, and the cleaner will just stay in one spot in the pool under a big tangle of hose (the curling effect doesn't affect a manual vacuum, but it makes a suction cleaner unusable). Many reasons for a robot. The only reason I see against one is the price tag.
but something i noticed yesterday there are tiny bubbles coming from the return, i have never noticed that before i am sure there wasn't any bubbles before, they are very tiny bubbles, i guess air is getting into the system from somewhere , is this normal and no issue ?
As others have already pointed out, the SWG creates hydrogen gas. What could also happen, depending on the plumbing, is that at low speed the pump doesn't manage to blow the gas all the way to the outlets, that gas accumulates somewhere in the pipe system (a bend, a high point, etc). Once enough has accumulated, it startes coming out the returns bit by bit. That could explain why you see the bubbles only sometimes. Does your pump have a prime function where it runs on full speed each time it turns on? That should blow any gas out of the system.
Another thing that I noticed is that when my suction cleaner (connected to skimmer via vac plate) is running and it gets to the surface and sucks a big gulp of air in, that this air accumulates in the skimmer (under the vac plate), and gets slowly blown through the system, adding bigger bubbles to the finer hydrogen bubbles coming out of the returns. Same thing with the manual vacuum when sucking in air.
BUT i have noticed something yesterday inspected just to see all is running ok and only the 50 light was on and it was flickering, i watched for a few minutes then the 75 came on, all good, this sounds like a cycle you mention maybe ? but i called watermaid they made no mention of it go thru a cycle
My SWG also has 8 lights that show the desired setting. The display will then show the actual chlorine production. If that value is lower than the desired setting, it indicates either that the salt is too low - the Aussie SWGs seem to be different in that regards to the US ones, my SWG also has a low salt light, but that is absolutely useless, it's permanently on once the water temperature is below about 22°C or below about 50% chlorine production, but the chlorine production is absolutely fine. Or that there is too much calcium built up on the plates, or that the cell is worn out (highly unlikely with your brand new setup) or otherwise damaged.
I'd say step one is to make sure that there is the right amount of salt in the pool and no calcium scale on the plates. Once that is ruled out, you should probably make a warranty claim.
You might have just not noticed the bubbles before. If you have your SWG setting anywhere less that 100%, then for X minutes the SWG will be producing chlorine and hydrogen, and for Y minutes it will produce neither, cycling back and forth, on and off, for the duration of its runtime. How often that cycle happens varies by brand. So even while the SWG is powered on, sometimes you'll see the tiny bubbles, and sometimes you won't. That is expected behavior.
Many Aussie SWGs (not sure about the Watermaid) work differently, and adjust the chlorine production not via a duty cycle, but by adjusting the voltage at the plates.
