Recent content by dcaton

For anyone who's following this, the mental anguish is over :hammer:. A got an early black Friday deal on the AquaCal SQ225 143K BTU, $500 off. That plus free shipping and no sales tax made it hard to turn down, even though it's a bit more than I wanted to spend. I might be able to heat my...

The difference between a 143K and 121K unit is about 16%, so all else being equal, I'd have to run a 121K unit 16% longer than a 143K unit to achieve more or less the same results. If that's correct, it doesn't seem too bad. But a 7.1 CoP vs a 6.5 CoP is 8.5% more efficient, which should...

Yikes, now we're over $6k. I was just telling my wife this morning that we'd probably be around $5k. I do like the 7 year warranty on the AquaCals though. I assume that's using the pool cover. I was expecting a much higher cost/month. Thanks very much for the detailed info, this is exactly...

Programmer. But I do tend to overthink or over analyze things sometimes. I guess this is going to cost me a bit more than I thought, but that's nothing new...

Ok, now we're getting somewhere. You're in a similar climate, I'm just south of Vero Beach. You keep your pool at 89 all winter, even in Dec and Jan?

I do understand that, and did exactly that when I replaced the filter recently. It's fairly easy to calculate the filter size based on the number of gallons in the pool, and I doubled that. But we're not talking a lot of money there. My SWG is also 2x oversized. Heaters are a different ball...

Yes, and I didn't find it particularly helpful. Every single model shows the swim season from March to September. The swim season down here is May through October without a heater. It's certainly not taking climate into consideration although it asks for my zip code. The only difference in all...

And therein is the problem. I know the pool size and I know the climate. What I don't know is how to calculate the BTU's needed, if there even is such a calculation.

Yeah, I know but I've already raised that possibility and it has a very low WAF. Depending on how much the heater increases our electric bills, it might be an easier sell down the road. I was going to try one of those water additives that claims to help reduce evaporation, but I've seen mixed...

James, Thanks for the recommendation, I appreciate it, but this is a trade-only unit. I am going to install it myself (I know what I'm doing when it comes to that). Really think I need a 140K unit in this climate with a 11,000 gallon pool? Looking at $5k for a Hayward or $4750 for a Raypak...

Nobody?

We just moved about 100 miles north but the climate here isn't significantly different where we were for 30+ years. So, generally it's in the 70's during the winter months, sometimes in the 80's. It can dip into the 50's or even 40's but those periods usually don't last long and a HP wouldn't...

Yes, thanks but I understand that, but at some point I would be paying for unneeded capacity. I don't know where that point is. Which is why I was hoping someone in this type of climate might be able to say what works (or doesn't) for them.

Electrical capacity isn't a problem, and in the grand scheme of things, none of these units are going to put us on welfare for the rest of our lives. I don't want to spend more than necessary though (or not spend enough and be disappointed), but at some point I'd think there would be diminishing...

Recently bought a house in the Vero Beach, Florida area. Pool is approx. 11,000 gallons, in-ground. We're not here most of the summer when a heater is unnecessary. Running in the pool helps my wife's arthritis so we'd like to extend the usable season as long as possible. The pool would be...