- Apr 26, 2009
- 419
... and I'm one of them.
Great site. Just joined last night, and haven't done my sig yet - so I have a ~45K IGP... it was put in in 2001 and we live in silicon valley.
The pool is about 40Kg with an attached spa and powered by a whisperflow 2HP pump, through a NPS72 DE filter, and 8 4x12 solar panels. I also have a nature2 canister container, and at one time it was plumbed with a Hayward off-line tablet chlorinator. Oh yeah, and the guy that sold us the pool also sold us a couple of "Aqua-docs" (Magnets). I bought a SWG a few years ago, but will have to do some serious re-plumbing at the pad before I put it in (so I'm still using tablets)
The pool cleaner is a schizophrenic Polaris 360 on its own booster-pump that loves the deep end and hates the shallow end - I spent most of yesterday trying to get him ("Wilson" - the "pool boy" 8) ) not doing large counter-clockwise circles in the deep end - and wound up needing to clean him out (one of his jets were clogged) and replace his backup mechani$m.
The spa uses two 2-hp pumps (it's a large spa) - one of them's the pools and another dedicated just for the spa.
So, for the first 3-4 years, the pool was great and sparkling clear - but more recently I've been having to put more-and-more tablets into the skimmer and going through gallons of shock and Poly-quat with limited effect/impact. In recent years I've been fighting a dusty algae on the steps and in the shallow end and always attributed it to not getting on top of it with enough Cl fast enough... so a vicious cycle of shock, poly, tablet... shock, poly, tablet... over and over again has been progressively getting more aggressive (and costly) over the last two seasons.
Which lead me to here - there has to be a better way.
After spending much of last evening going to "Pool School", my gut tells me that my CYA is through the roof keeping my Cl from being effective and I'm going to have to drain-down the pool.
My (hopefully) very last trip to Leslie's will be today to get a better test-kit than the OTO kit piece of junk that I've had for years and (hopefully) return the un-opened 80-lb pail of tablets I picked-up last weekend. Oh, dang it... I also have a new N2 cartridge already on the way from PP.com....
So, no measurements yet, but should have some once I get back from the pool store.
But now I know what I'm looking for.
Just a couple of quick ones -
1) How much can I safely drain down when I'm fairly confident that the water table is at lease a few feet below the pool's lowest point (we haven't had any significant rain in several weeks, either)?
2) I'll be ripping my NSP72 DE filter apart today and spraying off it's grids. How many pounds of DE will it need when I put it back together... both on initial charge, and after each backwash?
3) I tired of $700/month electric bills in the summer - should I consider moving to 1HP (from 2) pumps for both the jacuuzi and pool? I won't do that today, but when I re-plumb the pool-pad, I'll do it if it makes sense.
Thanks millions.
Great site. Just joined last night, and haven't done my sig yet - so I have a ~45K IGP... it was put in in 2001 and we live in silicon valley.
The pool is about 40Kg with an attached spa and powered by a whisperflow 2HP pump, through a NPS72 DE filter, and 8 4x12 solar panels. I also have a nature2 canister container, and at one time it was plumbed with a Hayward off-line tablet chlorinator. Oh yeah, and the guy that sold us the pool also sold us a couple of "Aqua-docs" (Magnets). I bought a SWG a few years ago, but will have to do some serious re-plumbing at the pad before I put it in (so I'm still using tablets)
The pool cleaner is a schizophrenic Polaris 360 on its own booster-pump that loves the deep end and hates the shallow end - I spent most of yesterday trying to get him ("Wilson" - the "pool boy" 8) ) not doing large counter-clockwise circles in the deep end - and wound up needing to clean him out (one of his jets were clogged) and replace his backup mechani$m.
The spa uses two 2-hp pumps (it's a large spa) - one of them's the pools and another dedicated just for the spa.
So, for the first 3-4 years, the pool was great and sparkling clear - but more recently I've been having to put more-and-more tablets into the skimmer and going through gallons of shock and Poly-quat with limited effect/impact. In recent years I've been fighting a dusty algae on the steps and in the shallow end and always attributed it to not getting on top of it with enough Cl fast enough... so a vicious cycle of shock, poly, tablet... shock, poly, tablet... over and over again has been progressively getting more aggressive (and costly) over the last two seasons.
Which lead me to here - there has to be a better way.
After spending much of last evening going to "Pool School", my gut tells me that my CYA is through the roof keeping my Cl from being effective and I'm going to have to drain-down the pool.
My (hopefully) very last trip to Leslie's will be today to get a better test-kit than the OTO kit piece of junk that I've had for years and (hopefully) return the un-opened 80-lb pail of tablets I picked-up last weekend. Oh, dang it... I also have a new N2 cartridge already on the way from PP.com....
So, no measurements yet, but should have some once I get back from the pool store.
But now I know what I'm looking for.
Just a couple of quick ones -
1) How much can I safely drain down when I'm fairly confident that the water table is at lease a few feet below the pool's lowest point (we haven't had any significant rain in several weeks, either)?
2) I'll be ripping my NSP72 DE filter apart today and spraying off it's grids. How many pounds of DE will it need when I put it back together... both on initial charge, and after each backwash?
3) I tired of $700/month electric bills in the summer - should I consider moving to 1HP (from 2) pumps for both the jacuuzi and pool? I won't do that today, but when I re-plumb the pool-pad, I'll do it if it makes sense.
Thanks millions.
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