Help with Stubborn Cloudy Green
- Thread starter madyogi
- Start date
Yep. So this is yesterday after work, and I believe the first two pics are still up from opening day and then maybe a week ago.
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And here's one from May 3rd, just for comparison.
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And here's one from May 3rd, just for comparison.
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Okay, well this should be interesting ... pool store folks told me not to mess with DE, because it could damage my filter. They said I should do Fiber Clear instead, but the price per volume is so much cheaper, and my general skepticism of pool store folks is high, mostly because of this website ;-), so I went ahead and bought the DE. I'll be adding 1/4 cup at a time with a gallon or so of water until my pressure goes up 1 psi.
What is the protocol for adding fiber clear? Looks like great results for just a couple days!
What is the protocol for adding fiber clear? Looks like great results for just a couple days!
Okay, so I'll freely admit to generally being a nerd as well. Given that, I really want to capitalize on this thread to see if we can drill down to a best practice for opening and clearing as quickly as humanly possible.
I don't have the model number of my filter on me, but I'll get it after work. I actually ran home real quick (five minutes) to backwash just to be sure. I then added 1/2 cup of DE back into the system, so the pressure is fine for now.
Here's what I want to get at from a nerdy scientific standpoint: how can you tell what the optimal DE level really is?
So, the main article here says add DE until your pressure goes up 1 psi, allowing a few minutes between each 1/4 cup, to see what changes pressure-wise.
My experience over the past 36 hours or so has been that I can add up to about 3/4 cup and notice the 1 psi change, then let things run and the pressure is more or less stable indefinitely (like overnight last night). If I move up to adding 1 cup to the system, pressure tends to rise more rapidly.
I'm trying to discern if I should be wanting this more rapid rise, like maybe that's an indication that I'm getting the desired effect of greatly increased filtration? Or perhaps that's an indication that I've added too much, and I should just keep it closer to the 3/4 cup and exercise patience? By rapid rise, I mean if I exceed 3/4 cup DE I start to see the pressure rise past 20 within 10 minutes, then it's up to 25 within an hour or two.
If I'm at home over the weekend, say, and can monitor things closely, should I err slightly higher on the DE and backwash more regularly?
Thoughts?
I don't have the model number of my filter on me, but I'll get it after work. I actually ran home real quick (five minutes) to backwash just to be sure. I then added 1/2 cup of DE back into the system, so the pressure is fine for now.
Here's what I want to get at from a nerdy scientific standpoint: how can you tell what the optimal DE level really is?
So, the main article here says add DE until your pressure goes up 1 psi, allowing a few minutes between each 1/4 cup, to see what changes pressure-wise.
My experience over the past 36 hours or so has been that I can add up to about 3/4 cup and notice the 1 psi change, then let things run and the pressure is more or less stable indefinitely (like overnight last night). If I move up to adding 1 cup to the system, pressure tends to rise more rapidly.
I'm trying to discern if I should be wanting this more rapid rise, like maybe that's an indication that I'm getting the desired effect of greatly increased filtration? Or perhaps that's an indication that I've added too much, and I should just keep it closer to the 3/4 cup and exercise patience? By rapid rise, I mean if I exceed 3/4 cup DE I start to see the pressure rise past 20 within 10 minutes, then it's up to 25 within an hour or two.
If I'm at home over the weekend, say, and can monitor things closely, should I err slightly higher on the DE and backwash more regularly?
Thoughts?
In the meantime, while I'm sipping my POP 
, and while we have Robert's attention, I want to see if I have the whole filter pressure concept figured out.
So positive pressure is pre-pump, like your skimmer basket or main drain. Negative pressure is post-pump, like your returns. The relationship between negative and positive pressure is what gives us the PSI reading? It seems like reducing the positive pressure increases the PSI. So when I'm running my Polaris, for example, I somewhat isolate the return it's running off of, which increases the positive pressure. I can balance that out by decreasing the negative pressure by closing down the value that lets water in from the main drain. So it seems shutting down the negative pressure decreases the PSI, while shutting down positive pressure increases it. I'm imagining there's some kind of equation that would explain this precisely ...
How am I doing so far?
, and while we have Robert's attention, I want to see if I have the whole filter pressure concept figured out.So positive pressure is pre-pump, like your skimmer basket or main drain. Negative pressure is post-pump, like your returns. The relationship between negative and positive pressure is what gives us the PSI reading? It seems like reducing the positive pressure increases the PSI. So when I'm running my Polaris, for example, I somewhat isolate the return it's running off of, which increases the positive pressure. I can balance that out by decreasing the negative pressure by closing down the value that lets water in from the main drain. So it seems shutting down the negative pressure decreases the PSI, while shutting down positive pressure increases it. I'm imagining there's some kind of equation that would explain this precisely ...
How am I doing so far?
Yeah, I've been doing the 10 ml, but I've been running 20 ppm, so that somewhere between 35-40 drops per test, three times a day. This is another question I've been meaning to ask, and I will start a new thread about it once this process is over, but 20-22 ppm is too high for my CYA level according to the chart. My CYA is probably around 25 right now. But when I had my FC at 12-16, assuming CYA of 35, which it what it was a couple weeks ago, I was barely losing any FC at all. Like I might have had to replace 2 ppm though the day and 1 ppm overnight, something like that. When I went up to 20 ppm, I started having to add much more bleach to keep pace. Not sure what this means exactly, but that has been my experience thus far this year, so I've let the FC level above recommended SLAM levels.
Are you sure about your CYA level? When is the last time you tested it? Also, it should end in a zero so if you are seeing the dot disappear halfway between 30 and 40, you should round up to 40.
I don’t bother trying to watch it the whole time. I fill to one line, glance. If I still see the dot, fill to the next line, glance. And repeat as needed.
I don’t bother trying to watch it the whole time. I fill to one line, glance. If I still see the dot, fill to the next line, glance. And repeat as needed.
Yeah, I think I understand how to do the test. Just got more reagent today, and tested earlier this afternoon. I'm just giving 25 as an answer, because the thing is pretty cloudy at thirty, but I can still make out the dot. Unless I have an odd interpretation of not being able to see the dot, which is entirely possible, I don't see how I could be vastly underestimated my CYA. But it's possible.
Ditto, I go every 10ppm on the tube. I don't try to guess.
Not sure why you are running higher levels of FC for your CYA? You trying to speed it up more?
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No but you should pool math and probably add 5-10ppm to get solid 30. That's not helping. CYA is sunblock/UV protection for your valuable Chlorine. You MUST Protect this house! Oh my bad, thats UA (under armor) not UV.
I know CYA is important, but I added 6 lbs from zero, got to basically forty by the test, but I've kicked out a lot of water in the course of three weeks, with backwashing so much and vacuuming on waste several times. I'm sort of hesitant to add more now until I get things cleared up. I guess I could let the chlorine drift down to the 20 level potentially without any compromise to eating algae. That's what the chart says, but then it wouldn't feel like I'm really kicking it's **S!
Okay, deep breath ....
Okay, deep breath ....
What exactly the manual referring to as 25%? 25% above clean starting pressure? Or 25 % of the whole Hayward gauge which tops out at 60 psi? At least my gague tops out at 60 psi. So .25 of 60 psi would be 15 psi. I don't know if Hayward has different higher psi gauges for different filtration systems. Kindly elaborate. 
I was thinking I had seen that around here. Something like backwash when pressure rises 25% above the clean running pressure. I haven't gone digging yet, so if I'm just totally making that up, my apologies, perhaps I read it somewhere else ... I don't think it was anything official from Hayward, I think it was something on the interwebs. Whatever the case, I thought it was referring to the clean running pressure, not the total range of the gauge, so if you run 10 after a backwash, backwash again at 12.5 or 13, etc. Is that the wrong way of looking at it?
What exactly the manual referring to as 25%? 25% above clean starting pressure? Or 25 % of the whole Hayward gauge which tops out at 60 psi? At least my gague tops out at 60 psi. So .25 of 60 psi would be 15 psi. I don't know if Hayward has different higher psi gauges for different filtration systems. Kindly elaborate.
Manual doesn't say anything about 25%, it says 10psi over clean psi and then backwash.
The 25% I read on TFP.
Headed to the tv Gents, will catch up on all the chatter in the morning.
Just saw this reply.
"In the meantime, while I'm sipping my POP , and while we have Robert's attention, I want to see if I have the whole filter pressure concept figured out.
So positive pressure is pre-pump, like your skimmer basket or main drain. Negative pressure is post-pump, like your returns. The relationship between negative and positive pressure is what gives us the PSI reading? It seems like reducing the positive pressure increases the PSI. So when I'm running my Polaris, for example, I somewhat isolate the return it's running off of, which increases the positive pressure. I can balance that out by decreasing the negative pressure by closing down the value that lets water in from the main drain. So it seems shutting down the negative pressure decreases the PSI, while shutting down positive pressure increases it. I'm imagining there's some kind of equation that would explain this precisely ...
How am I doing so far?"
The way I think of it is....Since the suction coming off the skimmer basket is creating a vaccum, sucking water, I think of that as negative pressure or suction before it hits the pump. Since when you throttle back the inlet side with the ball check valve, its reduces psi. Hence by throttling the inlet valve first, you reduce the negative pressure first without touching anything else, and essentially what happens is the positive pressure post pump or the water flow of the return side goes down and the impeller slows down. Now if you were to run the diesel bag and it were to load up, or your primary sand filter, cartridge filter or whatever filter were to load up with dirt, algae, DE, etc. What happens? The psi goes up right? Why? Because you are pushing water post pump, through the primary filter, through the debris obstructions, and out the return jet. So as a result when the primary filter loads up, the psi goes up. Now when you attach the bag, pretty much the same cause and effect happens. Its just ahead of your primary filtration. Now when your skimmer basket loads up pre pump. The opposite happens. The pressure goes down, and puts a strong vacuum on your skimmer basket. Same as putting your hand on a shop vac hose nozzle. Let the skimmer load up and go far enough, and your basket may possibly crack. This is happened to me many times so I know when to clean it. Skimmer basket are only 8 bucks though, no big loss.
Now what happens when you throttle the intake and the return ball check together? You wind up equaling out the pressure, but you slow down the water suction or vaccum and slow down the positive water flow out the return as well. Doing this and throttling equally across both valves, you wind up with the same amount of pressure, same amount of gunk in the filters, you just slow down the water flow, and in turn slow down the pump impeller.
It's just something that I experimented with over the years to slow down the turnover rate of my pump to filtrate more effectively since my pump is 1.5 hp and only one speed. At clean pressure my pump throws around water very violently. 1.5 hp is overkill for the size of my pool which is only 7200 gal. But I require it because I get a lot of debris, because the pool is in a partially shaded yard next to the woods. I get all kinds of debris. Bird droppings, bugs, bumblebees, termites, leaf debris, pollen in the spring, etc... Sometimes even after blowing out my diesel bag good cleaning it, and given it a good rinsing just at the sink, and not with the pressure washer, after reattaching it and turning on my pump at clean pressure I would see a little poof of algae go back in the pool through the bag because of sediment, or suspended particles were that were finer then the bag could filter at full clean water flow and pressure.
So I came up with an idea to ease the water pressure down a little by throttling the valves 1/8th of a turn. Essentially I wind up filtrating the water a lot slower and a lot longer, and it takes more running pump hours to turn over my entire pool, but it filters the water and polishes it more effectively. At least in theory it is supposed to anyway?
So what did we learn here today?
That throttling your Inlet and return valves slows down your pump impeller and slows down water flow, when they are both throttled. When you throttle the inlet side you lose pressure. When you throttle the return side you raise pressure.
Hope this makes sense? This is the way I kind of make sense of it all in my head, and hope I'm giving a good accurate sense of technical information? You can verify this experiment by watching the water flow in your pump basket. Usually when there's no air in the system and you've bled all the air out, the pump basket window should look perfectly clear.
"In the meantime, while I'm sipping my POP , and while we have Robert's attention, I want to see if I have the whole filter pressure concept figured out.
So positive pressure is pre-pump, like your skimmer basket or main drain. Negative pressure is post-pump, like your returns. The relationship between negative and positive pressure is what gives us the PSI reading? It seems like reducing the positive pressure increases the PSI. So when I'm running my Polaris, for example, I somewhat isolate the return it's running off of, which increases the positive pressure. I can balance that out by decreasing the negative pressure by closing down the value that lets water in from the main drain. So it seems shutting down the negative pressure decreases the PSI, while shutting down positive pressure increases it. I'm imagining there's some kind of equation that would explain this precisely ...
How am I doing so far?"
The way I think of it is....Since the suction coming off the skimmer basket is creating a vaccum, sucking water, I think of that as negative pressure or suction before it hits the pump. Since when you throttle back the inlet side with the ball check valve, its reduces psi. Hence by throttling the inlet valve first, you reduce the negative pressure first without touching anything else, and essentially what happens is the positive pressure post pump or the water flow of the return side goes down and the impeller slows down. Now if you were to run the diesel bag and it were to load up, or your primary sand filter, cartridge filter or whatever filter were to load up with dirt, algae, DE, etc. What happens? The psi goes up right? Why? Because you are pushing water post pump, through the primary filter, through the debris obstructions, and out the return jet. So as a result when the primary filter loads up, the psi goes up. Now when you attach the bag, pretty much the same cause and effect happens. Its just ahead of your primary filtration. Now when your skimmer basket loads up pre pump. The opposite happens. The pressure goes down, and puts a strong vacuum on your skimmer basket. Same as putting your hand on a shop vac hose nozzle. Let the skimmer load up and go far enough, and your basket may possibly crack. This is happened to me many times so I know when to clean it. Skimmer basket are only 8 bucks though, no big loss.
Now what happens when you throttle the intake and the return ball check together? You wind up equaling out the pressure, but you slow down the water suction or vaccum and slow down the positive water flow out the return as well. Doing this and throttling equally across both valves, you wind up with the same amount of pressure, same amount of gunk in the filters, you just slow down the water flow, and in turn slow down the pump impeller.
It's just something that I experimented with over the years to slow down the turnover rate of my pump to filtrate more effectively since my pump is 1.5 hp and only one speed. At clean pressure my pump throws around water very violently. 1.5 hp is overkill for the size of my pool which is only 7200 gal. But I require it because I get a lot of debris, because the pool is in a partially shaded yard next to the woods. I get all kinds of debris. Bird droppings, bugs, bumblebees, termites, leaf debris, pollen in the spring, etc... Sometimes even after blowing out my diesel bag good cleaning it, and given it a good rinsing just at the sink, and not with the pressure washer, after reattaching it and turning on my pump at clean pressure I would see a little poof of algae go back in the pool through the bag because of sediment, or suspended particles were that were finer then the bag could filter at full clean water flow and pressure.
So I came up with an idea to ease the water pressure down a little by throttling the valves 1/8th of a turn. Essentially I wind up filtrating the water a lot slower and a lot longer, and it takes more running pump hours to turn over my entire pool, but it filters the water and polishes it more effectively. At least in theory it is supposed to anyway?
So what did we learn here today?
That throttling your Inlet and return valves slows down your pump impeller and slows down water flow, when they are both throttled. When you throttle the inlet side you lose pressure. When you throttle the return side you raise pressure.
Hope this makes sense? This is the way I kind of make sense of it all in my head, and hope I'm giving a good accurate sense of technical information? You can verify this experiment by watching the water flow in your pump basket. Usually when there's no air in the system and you've bled all the air out, the pump basket window should look perfectly clear.
It's making sense to me, and thanks! That's an interesting idea that throttling down your PSI pushes water through the system slower, and therefore probably filters the water more effectively. That's your hypothesis, right?
One last set of questions, then ... what is it about higher PSI that is likely to lead to failure, and what is the limiting factor in most systems: motor, filter, something more structural like a pipe or hose? And what might cause the clean running PSI to vary from one system to another, like mine running at 17.5 as opposed to 9-10? And finally, if the same two motors run two systems with different pressures for the same amount of total hours, will the one running the system with greater pressure probably fail first?
Thanks again for the interaction. I'm heading to the couch then bed, myself now. Check in sometime tomorrow!
One last set of questions, then ... what is it about higher PSI that is likely to lead to failure, and what is the limiting factor in most systems: motor, filter, something more structural like a pipe or hose? And what might cause the clean running PSI to vary from one system to another, like mine running at 17.5 as opposed to 9-10? And finally, if the same two motors run two systems with different pressures for the same amount of total hours, will the one running the system with greater pressure probably fail first?
Thanks again for the interaction. I'm heading to the couch then bed, myself now. Check in sometime tomorrow!
I'm going to address the last reply backwards.
I don't see a improperly sized hose being a limiting factor because obviously the hose has to be properly sized in order to fit the ball check valves, skimmer inlet and return jet inlet. (I forget what the exact size is.)
With that being said.... Regarding hoses. You definitely want good, PVC sun resistant, above ground pool hose, if you have an above ground pool, and not the cheaper, white thinner material, spa hose, that is available in cutable 5ft lengths at most pool stores. PVC piping for in-ground pools obviously have to be sized properly as well according to your pool gallon size and proper pump size to accommodate so many gallons. There also is known as gallon per hour turnover rates for pump sizes.
Because I don't have experience with other filtration systems like sand or DE. I cannot definitively say what would cause a difference in operating clean pressure differences between sand or cartridge filtration.
I would think that the psi variables would reside in different horsepower pump sizes, pumps with different speed settings and rpm. Maybe possibly different impeller sizes for different motors? Typically pumps are rated by GPM's or GPH's meaning gallons per minute or gallons per hour. Not every manufacturer is created equal and not every model of filtration is created equal either. Different products for different needs. For different customers.
The majority of some plumbing and heating products in your home, and most pool pumps are manufactured by A.O. Smith which is what I believe Hayward utilizes.
What could also affect different clean starting operating pressures between sand and cartridge, or DE is DE filter grids, the type of sand you use, how old it is, how clogged it is, the type and brand of cartridge you use, etc, in combination with your current pump assembly. There are so many variables, that you have to explore it on a case-by-case, and symptom by symptom basis.
I never realized it until just last year. My model filtration unit is a Hayward CCX1500. The previous owner of the pool and the house that I bought from 6 years ago, left me the filtration unit, and pump with a brand new cartridge filter that was never used and still sealed in the box. For the past five years I've been using the filter that he left me. I just realized last year the filter was meant for a Hayward Model CCX 1000 which only filters 100 area sq. ft.
So last year I decided to replace the cartridge filter because the bands were wearing that contained and held the pleats together.
I got the same Pleatco cartridge expands and screws things up in there.
To my best knowledge there is no harm if it is coming from the manufacturer that it's okay to operate 10 psi above your clean operating pressure.
Hope this answer some of your questions.
I don't see a improperly sized hose being a limiting factor because obviously the hose has to be properly sized in order to fit the ball check valves, skimmer inlet and return jet inlet. (I forget what the exact size is.)
With that being said.... Regarding hoses. You definitely want good, PVC sun resistant, above ground pool hose, if you have an above ground pool, and not the cheaper, white thinner material, spa hose, that is available in cutable 5ft lengths at most pool stores. PVC piping for in-ground pools obviously have to be sized properly as well according to your pool gallon size and proper pump size to accommodate so many gallons. There also is known as gallon per hour turnover rates for pump sizes.
Because I don't have experience with other filtration systems like sand or DE. I cannot definitively say what would cause a difference in operating clean pressure differences between sand or cartridge filtration.
I would think that the psi variables would reside in different horsepower pump sizes, pumps with different speed settings and rpm. Maybe possibly different impeller sizes for different motors? Typically pumps are rated by GPM's or GPH's meaning gallons per minute or gallons per hour. Not every manufacturer is created equal and not every model of filtration is created equal either. Different products for different needs. For different customers.
The majority of some plumbing and heating products in your home, and most pool pumps are manufactured by A.O. Smith which is what I believe Hayward utilizes.
What could also affect different clean starting operating pressures between sand and cartridge, or DE is DE filter grids, the type of sand you use, how old it is, how clogged it is, the type and brand of cartridge you use, etc, in combination with your current pump assembly. There are so many variables, that you have to explore it on a case-by-case, and symptom by symptom basis.
I never realized it until just last year. My model filtration unit is a Hayward CCX1500. The previous owner of the pool and the house that I bought from 6 years ago, left me the filtration unit, and pump with a brand new cartridge filter that was never used and still sealed in the box. For the past five years I've been using the filter that he left me. I just realized last year the filter was meant for a Hayward Model CCX 1000 which only filters 100 area sq. ft.
So last year I decided to replace the cartridge filter because the bands were wearing that contained and held the pleats together.
I got the same Pleatco cartridge expands and screws things up in there.
To my best knowledge there is no harm if it is coming from the manufacturer that it's okay to operate 10 psi above your clean operating pressure.
Hope this answer some of your questions.
Yep, answers all but one: will my motor generally fail sooner if it is run at higher pressures consistently, all other things being equal, or is that not necessarily the case?
The OCLT is only 1 part of 3 to pass SLAM. It's Green, keep your foot on the gas!! You will stay in SLAM and FC @ SLAM levels until you are CLEAR. That is just part of the fun, what I am already seeing is that I am not green but blue cloudy and I am 100% at the mercy of my filtration system. But my FC is holding very well. My test results are exactly what I expect, which is great. But I am keeping foot in the gas all the way through. Just like I did last year.
Yeah, I'll keep the SLAM level up ...
I will probably have to defer to someone else in terms of your plumbing setup, but the pump is over on the right side of your picture, and it looks like there's a valve over there to control the flow coming into the pump. I can't really tell what's going on on the return side (left side of things). Perhaps someone else will recognize more of this setup ...
I will probably have to defer to someone else in terms of your plumbing setup, but the pump is over on the right side of your picture, and it looks like there's a valve over there to control the flow coming into the pump. I can't really tell what's going on on the return side (left side of things). Perhaps someone else will recognize more of this setup ...
Quick update - Added about 2.5 lbs CYA in sock in front of return. Brushed obsessively. Added roughly the same amount of chlorine as yesterday, can't test until new R-0871 comes next week, but I have a good idea what I've been adding to keep up the SLAM. I have backwashed twice today, adding 1 cup of DE back to the filter each time.
Water is progressively turning milky as opposed to green. And this is a small thing, but I actually saw a bit of the sunlight shimmers on the bottom of the shallow end this evening!
Anyhow, elbow came in today, and I expect the 5 micron duda bag tomorrow or Tuesday. I expect the SLAM to be over by Tuesday night, perhaps even tomorrow, given the rate of improvement in water clarity over the past two days.
Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there!!
Water is progressively turning milky as opposed to green. And this is a small thing, but I actually saw a bit of the sunlight shimmers on the bottom of the shallow end this evening!
Anyhow, elbow came in today, and I expect the 5 micron duda bag tomorrow or Tuesday. I expect the SLAM to be over by Tuesday night, perhaps even tomorrow, given the rate of improvement in water clarity over the past two days.
Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there!!