Help w/ Bleach feeding thru Pentair In-line Chlorinator

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DBergeron

DBergeron

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LifeTime Supporter
Mar 25, 2010
19
SW Louisiana
Hello! I'm having an In-ground vinyl liner pool installed. I'm hoping they will be finished by this weekend. My pool installer initially had my wife and me convinced in using the Frog Mineral Sytem; however, I have done quite a bit of reading on TFP over the past week which has convinced me otherwise. Thank y'all! :goodjob: So I told them to install an inline chlorine feeder instead of the Frog Mineral System. I found out today that they are installing a Pentair Rainbow 320 In-line Chlorinator which I am happy with.

I have done my readings on The BBB Method forum and Pool School. My plan is to use the BBB Method. I would like to use a peristaltic pump on a timer to feed liquid chlorine (bleach 6%) into the Pentair Rainbow 320 In-line Chlorinator. The peristaltic pump I plan on using is rated at 50 mL/min. Obviously, I don't plan on using chlorine tablets (Di- or Tri-) in the feeder due to the issues with elevated CYA (Cyanuric Acid / Stabilizer).

I have a few questions:

Does anyone have any pictures on how they have theirs setup? It looks like the Pentair Chlorinator has the top side tapped which I think I can take advantage of. I thought about putting a 90 degree drip-line through that hole and feeding bleach into the top side of the feeder which will drip into the enclosed water and eventually feed into the pool.

How high does the water typically get inside the feeder? Which I guess I will know for sure in a few days once everything is online. I'm hoping it only fills up about halfway which will easily allow my dripping bleach inside.

Should I feed straight bleach or should I dilute the bleach with water, say 50/50?

Does anyone foresee any issues with this setup?


Thank you for your time and assistance!

-Dennis


Future project: Solar panels
 
That isn't such a great idea. If there ever was any trichlor in the tablet feeder there are some serious safety risks. You don't ever want to mix bleach and trichlor (unless they are both dissolved in the water). It is easy enough to feed the bleach in somewhere else, and much safer.
 
Welcome to TFP! :wave:
If it were me, I'd opt out of the chlorine tablet feeder all together. Since you're planning on using a peristaltic pump (great idea by the way) You won't need to use the feeder to maintain your chlorine level if you go away on vacation, etc. I'd tap the return piping to the pool and inject the chlorine there. I have the liquidator and have removed the Frog System completely (I wish I'd have found this forum before I paid good money for it).

Also, I believe that the injection pump you're planning on using is way too big for the application. As a reference 50ml/min equals 19gal/day. On the liquidator the flow meter is scaled from 0 to 5 ml/min which equates to 1.9 gal/day and right now I'm running it at 2 ml/min for 6 hours a day. I figured it up and figured that during the summer with a heavy bather load I was using about 1.5 quarts of 6% chlorine per day. Just throwing this out for you to think about.
 
I would tap into the 1/4" drain plug at the bottom of the pump strainer basket. a simple npt-to-barb fitting will let you hook up a hose that will handle your liquid chlorine.

If they've already got the chlorinator installed, that's fine. I'd just leave it.

If not, I'm of the same mind as Bama.
 
Thanks, guys! I seriously thought about a liquidator, but read there are issues with it that I would rather not deal with.

JasonLion,
I will definitely avoid mixing the two! Thanks!

Bama Rambler,
I may be misunderstanding something. 50 mL/min = 1.69 oz/min I'm just guesstimating that I will be dosing a few ounces of bleach over just a couple minutes instead of dosing bleach all day long like the liquidator does. My plan is to have my pool pump come on additionally for an hour during the night and peristaltic pump separately to dose a certain amount of bleach over a few minutes. Is there something wrong with this way? Or is it preferred to dose throughout the day?

duraleigh,
Going through the drain plug won't affect the pump? I thought you wanted to induce chlorine after your equipment to feed directly into the pool.

Thanks,
Dennis
 
Hi, Dennis,

The dilution is so great and so fast and it's for such a short period, I doubt it could have any effect. That said, if it were easy for me to put it after the equipment I would but I wouldn't expend too much effort if it was easier for me to go thru the pump strainer basket.
 
There's nothing wrong with injecting the chlorine faster. It would kinda be like pouring it in front of a return. I just threw it out for you to think about.

As you see in my sig I have a liquidator. It has worked great but I did have to upgrade it to 3/8" tubing so that's an added expense on top of the cost of the LQ itself.
 
DBergeron said:
Thanks, guys! I'll be around! Hopefully, everything will go through well, and I won't have to pollute the board with too many stupid questions!!! But it's good to know TFP is available! :goodjob:

-Dennis
Click to expand...

Stupid questions help stupid people like me :)
 
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