I have a Tagelus Purex Triton 60D sand filter. This spring I have begun seeing lots of white sand in the bag of my auto pool cleaner. Is it the sand from the filter or my marcite falling apart? What would cause sand to escape from the filter?
sand in the pool
- Thread starter katiecraigslist
- Start date
Find a way to get a nylon or something very fine over the returns into your pool. They'll capture the sand if that's where it's coming from. Good idea to find the source definitively and then find a cure.
duraleigh said:
Great idea. I did it immediately and am so far finding no sand in the improvised trap! Now it would appear that our fairly new marcite (4 years) is disintegrating. Oh no! It cost a fortune. What could be going wrong? It appears that the marcite both above and below the winter pool water level is rough to the touch. It was so smooth and nice before this winter.
Katie,
It sounds like you might have calcium scaling. Can you post test results for pH, CH, and TA?
It sounds like you might have calcium scaling. Can you post test results for pH, CH, and TA?
OK first officially there is no sand in the nylong stocking improvised filters at the inports to the pool.
To answer about the chemicals. Of course these are all very ephemeral measurements. Today at this moment just after a big storm dumped a bunch of leaves and debris in the pool and after I added acid this morning to continue to bring pH down this is what we have:
pH 7.6 I have added a gallon of Muriatic acid over the past week at no more than 1 quart per day as suggested. It finally got in range today. When we opened the pool it was off the charts on my little color match guide meaning above 8.2.
Chlorine is now 2.0 ppm
Alkalinity is 80 whatever units it is reported in.
To answer about the chemicals. Of course these are all very ephemeral measurements. Today at this moment just after a big storm dumped a bunch of leaves and debris in the pool and after I added acid this morning to continue to bring pH down this is what we have:
pH 7.6 I have added a gallon of Muriatic acid over the past week at no more than 1 quart per day as suggested. It finally got in range today. When we opened the pool it was off the charts on my little color match guide meaning above 8.2.
Chlorine is now 2.0 ppm
Alkalinity is 80 whatever units it is reported in.
The "white sand" is probably the scale. Your very high prior pH indicates conditions were very favorable for scale to form.
My first suggestion is to assume that it is scale and get your pH down to around 7.0 or 7.2. Then, let's try to figure out what caused that pH to get so high so it won't happen again.
Posting a complete set of test results will get us started on what you can do to
1. stop the process.
2. reduce or repair what damage has been done.
3. I'd leave the "net" on the return perhaps a little while longer until you can positively eliminate the filter as the source.
Well the pH went way up over the winter while the pool was covered. I would not have access to the water then to test. I have been adjusting it down since we opened it 6 days ago. I have it down to 7.6 and thought that was OK. You think I should keep going down? As I said the alkalinity was 80 and the chlorine was 2 ppm. The scale as you said certainly looks like white sand. There is no sand in the nylon stockings at the inflow places.
You keep mentioning the "inplaces". I assume you mean the skimmers where the water is drawn in.
How about the returns- the jets that blow the water back into the pool? Have you put some sort of trap on those to see if there is sand blowing out of them? Do you have a sand filter? You mentioned covering the pool in winter. If you have a sand filter, it could be some of the laterals cracked due to freezing. The easiest way to tell would be to unscrew the return plate, put a filter bag made out of old nylons across the return, then put the plate back and see if the bag gets sand in it when the filter runs.
If I am not mistaken, scale is white and flaky whereas sand is... well . . . . just sand. But I will gladly defer to Duraleigh's knowledge- it's more extensive than mine.
How about the returns- the jets that blow the water back into the pool? Have you put some sort of trap on those to see if there is sand blowing out of them? Do you have a sand filter? You mentioned covering the pool in winter. If you have a sand filter, it could be some of the laterals cracked due to freezing. The easiest way to tell would be to unscrew the return plate, put a filter bag made out of old nylons across the return, then put the plate back and see if the bag gets sand in it when the filter runs.
If I am not mistaken, scale is white and flaky whereas sand is... well . . . . just sand. But I will gladly defer to Duraleigh's knowledge- it's more extensive than mine.
OK this morning I added more acid. Will check the pH later after it equilibrilizes. Before addition the pH was still around 7.5. no sand in improvised traps. Mr. Machine on to collect storm leaf debris and any remaining white granules.
I do have nylon stocking over the return jets. Sorry for the confusion. there is no sand there at all. The white stuff in Mr. Machine looks like sand. Yes we are in Michigan so the cool was closed over the winter. I also thought of the laterals in the sand filter but it does not seem to be coming out of the filter through the return jets. Weird.
Hopefully you'll get to the bottom of this.
I just copied this and put it on my wife's desk, right under her nose. If I don't post for a month or perhaps disappear, you'll know it was not one of my better ideas!!OK. I humbly defer to Duraleigh then
Similar threads
