I took it apart a week and a half ago and gave it a very good cleaning. I now have a good idea of what the clean pressure should be so knowing when to actually backflush should be a little more clear.
As far as the age of our pool it's new this summer and the process with the installer has been extremely painful. Started the install last September and were still working out issues as of this week. I could write a paper on all the issues we've had. If I had a magic rewind button I probably wouldn't have done it to be completely honest. I've never seen an industry so full of incompetence in all my life. I know that's a sweeping generalization but where I live it's definitely the case.