Need to stop just throwing money around randomly.. [FILTER]

[jimheem]

So.. 15,000ish gallon Above ground, I have a 1hp pump and a 16" Hayward sand filter. The filter has been fine for the 2 previous years, but this year I ran into quite an issue with particles that it could not filter. Sadly it came to I had to floc the pool.. and am still dealing with getting the gunk off the bottom out to waste. So my question comes to this.

I have to spend some money coming up soon. There's a possibility that my multiport valve is having an issue (possibly causing the filter to not work as well?) - it leaks water to waste when put on recirculate. Is that enough of a problem to cause a filtration issue? I don't know - maybe - can't tell. So there's $75 bucks I could spend as just a shot in the dark.

If I continue to waste this flocc-ed stuff, I'm going to end up needing a $265 truck of water (well can't possibly keep up)

Seems a sand filter isn't really the way to go, and the one I bought at 16" is too small anyway. Do I spend my money on a cartridge filter, keep my water, and hope it's small enough to filter out the flocc-ed gunk, and be a better overall solution?

Or do I get a smaller cartridge filter and run it in series with the sand filter as a multi-stage setup to catch what the sand can't? That's about a $75 option.

As you can see, I'm not made of money here, ha.. but I'm feeling like an *** because my kids can't swim yet this year.

So.. where do you think my money is best spent?

 

[JasonLion]

We recommend avoiding flocculates. They can speed things up a little, but often cause far more trouble than they could possibly be worth.

From your description, your multi-port valve needs a new spider gasket. That is a fairly easy repair. Still, it would not cause the water to turn cloudy. Cloudy water is invariable a chemistry problem. If you post a complete set of water test results we can give you suggestions on getting your water chemistry in line.

 

[tim5055]

We recommend avoiding flocculates. They can speed things up a little, but often cause far more trouble than they could possibly be worth.

From your description, your multi-port valve needs a new spider gasket. That is a fairly easy repair. Still, it would not cause the water to turn cloudy. Cloudy water is invariable a chemistry problem. If you post a complete set of water test results we can give you suggestions on getting your water chemistry in line.

What he said

 

[Rocco]

The leaking water into waste most certainly sounds like a spider valve issue. I recently replaced mine for under $14.00.

 

[jimheem]

Yea. Lousy flocculant. I didn't want to do it, but I threw it in in a fit of desperation.

As for the spider gasket, From what I read, my model doesnt have a serviceable spider gasket and you have to replace the whole head. It's the Hayward Pro s166t - And you're right, I don't think it's really the issue, but with it throwing a visibile leak on "recirc" who is to say that when It's on filter it's only actually filtering 20% of the water or so and letting the rest just fly by. I dunno.


I don't have a fancy test kit yet, but Basic numbers show

Free chroline: 3
total chlorine 5
CYA ~20
TA ~35
PH: bouncing a bit from 7.0 to 7.5 - I've been adding washing soda

As for cloudy water being a chemistry problem, I understand what you are saying - The **** will settle out and the water is looking good (ya know except for the inch of yuck on the bottom) - If I filter it all gets trapped in solution and becomes cloudy. Seems I'm just not able to actually filter the stuff out, either due to a sand filter not being "good enough" or it bypassing the filter.