Ozinator 3 and BBB method
- Thread starter jbequer
- Start date
We don't generally recommend ozone systems. That said, using ozone with BBB is fine if that is what you want to do.
Why is it that you would not use the ozone system?
My pool builder is going to throw this in, as well as the pentair rainbow automatic sanitizer and other things as part of the package.
My pool builder is going to throw this in, as well as the pentair rainbow automatic sanitizer and other things as part of the package.
In an outdoor pool, chlorine is very effective, so there is little improvement to be had from an ozone system. The ozone system adds complexity, there are more things that can break, but does little to improve the water. Ozone is much more valuable for spas, where the bather load is much higher and chlorine is less effective at the higher temperatures.
Is the ozone system something i should pass on ?? The builder is set on this system with the rainbow auto sanitizer as being a great additions to my pool and spa.
JasonLion said:
I agree with this. The ozonator works great in the spa.
Spend the electricity running a Salt Water Chlorine Generator instead of the ozonator.
If you are talking about a rainbow (pentair) trichlor feeder you need to read a bit more in the forum about the problems of using trichlor and overstabilization! See if your builder would consider a SWG or a peristaltic pump and tank for liquid chlorine or bleach.
The pool builder I'm leaning towards is also very high on installing an ozonator. His sales pitch is a lot like what is said on This site:
To me, the theory is good, the logic is sound.
The question, is it the water passing the UV that causes the oxidation, or is Ozone being distributed throughout the pool to accomplish the oxidation?
To me, the theory is good, the logic is sound.
The question, is it the water passing the UV that causes the oxidation, or is Ozone being distributed throughout the pool to accomplish the oxidation?
The logic would be good, if those statements were actually true. 90% of the chlorine consumed in an outdoor residential pool is lost to sunlight. Ozone does nothing to improve that at all. The chlorine level can not be lowered and there is no detectable benefit. Those statements are true of heavily used commercial pools, where either ozone or UV can be very helpful. But there just aren't that many people swimming in a typical residential pool, and thus not enough stuff needing to be oxidized to make any detectable difference.
Ozone and UV both act only right where they are being applied. UV doesn't make it outside of the UV cell at all, and ozone is consumed in the first couple of feet of pipe after the ozone injection point. In neither case is there any residual left in the bulk pool water.
Ozone and UV both act only right where they are being applied. UV doesn't make it outside of the UV cell at all, and ozone is consumed in the first couple of feet of pipe after the ozone injection point. In neither case is there any residual left in the bulk pool water.
JasonLion said:
I appreciate your reply, but still not understanding why the ozone systems provide benefits for spa's (small systems) and commercial pools (large systems) but absolutely positively no measurable benefit for a 25K-55K gal in-ground swimming pool.
another thing, the quoted material made it clear, chlorine would be required to provide the residual.
It has to do with the number of person seconds of swimming per gallon of water. A spa, with say 500 gallons, used for 30 minutes is 3.6 person seconds per gallon. A commercial pool is similar, there might be 50 people, each swimming for an hour, in a 60K gallon pool, or 3.0 person seconds per gallon. Meanwhile, a 25K gallon pool with one person swimming for an hour is 0.14 person seconds per gallon. In the spa there is about 25 times as much organic debris (skin cells, sweat, etc which are shed constantly while you are swimming) per gallon as there is in the residential pool, and in the commercial pool about 21 times as much as in the 25K residential pool.
The extra treatment provided by ozone or UV is needed when the person seconds per gallon level is consistently high several days in a row. That is very common in a spa or a commercial pool and extremely rare in a residential pool.
The extra treatment provided by ozone or UV is needed when the person seconds per gallon level is consistently high several days in a row. That is very common in a spa or a commercial pool and extremely rare in a residential pool.
JasonLion said:
Good answer, thanks.
My pool design does include a spa, is it necessary? Or can I maintain my spa without it? will I end up using more chlorine?
There are two different ways to deal with a spa. If it is connected to the pool, then it is very simple. The spa exchanges water with the pool, so the effective volume of the spa is the same as the total volume of the pool and spa together. If the spa is a stand alone spa, then the most common approach is to shock the spa after each use.
As noted with many spa users on another forum, an ozonator reduces chlorine consumption roughly in half when a spa is heavily used, so at least one person every day. When a spa is lightly used, such as just once a week, an ozonator results in a higher chlorine consumption because the ozone consumes some chlorine oxidizing it into chlorate. So as Jason noted, an ozonator is only helpful when the bather load is high which for a residential spa means that it is used nearly every day. This analysis is for detatched spas -- as Jason noted, a spa that circulates water with the pool probably won't need the benefit of the ozonator even if you were to use the spa every day.
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