Hey all, without getting too technical I was hoping to get some basic feedback on my solar panel heaters for my pool. I read through a lot of "hydraulics 101" sticky and will probably have to read a few more times for it to make sense to me.
Anyhow, I am in very early stages of "pool anything" at this point but need to come up with a plan in preparation of pool opening at end of this month. I have a 21 round AG with a cartridge filter and I purchased two solar panels (2'x20' each) last summer. I had them laid out on the ground over a retaining wall about 3 feet high near the pool and they worked great for about half the summer, around August the path of the sun ends up on the other side of my neighbors fence instead of directly over my yard and therefore shading my panels instead of heating them. So ideally these panels need to go up on my roof because it gets sun from dawn till dusk so long as its sunny out.
ok so initially I thought I would run hoses to and from the panels on the roof and we are talking about 100 feet each way. My house is only one level so its not much of a climb but after reading the Hydraulics 101 I noticed no mention of using hose so I think its safe to assume that its not a practical means of running water for this purpose so pipes are the way to go, correct?
Ok now my other thought was my pump and is it strong enough to push all through roughly 200 + feet of pipes and hoses. Its a no name pump purchased with a pool package at my local "At Home Recreation" store. I don't have the actual specs for it at the moment but I recall the pump says its a 1.5 HP. Last summer I noticed a considerable loss of pressure on the return whenever I had the heaters on versus off. It was still strong enough to rotate the water, eventually, if no one was in the pool but a no where near as strong as when the heaters were off. So if return pressure was so weak with roughly 20 feet of hose will a 1.5hp pump be enough to push this water all the way through or was my set up wrong?
Set up was basically one hose coming from filter and into a PVC splitter with a valve and then connected to two more hoses. one went towards the the heaters and the other went to the return jet. Actually both the heaters return hose and the regular return hose were connected via PVC yet again about 4ft prior to the hose that connects to the return jet. and the heater return line had a one way valve before joining the other return line so as to keep water from going to the heaters when I wasn't using the heaters but I think it was defective as when the heaters were shut off I could still see leaks coming from the panels. Only time the leaks would stop is when pump was off.
If I have to invest in a name brand pump I will bite the bullet and do so because being in Central Jersey these summers are hit or miss but I'm wondering if my pump is sufficient enough and maybe with some guidance I can put something together that will actually work because it seems like last years set up was not quite right. Thanks in advance for any feedback/suggestions on how to get this project going properly.
Anyhow, I am in very early stages of "pool anything" at this point but need to come up with a plan in preparation of pool opening at end of this month. I have a 21 round AG with a cartridge filter and I purchased two solar panels (2'x20' each) last summer. I had them laid out on the ground over a retaining wall about 3 feet high near the pool and they worked great for about half the summer, around August the path of the sun ends up on the other side of my neighbors fence instead of directly over my yard and therefore shading my panels instead of heating them. So ideally these panels need to go up on my roof because it gets sun from dawn till dusk so long as its sunny out.
ok so initially I thought I would run hoses to and from the panels on the roof and we are talking about 100 feet each way. My house is only one level so its not much of a climb but after reading the Hydraulics 101 I noticed no mention of using hose so I think its safe to assume that its not a practical means of running water for this purpose so pipes are the way to go, correct?
Ok now my other thought was my pump and is it strong enough to push all through roughly 200 + feet of pipes and hoses. Its a no name pump purchased with a pool package at my local "At Home Recreation" store. I don't have the actual specs for it at the moment but I recall the pump says its a 1.5 HP. Last summer I noticed a considerable loss of pressure on the return whenever I had the heaters on versus off. It was still strong enough to rotate the water, eventually, if no one was in the pool but a no where near as strong as when the heaters were off. So if return pressure was so weak with roughly 20 feet of hose will a 1.5hp pump be enough to push this water all the way through or was my set up wrong?
Set up was basically one hose coming from filter and into a PVC splitter with a valve and then connected to two more hoses. one went towards the the heaters and the other went to the return jet. Actually both the heaters return hose and the regular return hose were connected via PVC yet again about 4ft prior to the hose that connects to the return jet. and the heater return line had a one way valve before joining the other return line so as to keep water from going to the heaters when I wasn't using the heaters but I think it was defective as when the heaters were shut off I could still see leaks coming from the panels. Only time the leaks would stop is when pump was off.
If I have to invest in a name brand pump I will bite the bullet and do so because being in Central Jersey these summers are hit or miss but I'm wondering if my pump is sufficient enough and maybe with some guidance I can put something together that will actually work because it seems like last years set up was not quite right. Thanks in advance for any feedback/suggestions on how to get this project going properly.
