Additional troubleshooting help for my SWG

[ndakotaninja]

I have a Hayward Aquarite SWG with a T15 cell. The control board/cell were here when i bought the house in 2013. I replaced the cell last summer when it had issues. This past week we had some storms/power outages and my control board ran into the typical thermistor issues. When set to "Off" the power light would come on and all was normal. When I turned it to auto or super, it would click, amps would jump, then the power/generating lights would go out. I bought the new parts, replaced the thermistor and re-installed it.

When I turned it to Auto....nothing, no click. The Generating light came on, but it wasn't actually generating. I turn it to Super, and the Super light comes on, it clicks, and i can see amp numbers change. I played around with it for a while and couldn't get it actually 'on' when it was set to Auto. I let it run overnight on Super, and tested things today. It's definitely generating chlorine because my FC jumped. So I turned it from Super to Auto and...amps drop to 0 again. Generating light is still on. I turned it off and left it for ~15 minutes while I did some other things. I came back to it and turned it to Auto and this time it clicked, and the amps jumped and it seems to be generating.

As of right now (an hour ago), it was working on Auto. I just checked again and it was still 'Generating' but the amps had dropped to 0 again. I'm going to check periodically to see how long it's taking to shut down. Does anyone knows why it would act this way, i.e. no voltage on Auto. The control board IS old, like 10 years at least, so maybe there's more wrong on the circuit board? Any thoughts on additional troubleshooting?

 

[mknauss]

Hayward Aquarite SWG - Further Reading

www.troublefreepool.com

Lots of trouble shooting tips in the article.

 

[ndakotaninja]

Yep, that's the article i reviewed after I replaced the thermistor and still had issues. Also looked through past posts and couldn't find the same issue I'm seeing. I timed things...I can set it to "auto" and it will turn on and run and sometime between 20 and 30 minutes it shuts off. Still says generating, but the amps are 0.00 and voltage is back to 29.5. If I have it on Super chlorinate, it seems to run fine for hours (overnight at least) and continue generating.

 

[mknauss]

Do realize the unit cycles on and off based on your % generation setting.

 

[ndakotaninja]

You're saying if it's at 100%, it's always generating, and if you have it on 50% it cycles on/off every ~30 minutes? I've never noticed that, but that would explain the behavior i'm seeing.

The only reason I was alarmed at this behavior was because the last time it did this, it never cycled back on and i went 3 days without generating chlorine. Do you know how the timing is calculated so I can verify it's actually cycling back on? When I checked earlier, it stopped generating after 20-30 minutes, and from 30-70 minutes it never turned back on. I think my current setting is 25%.

 

[Rancho Cost-a-Lotta]

SWG Generation Cycle Times - Further Reading

www.troublefreepool.com

 

[ndakotaninja]

Thanks, that helps. so it says the AquaRite is 180 minute cycle, and 120 minutes prior to firmware 1.55. I'm running v1.4, so if I read the post correctly, it is at 120 minutes. So at 25% it should run for 30 minutes, then stop for the other 90 minutes. if it's 180 minutes total, it should run for 45 minutes. Mine is stopping before 20 minutes is done.

I'm watching it right now to see if/when it kicks on again, but still seems like something isn't quite right.

 

[ndakotaninja]

Just an update...I watched it last night and caught it while it was back on, so it is cycling like it's supposed to. It doesn't seem to be 180 or 120 minute cycles, so not sure what it is. It's definitely not 60 minutes, so maybe 90 minute cycle. Just goes to show you can still learn something new after 8 years.

Thanks for the info, I was stressed because of past behavior and a lack of confidence it was only the thermistor that was bad since it IS so old.

 

[mknauss]

You have an Easytouch, but a Hayward Aquarite. Do you have the Aquarite wired to the ET for it to control? Have not seen it before, but that might change the cycle for the Aquarite.