Century V Green 165 Automation

[TXpoolDIYguy]

New to serial programming for pool automation, but very excited to try out the solution presented by @MSchutzer in the previous thread Century (Regal) VGreen motor automation.
Currently running a Hayward Tristar 1HP single speed, but have been looking to upgrade to VS without breaking the bank. $2k for a new VS pump will not yield electricity savings returns until 4-5 years down the road, but $600 for a new VS motor is more manageable.

Originally ordered the Vgreen EVO before I started reading on here about the complete lack of automation support for it, so I am returning it and getting the ECM16SQU. Seems like Century took a step backwards with the new Evo motors which is a shame. I have a Jandy Aqualink RS with PDA, so looks like I should be in luck here with getting this to work.

Also ordered the RS485 adapter posted in the original thread. Only issue I am running into right now is it looks like the BPP Terminal program is no longer available. Does someone have the original .exe file they can share? If not it looks like RealTerm should work (allows for hex commands), but I don't think it has macros for predefined commands so I'll just have to type out each command as I go which is fine.

Will post updates once all is (hopefully) up and running! Thanks to all, this website and thread has been amazing.

 

[MSchutzer]

Unfortunately I think you may have to upgrade more than just the motor to get your Aqualink RS to talk to a VSP motor (Vgreen or otherwise). Your post says that you have an Aqualink RS controlled via the PDA. That's likely an older system and you will need to check to see what firmware revision that you have. You need to have Rev O or later for VSP pump support. I don't know if the PDA interface supports the configuration and setup of the VSP pumps. Please see the Aqualink wiki here for information on VSP pump setup.

Jandy Aqualink RS - Further Reading

Revision as of 21:13, 5 June 2023 by ajw22 (talk | contribs) (→‎Aquapure not found. Check Aquapure RS485 and power connections)(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)

www.troublefreepool.com

@PoolGate may be able to shed some light on whether a PDA interface can control a VSP pump. I know he had the PDA system and later upgraded to the iAqualink interface for it's enhanced abilities.

You may have to upgrade to the iAqualink interface (kit iQ30-RS) that gets you the latest Aqualink RS- PS8 main board and the IQ30 antenna unit. This will let you use the web interface, or any mobile with iAqualink app to set up VSP pump.

Depending on the Service Factor Horse Power (SFHP) of your current motor you may also want to consider an optional impeller change in your pump as part of the upgrade. You say you have a Hayward Tristar 1 HP pump, what is the HP and SF of your current motor? The total HP of the pump is found by multiplying these two numbers together. If the SFHP is less than 1.65 HP then the VGreen165 will drop right in. If your SFHP is really 1HP then you can increase the pump's impeller size up maximum of 1.65 HP. You will have to look at the Tristar pump manuals to see what impellers are available for that pump.

Now you are probably asking why you would want to do that? Increasing the impeller size allows the motor to run slower to move the same amount of water. I was a bit surprised at first by the noise level of the VGreen165 when I installed my motor. The built in fan on the back of the motor is louder than a single speed motor when running at the full speed of 3450 RPM. But with a VSP motor you can just lower the speed and you rarely need to run it at full speed. Your real savings come from running the motor at slower speeds as the power consumed drops by the power of three of the speed reduction. For example running the motor at 80% of full speed results in less than half the AC power consumed. (.80^3 = .51) So your flow drops to 80% as that follows the pump speed, but your power consumption is half.

And on the question of TerminalBPP I have a copy on the laptop that I can ZIP up and send you. It's just a single executable but it is only for Windows systems so I assume you have a Windows machine?

 

[TXpoolDIYguy]

Unfortunately I think you may have to upgrade more than just the motor to get your Aqualink RS to talk to a VSP motor (Vgreen or otherwise). Your post says that you have an Aqualink RS controlled via the PDA. That's likely an older system and you will need to check to see what firmware revision that you have. You need to have Rev O or later for VSP pump support. I don't know if the PDA interface supports the configuration and setup of the VSP pumps. Please see the Aqualink wiki here for information on VSP pump setup.

Jandy Aqualink RS - Further Reading

Revision as of 21:13, 5 June 2023 by ajw22 (talk | contribs) (→‎Aquapure not found. Check Aquapure RS485 and power connections)(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)

www.troublefreepool.com

@PoolGate may be able to shed some light on whether a PDA interface can control a VSP pump. I know he had the PDA system and later upgraded to the iAqualink interface for it's enhanced abilities.

You may have to upgrade to the iAqualink interface (kit iQ30-RS) that gets you the latest Aqualink RS- PS8 main board and the IQ30 antenna unit. This will let you use the web interface, or any mobile with iAqualink app to set up VSP pump.

Depending on the Service Factor Horse Power (SFHP) of your current motor you may also want to consider an optional impeller change in your pump as part of the upgrade. You say you have a Hayward Tristar 1 HP pump, what is the HP and SF of your current motor? The total HP of the pump is found by multiplying these two numbers together. If the SFHP is less than 1.65 HP then the VGreen165 will drop right in. If your SFHP is really 1HP then you can increase the pump's impeller size up maximum of 1.65 HP. You will have to look at the Tristar pump manuals to see what impellers are available for that pump.

Now you are probably asking why you would want to do that? Increasing the impeller size allows the motor to run slower to move the same amount of water. I was a bit surprised at first by the noise level of the VGreen165 when I installed my motor. The built in fan on the back of the motor is louder than a single speed motor when running at the full speed of 3450 RPM. But with a VSP motor you can just lower the speed and you rarely need to run it at full speed. Your real savings come from running the motor at slower speeds as the power consumed drops by the power of three of the speed reduction. For example running the motor at 80% of full speed results in less than half the AC power consumed. (.80^3 = .51) So your flow drops to 80% as that follows the pump speed, but your power consumption is half.

And on the question of TerminalBPP I have a copy on the laptop that I can ZIP up and send you. It's just a single executable but it is only for Windows systems so I assume you have a Windows machine?

I went into my PDA system setup menu and there are VSP settings options in there so I assume they will work. I think it is firmware version 5. May end up upgrading to the iAqualink eventually anyways though.

I'm currently running a full rated 1HP impeller and full rated 1HP (1.65THP) single stage motor in the Tristar, but my pool's FOH is low (38ft @ 60GPM), and the tristar hydraulics are pretty efficient such that the current pump's design flow rate is well above what a 2" pipe can supply, hence the constant cavitating noise that I always had just thought was the motor being old. I was thinking of downsizing to the 3/4HP impeller when I rebuild the pump with the new VS motor. Based on the Tristar specs, the flow rate for 38ft of head should be around 85GPM (at max VS motor speed of 3450), which is right at the max of what 2" pipe can handle. I was planning on running the motor very low anyways (only need to push 21GPM to turn over the water in 8 hours), but it seemed kind of silly to have an impeller that could not be operated at full speed without cavitation. If I have both impellers set up to push the same flow rate, but one with a higher RPM and 3/4HP impeller vs lower RPM and 1HP impeller, would one be more efficient than the other?

Please do send the TerminalBPP program! Yes I'm running a windows machine.

Thanks!

 

[MSchutzer]

I sent you a copy of the terminal program in your private PM.

I wouldn't ever recommend going to a smaller impeller as that means you will need to run the motor faster for whatever volume of water you want to move. The efficiency of the motor doesn't change much in the 1000 to 3450 RPM range, when you go real slow <1000 RPM then the motors electronics draw becomes a larger percentage of the overall load so the net efficiency is lower, but you are drawing so little power at slow speeds that it doesn't add up to much.

For the quietest operation you want to go with a bigger impeller and then just run the motor slower. There's really no need to ever run the motor at full speed, just set it to the speed to do whatever you need to do, whether that is running your cleaner, skimming, spillover, or just filtering.

 

[TXpoolDIYguy]

Ok just to put my mind at ease...

Hayward has a max rate and full rate line of Tristar pumps. They use the same impeller part #(SPX3210C) for the SP3210EE full rate pump (1.85THP motor) and the SP3210X15 max rate pump (1.65THP motor). Last time I rebuilt the pump I put in that impeller, and replaced with a A.O. Smith (Century) SQ1102 1.65THP single stage motor. Motor hasn't burned up, and I'm assuming that the actual power demand of the impeller is 1.65HP (hence why they use it for both pumps), and I guess they just slightly oversized the motor for the SP3210EE? Every part for the Tristar series except for the impeller and motor are universal (housing, diffuser, etc.). Sorry if that's a stupid question but it's been bugging me a little bit why they used a 1.85THP motor for the full rate pump, but 1.65 for the max rate with the same impeller in each.

 

[MSchutzer]

The total HP of the motor needs to be at least as much as the THP rating of the impeller and usually the motor rating is a little bit above the impeller.

The whole marketing thing of full rate / max rate pumps just confuses the issue.

Inyo pools includes the THP for each of the Hayward impellers and they are as follows:
SPX3207X - 1 THP
SPX3210X - 1.5 THP
SPX3215X - 2 THP
SPX3220X - 2.5 THP

So the SPX3210X would be the correct impeller for the Vgreen165 with it's max rating of 1.65HP.

Hayward Tristar Impeller with Screw, 1.5THP - SPX3210C - INYOPools.com

Impeller w/ Screw 1-1-1/2 HP - SPX3210C

www.inyopools.com

The motor ratings on the two different pump models (1.65 THP and 1.85 THP) you called out would both use a 1.5 THP impeller, one motor just has a little more margin that the other. It's the impeller that determines the working THP (and power draw) of the pump system, and currently you have a 1.5 THP system using the SPX 3210X impeller.

 

[TXpoolDIYguy]

Just got the motor programmed, pump rebuilt, and everything wired up today. Works like a charm! Full VS control with Jandy Aqualink PDA. Thanks again @MSchutzer for all the help.