Featured Circupool Core Control 55 Initial Thoughts

Capnswab

Active member
Apr 20, 2023
36
Leander, TX
Pool Size
15200
Surface
Plaster
Chlorine
Salt Water Generator
SWG Type
CircuPool Core-55
I was asked in another thread to write up a review for their new system, so here goes. Any questions, ask away!

I saw Circupool’s Facebook announcement that they were introducing a new system, so it got me interested. Called up Discountsaltpool to ask about it, they said it’s not advertised yet but had some in stock and they’d sell me one. The owner called me shortly after that and said he has been beta testing it for about a year now and has really liked it.

I was torn between this and the Aquapure 1400, but after a less than stellar Jandy warranty experience, I decided to shy away from them.

This unit got my attention because it had app control, an 8 year warranty and seemed to be a relatively easy DIY install. Also, some new functionality that will be available over the next year or so. No idea if I’ll ever take advantage of any of it.

The biggest pain point was wiring up the electrical. The power cord it comes with is about 5’ long, and wouldn’t work for my situation. I wanted to wire it to the aux1 relay on my Jandy pump and have the pump control on/off. I landed on 1/2” conduit to run the electrical to the pump and here was my first challenge. I’m guessing the punch outs in the control box are metric, and the 1/2” conduit fitting was a little bit too big to fit through. So I used a 1/2” tap to get it to fit. Problem solved. Then it was on to figure out how to wire it up to the pump, and this was the easy part. 14 gauge wire was the easiest one to fit into the Core Control internal connections. Thought about using wire nuts to make the connections, but future versions of this controller I believe will utilize this space for additional boards.

Getting to this area was also a little annoying. There are 3 small screws that attach bottom up in order to make this area water tight. If it’s not perfect, it won’t get a good seal. There is also a mounting point underneath this cover, so you’ll want to make sure you have space underneath to at least fit a stubby screwdriver in there to secure it. Because you’ll have to attach it to where ever you’re going to put it, then screw this cover back on. Other than that, I don’t anticipate ever getting in here much. The WiFi connection is in here, and I have the WiFi module attached to the back of the cover I made.

I got some more unistrut and attached the unit there. There is a QR code and serial number on the side of the box (left side as you’re looking at the pictures) that you’ll need to setup the app. Make sure you can get to it. I could not and had to take a phone pic, zoom in and hope I could read it. The serial number is also on the box, but in my case…they were different.

The cell itself was very easy for me. The Jandy adapter they sell was plug and play to remove my Fusion Nature2 and screw this in. I set it up where I could easily see the flow switch when I’m at the pad. Wired up to the controller and turned it on.

The ring will light up either blue or red for each zone on the controller to tell you what is/isn’t within range. There is temp protection on this one where it will automatically lower output at certain thresholds. Once the pool is over the threshold, it turns back to blue. The box itself can adjust in 25% increments, and the app lets you control it in 1% increments. It didn’t seem to like being set closer to 10% with the temp swings in the water, and seemed to get more steady closer to 20%. Set at 12%, the output would fluctuate a bit between 10-20. I didn’t really have a need to test this out any more, just an initial observation.

When I first fired up the app, it said 2 probes weren’t working and gave me an error. It shipped as the “G+” and not the “G”, which required the vendor to make a change to my setup. Once they did this, all was well. It’s the Magen Resilience G/G+ behind the scenes.

I also made a very simple “hat” out of a cedar fence plank. The control box itself has vents on the top, and you can see the Meanwell power supply. I wanted to give it a little bit of cover from the weather and UV as the sun would hit this thing all day long traveling from left to right over the box.

So far, it’s been nice. 30% power between 8am-6pm seems to keep my chlorine in the low 6s. I still need to get my CYA from 60 to 70.
 

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Nice wrote up. Thanks for sharing!!!
So far, it’s been nice. 30% power between 8am-6pm seems to keep my chlorine in the low 6s
Thats great, but the systems hiccup or big rains around the time of the self check will trigger the low salt alarm and it stays off until the next self check 12/24 hours later. With insane Texas UV you may lose 5 ppm a day mid season. The closer you run to min, the closer you need to pay attention and most with SWGs get lulled into slacking when it's consistently ok. But it will shut off a handful of times a season and might replace the FC before you test next, fooling you into believing everything is still great.

Its much less of a deal now with mild daily loss, just pointing it out for the good measure. :)
 
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Nice wrote up. Thanks for sharing!!!

Thats great, but the systems hiccup or big rains around the time of the self check will trigger the low salt alarm and it stays off until the next self check 12/24 hours later. With insane Texas UV you may lose 5 ppm a day mid season. The closer you run to min, the closer you need to pay attention and most with SWGs get lulled into slacking when it's consistently ok. But it will shut off a handful of times a season and might replace the FC before you test next, fooling you into believing everything is still great.

Its much less of a deal now with mild daily loss, just pointing it out for the good measure. :)
I’m still checking the levels every 2-3 days. We have some rains coming through the next couple days, so I’ll see how it goes. Appreciate the heads up!
 
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Thanks for the write up. I just put mine in and I’m not getting any reaction out of the LEDs. Wi-Fi module is blinking and the salt cell bubbles, but no control ring or otherwise… guess we’ll see what they say.
Let us know what they say. When I needed help they were pretty quick to figure it out.
 
Mine is up and running. There is a ribbon cable that connects the faceplate to the main PCB board that came loose and wasn't connected. It has the front panel LEDs, buttons, and apparently the bluetooth module as well. Fluke issue. I can see how the unit could have passed QA and then come loose in shipping.

Support was A+. Nobody likes having issues pop up, but when it happens it is almost a joy to work with a support team that will actually talk with you and knows the product.

Had it opened, reconnected, tested, and closed in about 15 minutes.

Still learning the bluetooth/wifi connection distinction in the app. @Capnswab do you have to switch back and forth between "Bluetooth" and "Internet" under Device-App connection to get remote functionality?
 
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Mine is up and running. There is a ribbon cable that connects the faceplate to the main PCB board that came loose and wasn't connected. It has the front panel LEDs, buttons, and apparently the bluetooth module as well. Fluke issue. I can see how the unit could have passed QA and then come loose in shipping.

Support was A+. Nobody likes having issues pop up, but when it happens it is almost a joy to work with a support team that will actually talk with you and knows the product.

Had it opened, reconnected, tested, and closed in about 15 minutes.

Still learning the bluetooth/wifi connection distinction in the app. @Capnswab do you have to switch back and forth between "Bluetooth" and "Internet" under Device-App connection to get remote functionality?
I don’t. I went through the setup in the manual and have it set for WiFi.
 
Great to see some people posting about this option. At first glance, the cell seems unusually small, almost like the Jandy Tru Clear, which some on this forum have told me to avoid. Does it seem like a substantial cell that is capably of 2.0 lbs/day of chlorine production?
 
Great to see some people posting about this option. At first glance, the cell seems unusually small, almost like the Jandy Tru Clear, which some on this forum have told me to avoid. Does it seem like a substantial cell that is capably of 2.0 lbs/day of chlorine production?
I’ve only seen the TruClear at the pool store. This unit seems a bit larger in physical size. Cell for sure looks bigger. I didn’t want the TruClear because it only had the gas trap and not separate salinity and flow sensors. And it had to manually be shut down in cold water where this one steps down according to water temp. Still playing around with run times as the weather is changing and getting warmer. Goal is to keep free chlorine around 8 with cya at 70 currently. I’m trying out 40% for 10.5 hours on a 15,000 gallon pool. This is on a Core Control 55. So far 30-35% for 10 hours a day has kept my FC close to 6.2-6.4.
 

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Cap,

You have a large VS pump and a large cartridge filter... You should really try running your pump 24/7... Better on the pump, and it is better to make a little chlorine all the time, then only make chlorine half of the day.. Skimming all the time keeps my pool cleaner. Running 24/7 at a low rpm should cost less than $20 bucks a month...

Just a suggestion, you should run your pool however you want. :mrgreen:

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
The biggest pain point was wiring up the electrical. The power cord it comes with is about 5’ long, and wouldn’t work for my situation. I wanted to wire it to the aux1 relay on my Jandy pump and have the pump control on/off. I landed on 1/2” conduit to run the electrical to the pump and here was my first challenge. I’m guessing the punch outs in the control box are metric, and the 1/2” conduit fitting was a little bit too big to fit through. So I used a 1/2” tap to get it to fit. Problem solved. Then it was on to figure out how to wire it up to the pump, and this was the easy part. 14 gauge wire was the easiest one to fit into the Core Control internal connections. Thought about using wire nuts to make the connections, but future versions of this controller I believe will utilize this space for additional boards.
I am planning on wiring my salt cell to the pump relay in the Jandy control box. Do you think it would still be a pain to wire in this case?

Do you plan on adding any of the other testing/automation when it becomes available?
Cap,

You have a large VS pump and a large cartridge filter... You should really try running your pump 24/7... Better on the pump, and it is better to make a little chlorine all the time, then only make chlorine half of the day.. Skimming all the time keeps my pool cleaner. Running 24/7 at a low rpm should cost less than $20 bucks a month...
I’ve had variable speed pumps for years, and this is the first time I’ve heard of this suggestion. I’m intrigued. It seems like you would need a very low flow rate for most of the time, which would probably be too low to move my suction cleaner. I have a 11000 gallon pool. Currently running for about 7 hours total, 3 of which are on a higher speed to facilitate the vacuum. I need to check the actual pump speeds and flow rates during these run periods. You think there would be a net savings on electricity running the pump 24 hours a day? I need to research this a little more.
 
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You think there would be a net savings on electricity running the pump 24 hours a day? I need to research this a little more.
Mine ran 24 hours on low rpm for the same energy as 2pointsomething hours at full speed.
Currently running for about 7 hours total, 3 of which are on a higher speed to facilitate the vacuum
Nobody needs to vacuum 7 days a week. You'd never manually vac daily, you'd be lucky to feel like doing it once a week. But once anyone don't have to go do it themselves, it *has* to be done daily ? Sucking lots of power ?

I never understand this one. The world will keep spinning if 6 leaves are in the pool. Especially when we're busy and don't even get out there for 4 days at a time.
 
Thanks for the review. I am a big fan of my RJ-30+ but of course I cant control it with my phone like my new pump, so your review piqued my interest. How is the app? I just looked at the price and Dang. The Core Control 35 is more expensive than the IC-40. I suppose I would still need Pentair's automation to control their cell though.
 
Cap,

You have a large VS pump and a large cartridge filter... You should really try running your pump 24/7... Better on the pump, and it is better to make a little chlorine all the time, then only make chlorine half of the day.. Skimming all the time keeps my pool cleaner. Running 24/7 at a low rpm should cost less than $20 bucks a month...

Just a suggestion, you should run your pool however you want. :mrgreen:

Thanks,

Jim R.
Pump is on 24x7. It’s hooked up to the aux1 relay on the pump itself. So I run the pump at 1850rpm for 10.5 hours and 1650 for the remainder. SWG is only on during the time I have it at 1850.

Still playing around with it a bit. 1650 is the lowest RPM I can get to spill over the spa, but that won’t close the relay on the pump. I can give it a go at a lower % running the pump a bit higher to close that relay and leave it on.
 
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I am planning on wiring my salt cell to the pump relay in the Jandy control box. Do you think it would still be a pain to wire in this case?

Do you plan on adding any of the other testing/automation when it becomes available?

I’ve had variable speed pumps for years, and this is the first time I’ve heard of this suggestion. I’m intrigued. It seems like you would need a very low flow rate for most of the time, which would probably be too low to move my suction cleaner. I have a 11000 gallon pool. Currently running for about 7 hours total, 3 of which are on a higher speed to facilitate the vacuum. I need to check the actual pump speeds and flow rates during these run periods. You think there would be a net savings on electricity running the pump 24 hours a day? I need to research this a little more.
I think you’ll be fine, especially if you can re-use the power cord it came with. The pain was more trial and error of getting the right wire size, conduit length, etc.

Automation, not sure. If anything I could see myself trying out the ph probe, but having a tank of acid anywhere outside just makes me nervous. I’ve had reef tanks for years and had all sorts of peristaltic pumps running for calcium and alk, so I get that part of it. @PoolStored turned me off any testing related to ORP.
 
I think you’ll be fine, especially if you can re-use the power cord it came with. The pain was more trial and error of getting the right wire size, conduit length, etc.
I literally just chopped the 110V plug off the end of mine and wired it straight into the intermatic timer terminals right alongside the pump and ran it off 240V. Didn't even tin the wires because I was in a rush. (I'm not cool enough to have bought a VS pump yet. Just bought the house and waiting for the warranty to roll off...)

I am planning on wiring my salt cell to the pump relay in the Jandy control box. Do you think it would still be a pain to wire in this case?
The only thing I would add to what @Capnswab has said would be to consider skipping the conduit and just running SJO cable through the cable gland. (I certainly won't fault him for running conduit, its just a bit of a tight fit as he has pointed out). This unit hardly uses any power. I think I remember reading that it draws around 1 amp at 240V, but don't quote me on that. Either way, you don't need heavy cable for this.

Do you plan on adding any of the other testing/automation when it becomes available?
Yup. That's the only reason I bought it. Looked like a step in the right direction towards "set and forget" pool chemistry. That being said, I'll still be checking FC manually since ORP is useless in my use case (see discussion elsewhere on TFP). I really want the pH probe and acid dosing, both of which I had already decided I would integrate into my pool myself by means of a PLC before I found this device and talked to CircuPool.

Thanks for the review. I am a big fan of my RJ-30+ but of course I cant control it with my phone like my new pump, so your review piqued my interest. How is the app? I just looked at the price and Dang. The Core Control 35 is more expensive than the IC-40. I suppose I would still need Pentair's automation to control their cell though.
You're paying extra for the WiFi, but to me the value proposition was in the future expansion capability regarding the pH monitor, the acid doser, and electrical relay contacts. The app is simple enough with just the base system. I adjusted my system from Argentina last week after my wife did an FC test. Not that its an everyday thing, but I do find myself using the app to do all the interfacing with the product.

Once the rest of the expansion kits are installed I expect the app will become a pretty powerful tool. If I can get to where I only have to test FC every 7-10 days, I'll consider it a success. Previously I dosed LC for 6 months and was having problems keeping it up and stable. I'll probably install a little locked dock box next to my filter pad and drop the acid container in it.

And it had to manually be shut down in cold water where this one steps down according to water temp. Still playing around with run times as the weather is changing and getting warmer.
I have noticed on start-up my unit logs having auto-reduced output due to low water temperature. I REALLY like that the app records and reports both time of event and time of resolution. In my case it seems to trigger at pump start-up on cool mornings as ambient-air-temp-water that sat around all night in the pool filter is flushed through the unit. Once the pump lines purge with warmer water from the pool, the water temperature comes up around 2-5 minutes later and the system resolves the error and resumes normal operation, leading me to believe I don't need to worry about this specific event. Pretty cool to me.

That's the long way of saying, yes, mine seems to react to water temp.
 
I ordered the Core Control 35 and expect it to arrive this weekend. I'm trying to plan for a quick installation. How long is the cord leading from the cell to the control panel? Thanks.
Also, would the salt cell cable fit through a 1/2" ID flex conduit?
UPDATE: I received my unit yesterday. The cable for the salt cell is slightly over 10 feet long.
 
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Great reviews and input from all.

I am looking into this system to replace my old Jandy Aquapure Ei35. I have emailed Circupool to request an owner's manual so I can examine the wiring diagram. My current setup has a Jandy 2.0 VS E-pum with a JEP-R controller running the pump, and the SWG turns on via flow through the cell. The SWG is wired directly into a breaker in the panel.

How does the install compare? Reading some of the info above, it looks like I would be doing the same as Capnswab, wiring into the aux on the pump. I am just wanting to make sure I completely understand the install before moving forward.

Also how big is the wall mount controller? After 7 years of my Jandy being in the sun the controller cover has dry rotted. Would a larger waterproof enclosure be a bad idea? Something like this? I was thinking if I went this route, I could drill holes in the side and bottom of the box to promote airflow.

 

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