I was recommended by a forum admin to start a new thread instead of consolidating information into one place under an old thread that I had been contributing to. I guess at some point, some threads can get pretty long and difficult to read if there are lots of little posts in between the more informative posts, so here's a new thread!
Trisodium phosphate (TSP) is highly damaging to the environment, which is why since the 1960's, most cleaning products have been advertised as "phosphate free". Many products that formerly contained TSP are manufactured with TSP substitutes, which are mostly sodium carbonate, sodium percarbonate, and various non-ionic surfactants and enzymes. For environmental reasons, I strongly recommend discontinuing the use of TSP (and I suspect local authorities and the EPA may disapprove of people using TSP all willy nilly).
I looked up the SDS/MSDS of several safer, modern, environmentally-friendlier cleaning/detergent type products, and found that the most important ingredients are:
1) 30-50% by weight disodium carbonate, compound with hydrogen peroxide (2:3) {Sodium percarbonate; Sodium carbonate peroxyhydrate} (CAS 15630-89-4). This is an oxidizer, sanitizer, and cleaning agent. It is essentially hydrogen peroxide in solid form. When dissolved in water, sodium percarbonate is effective for about 6 hours as the oxygen off-gasses (refer to Oxyclean's usage and SDS sheets).
2) 1-100% by weight sodium carbonate (CAS 497-19-18), a cleaning/degreasing agent.
3) 1-5% by weight enzymes, surfactants, pH adjusters. Enzymes help break contaminants into smaller chunks, and some chemicals work better at higher pH while others at lower pH - depends on the chemicals involved and targetted contaminants.
Therefore, instead of buying environmentally-damaging TSP, a cheap and friendlier grocery store alternative is OxyClean, which is ~50% sodium percarbonate. I assume the other ~50% is dissolvable silica filler. Note that most cleaner formulations use sodium carbonate in a slightly lower concentration than sodium percarbonate. I'm sure there's a good reason.
I bought both Eco One and Spa Marvel filter cleaning powders to test. Eco One Filter Cleaner cakes up hard inside the bottle, noting it has 1-1.5% anti-caking agent and 45-55% silica filler. It does not have any warning symbols on the front, which suggests the chemicals are weak. I probably won't buy Eco One again due to the high filler content and weak cleaning power. Spa Marvel has 2 warning symbols on the front, corrosive (from the percarbonate oxidizer) and poisonous. Both Eco One and Spa Marvel seem to use borates to increase pH; a cheap grocery store pH increaser is 20 Mule Team Borax.
I've also tried various liquid filter cleaners, and they are always some combination of various acids and various alcohols, some more "environmentally-preferable" than others. Generally, you're paying for transportation of water, so I'm not a fan. However, these acid-based cleaners would be useful if you have hard water and high mineral deposits. My water is very soft and I have to use calcium increaser to increase my CH from 30 to 180, so I have no need for an acid-based filter cleaner.
As mentioned in my prior posts, spa manufacturers advise you to use a degreaser (i.e. sodium percarbonate/carbonate or alcohol-based cleaners) prior to using an acid-based cleaner, in order to prolong the life of the filters. I suspect that when acid cleaners react with grease/oils/fats, they gum up the filters even more. The alcohols added to liquid acid cleaners are probably intended to alleviate this problem. A cheap DIY acid-based cleaner would be hardware store muriatic acid, which many people already use to lower spa water pH (bonus it doesn't add sulfates to the water).
The latest revisions of Cascade Platinum dishwasher pacs have an exceptionally optimized blend of sodium percarbonate, sodium carbonate, enzymes, surfactants, and pH adjusters for cleaning dishes, and I've been using it in my dishwasher for many years with excellent results on dishes. I've seen comments on random web blogs saying that Cascade Platinum works exceptionally well on filters, and that the platinum version works much better than normal Cascade. I suspect Proctor and Gamble spent millions in research to settle on this optimized formulation (see below table). When my bottles of Eco One and Spa Marvel filter cleaners run out, I'll try dissolving 1 Cascade Platinum pac in hot water per filter bucket. I suppose I'll have to create a new thread at that time to provide an update because this thread will be many months old by then.
In summary, to make your own cleaner: use OxyClean since it is mostly sodium percarbonate (optionally add sodium carbonate and a touch of borax and enzymes to more closely replicate the filter cleaners) or just use Cascade Platinum as-is, using unscented, unadulterated versions where available. If you have hard water, then after the percarbonate soaking, remove minerals by soaking in a muriatic acid solution. Spa manufacturer Bullfrog recommends a 1:10 ratio of unspecified strength muriatic acid to water, so I would use whatever the hardware store labels as regular strength. Rinse filters very well after. If you're really driving down costs, you could replace OxyClean with bulk sodium percarbonate. Study every ingredient well enough so that you use the correct concentrations of each based on your bucket size, and obviously these can be dangerous chemicals (esp. if you obtain bulk high purity percarbonate), so pay attention to the MSDS/SDS and use appropriate PPE.
Chlorine bleach is not recommended for filter cleaning because at the concentrations required to clean, it would be damaging to the filter media. Vinegar is too weak of an acid to remove minerals. Hydrogen peroxide is normally 3% and would be much too weak when watered down in a bucket, and rather expensive to fill a bucket with 3% peroxide. Higher strength 35% peroxide is harder to find and also not cheap. Therefore, all roads point back to sodium percarbonate and sodium carbonate. See below MSDS table I've consolidated of some cleaners of interest:
Trisodium phosphate (TSP) is highly damaging to the environment, which is why since the 1960's, most cleaning products have been advertised as "phosphate free". Many products that formerly contained TSP are manufactured with TSP substitutes, which are mostly sodium carbonate, sodium percarbonate, and various non-ionic surfactants and enzymes. For environmental reasons, I strongly recommend discontinuing the use of TSP (and I suspect local authorities and the EPA may disapprove of people using TSP all willy nilly).
I looked up the SDS/MSDS of several safer, modern, environmentally-friendlier cleaning/detergent type products, and found that the most important ingredients are:
1) 30-50% by weight disodium carbonate, compound with hydrogen peroxide (2:3) {Sodium percarbonate; Sodium carbonate peroxyhydrate} (CAS 15630-89-4). This is an oxidizer, sanitizer, and cleaning agent. It is essentially hydrogen peroxide in solid form. When dissolved in water, sodium percarbonate is effective for about 6 hours as the oxygen off-gasses (refer to Oxyclean's usage and SDS sheets).
2) 1-100% by weight sodium carbonate (CAS 497-19-18), a cleaning/degreasing agent.
3) 1-5% by weight enzymes, surfactants, pH adjusters. Enzymes help break contaminants into smaller chunks, and some chemicals work better at higher pH while others at lower pH - depends on the chemicals involved and targetted contaminants.
Therefore, instead of buying environmentally-damaging TSP, a cheap and friendlier grocery store alternative is OxyClean, which is ~50% sodium percarbonate. I assume the other ~50% is dissolvable silica filler. Note that most cleaner formulations use sodium carbonate in a slightly lower concentration than sodium percarbonate. I'm sure there's a good reason.
I bought both Eco One and Spa Marvel filter cleaning powders to test. Eco One Filter Cleaner cakes up hard inside the bottle, noting it has 1-1.5% anti-caking agent and 45-55% silica filler. It does not have any warning symbols on the front, which suggests the chemicals are weak. I probably won't buy Eco One again due to the high filler content and weak cleaning power. Spa Marvel has 2 warning symbols on the front, corrosive (from the percarbonate oxidizer) and poisonous. Both Eco One and Spa Marvel seem to use borates to increase pH; a cheap grocery store pH increaser is 20 Mule Team Borax.
I've also tried various liquid filter cleaners, and they are always some combination of various acids and various alcohols, some more "environmentally-preferable" than others. Generally, you're paying for transportation of water, so I'm not a fan. However, these acid-based cleaners would be useful if you have hard water and high mineral deposits. My water is very soft and I have to use calcium increaser to increase my CH from 30 to 180, so I have no need for an acid-based filter cleaner.
As mentioned in my prior posts, spa manufacturers advise you to use a degreaser (i.e. sodium percarbonate/carbonate or alcohol-based cleaners) prior to using an acid-based cleaner, in order to prolong the life of the filters. I suspect that when acid cleaners react with grease/oils/fats, they gum up the filters even more. The alcohols added to liquid acid cleaners are probably intended to alleviate this problem. A cheap DIY acid-based cleaner would be hardware store muriatic acid, which many people already use to lower spa water pH (bonus it doesn't add sulfates to the water).
The latest revisions of Cascade Platinum dishwasher pacs have an exceptionally optimized blend of sodium percarbonate, sodium carbonate, enzymes, surfactants, and pH adjusters for cleaning dishes, and I've been using it in my dishwasher for many years with excellent results on dishes. I've seen comments on random web blogs saying that Cascade Platinum works exceptionally well on filters, and that the platinum version works much better than normal Cascade. I suspect Proctor and Gamble spent millions in research to settle on this optimized formulation (see below table). When my bottles of Eco One and Spa Marvel filter cleaners run out, I'll try dissolving 1 Cascade Platinum pac in hot water per filter bucket. I suppose I'll have to create a new thread at that time to provide an update because this thread will be many months old by then.
In summary, to make your own cleaner: use OxyClean since it is mostly sodium percarbonate (optionally add sodium carbonate and a touch of borax and enzymes to more closely replicate the filter cleaners) or just use Cascade Platinum as-is, using unscented, unadulterated versions where available. If you have hard water, then after the percarbonate soaking, remove minerals by soaking in a muriatic acid solution. Spa manufacturer Bullfrog recommends a 1:10 ratio of unspecified strength muriatic acid to water, so I would use whatever the hardware store labels as regular strength. Rinse filters very well after. If you're really driving down costs, you could replace OxyClean with bulk sodium percarbonate. Study every ingredient well enough so that you use the correct concentrations of each based on your bucket size, and obviously these can be dangerous chemicals (esp. if you obtain bulk high purity percarbonate), so pay attention to the MSDS/SDS and use appropriate PPE.
Chlorine bleach is not recommended for filter cleaning because at the concentrations required to clean, it would be damaging to the filter media. Vinegar is too weak of an acid to remove minerals. Hydrogen peroxide is normally 3% and would be much too weak when watered down in a bucket, and rather expensive to fill a bucket with 3% peroxide. Higher strength 35% peroxide is harder to find and also not cheap. Therefore, all roads point back to sodium percarbonate and sodium carbonate. See below MSDS table I've consolidated of some cleaners of interest:
| Product | Ingredient | Function | CAS Number | Concentration |
| Eco One Filter Cleanser 2015-12-11 | Sodium Borate Decehydrate | Chelating agent / pH adjuster | 1302-96-4 | 1-10% |
| Hydrous sodium silicate | Filler | 1433-09-8 | 45-55% | |
| Sodium Per carbonate | Cleaning and sanitizing agent | 15630-89-4 | 30-45% | |
| Proprietary surfactant (possibly 25155-30-0?) | Cleaning agent | 0.1-2 | ||
| Anti-caking agent | Modifier | 112928-00-8 | 0.1-1 | |
| Sodium carbonate | Cleaning agent | 497-19-8 | 1-1.5% | |
| Sodium dodecylbenzene sulfonate (sulfonic acid) | Cleaning/emulsifier/surfactant | 25155-30-0 | 1-1.5% | |
| Spa Marvel Filter Cleaner 2019-12-02 | Sodium Tetraborate Decahydrate | Chelating agent | 1303-96-4 | 5-10% |
| Amorphous silica, precipitated | Filler/anti-caking agent | 112926-00-8 | 0.1-1% | |
| Sodium percarbonate | Cleaning and sanitizing agent | 15630-89-4 | 15-40% | |
| Silicic acid, sodium salt | Detergent/emulsifier | 1344-09-8 | 30-60% | |
| Sodium carbonate | Cleaning agent | 497-19-8 | 1-5% | |
| Cascade Platinum Action Pacs with Power of Clorox - Fresh Scent 2015-03-25 | Sodium carbonate | Cleaning agent | 497-19-8 | 30-35% |
| Sodium percarbonate (carbonic acid disodium salt, compd with hydrogen peroxide) | Cleaning and sanitizing agent | 15630-89-4 | 15-40% | |
| Polyethylene glycol monoisotridecyl ether | Surfactant for microemulsions | 9043-30-5 | 1-5% | |
| CASCADE PLATINUM ACTION PACS (Fresh and Lemon Burst Scents) 2014-04 | Sodium carbonate | Cleaning agent | 497-19-8 | 60-100% |
| Sodium percarbonate | Cleaning and sanitizing agent | 15630-89-4 | 3-7% | |
| Enzymes | 1-5% | |||
| OXY CLEAN 2017-07-27 | Disodium carbonate, compound with hydrogen peroxide (2:3) {Sodium percarbonate; Sodium carbonate peroxyhydrate} | Cleaning and sanitizing agent | 15630-89-4 | <50% |
