Looking to purchase a used heater for our pool… but a little leery…

[SuburbanMom]

Hi guys. Finally have my pool water balanced, pump and filter running perfectly, and eliminated all the yuck from the pool I just put up this summer. As luck would have it, we had a bit of a cooler snap, and for almost a week we’ve had 70 degree weather during the day and mid 50’s at night. I got a good deal on some solar disks, I have 6 in the pool. It’s helping a bit, but the water is still kind of chilly for my taste.

I found a listing for a used Hayward propane pool heater. The price on it is phenomenal under $100, however the seller states that it has been sitting and unused for about 10 years.

What are your thoughts on this? Would the gamble be worth it? I know this is a good heater and would costs thousands new, but spending money on something that doesn’t work isn’t ideal, and propane scares me to a degree lol. However, with the amount of work I’ve put into the pool this summer it would be fantastic if I could extend our swim season a little longer.

Thanks!

 

[PoolStored]

Pass. Propane is expensive to heat a pool to. Uses a gallon / 100K BTU per hour. Propane prices are around $2.41 / gallon in Ohio. That is 100K BTU heater.

Assuming a 9K gallon pool. Further assume 5dF demand daily (may be off, but just an assumption)

30,000 x 8.3 = 74,700 lb of water.

Gas heater
100,000BTU * .8 efficiency =80K BTU effective
74,700 / 80,000= .92 hours to raise 1dF Cal it an hour to raise 1 degree
Gas heater consume 1g/h/100K BTU
.93*5dF = 4.65 hours
4.65hours * 1g/H = 4.65g/day...call it 5 gallons a day.
Don't know your gas prices, but average in July in Ohio is $2.41 Weekly Ohio Propane Residential Price (Dollars per Gallon)
5g/day * $2.41 = $12/day
This assumes that you have a large tank on the property and have residential service.

If you were going to use a small tank like your grill, it holds 4.6 gallons. Most tank exchanges are $30. Not really economical or viable...you'll be changing tanks almost every day.

Additionally, a 10 year old unit will likely have problems...

 

[isee]

If you have the space for it I really like my Solar Bear heaters (4x20 ft and 2x20 ft). They are just big black panels where water gets routed through it before hitting the pool returns. The black plastic absorbs the heat from the sun, transfers it to the water running through it, then into your pool. There's lots of other brands that make similar devices in different sizes too. If you don't feel like dealing with heaters at a minimum I'd recommend upgrading to a full sized solar cover to cover the entirity of your pool instead of the disks. You lose a lot of heat through evaporation and every square inch that's open to the air is an opportunity for lost heat.

But to your question on a used propane heater with no set plans on how to hook it up (lots of $) and as @PoolStored said the cost of running the thing (lots of $) combined with the age will lead to a lot more headaches than it's worth.

 

[ajw22]

You know how to repair gas heaters?

The seller should be paying you to haul it away.

If you are given it for free and like to tinker then it could be a project.

Otherwise pass.

 

[Aaron2024]

If you have the space for it I really like my Solar Bear heaters (4x20 ft and 2x20 ft). They are just big black panels where water gets routed through it before hitting the pool returns. The black plastic absorbs the heat from the sun, transfers it to the water running through it, then into your pool. There's lots of other brands that make similar devices in different sizes too. If you don't feel like dealing with heaters at a minimum I'd recommend upgrading to a full sized solar cover to cover the entirity of your pool instead of the disks. You lose a lot of heat through evaporation and every square inch that's open to the air is an opportunity for lost heat.

But to your question on a used propane heater with no set plans on how to hook it up (lots of $) and as @PoolStored said the cost of running the thing (lots of $) combined with the age will lead to a lot more headaches than it's worth.

@isee

I have a question for ya... when it comes to the solar heaters you have (4x20' and 2x20') do you notice the back pressure on your pump going up significantly while running the water through those plastic panels? I'll likely be upgrading my pump almost immediately but curious about how much harder the stock one has to work to push water through everything and if it's going to choke and die just trying to keep the pool warm enough haha.

Thanks! @SuburbanMom also, I agree with the others on the fuel heaters... you gotta remember residual costs that will come during/after install. It's not necessarily the best choice although I've heard heat pumps efficiency have gotten a lot better if you went the electric route... but again money in... money out always!

 

[isee]

@Aaron2024 I'm using the stock 12x24 Intel pump but to help keep the water moving through fast enough I'm also using a slightly smaller pump as well with no filter. Goes through the pump with a filter first of course. It's about 400 watts total to keep it moving but neither of them seem to mind I think I'm done with pool stuff for the year though because the weather has gone cold out of nowhere but next year I'm PVC plumbing everything in and have a heavy duty Pentair pump (~1.5hp variable speed) and giant Pentair cartridge filter to do it all. From my research I should be able to run the pump at the lowest speed for less than half the current watts and get even more water filtration.