Low temperature preventing Pentair IC60 from turning on

[stoteda]

I converted our pool to salt two years ago, and had great results. But this winter it’s been cold and rainy and our SWG, a Pentair IC60 has a shutoff for cold water that appears to be set to 55 degrees (F). The pool temperature has been below this for a mont or so and now I see some algae.

Is there a way to lower the temperature setting in the IC60, or do I need to go back to chlorine until the temperature comes up a bit?

I am also getting a low salt alarm, which I assume is because we have had so much rain that the salt content is getting diluted, but I don’t know for sure. Does the salt gradually lower over time?

We live in Northern California.

 

[mknauss]

Have you been maintaining your FC levels with liquid chlorine? All SWCG's shut down at lower water temperatures. We then add liquid chlorine to maintain the proper FC/CYA relationship.

You cannot change the temperature at which the SWCG shuts down.

If you have had water overflow or drainage due to the rain your salinity will have decreased. Use your K1766 salinity test to determine how much salt to add once the rain threat has subsided.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Every SWG shuts down when the water temperature is below 55°F (different manufacturers have slightly different shut off values but it’s always below 55). This is to protect the cell from damage because chlorine generation is inefficient at low temperature. I typically purchase a few gallons of 10% liquid chlorine when the I know the cell has started to shut off, this is typically late Nov or early Dec. My pool has never needed more that 2 or 3 gallons of LC over the cold months. The chlorine will last a long time in cold water so I usually only have to test and add once every couple of weeks.

 

[generessler]

Another technique is to let CYA drift down toward 60 during the summer and then use trichlor tabs in a floater for the cold months to get it back up to the desired 70-80 range. My 20k gallon pool needs one tab every ~3 weeks when water is 50F or less. Stops pH upward drift, too. So perfect for my case. Ymmv. Having some LC for quick tweaks is still helpful.

 

[stoteda]

Thanks for the feedback. We had not been monitoring the chlorine regularly…we became so used to not worrying about the pool with the SWG! We added salt and chlorine and will just wait for Spring.