My Experience with Floater/Pucks

Jump to latest Follow Reply
M

Michael1

0
May 3, 2015
206
Moorpark, CA
I bought my house two years ago, and started with TFP right away, so I didn't have any experience with chlorine pucks. I needed to raise my CYA, so I thought it would be a good time to experiment with them, in case I went on an extended vacation.

I researched pucks, and found that many of them contain other chemicals other than trichlor. I found some made by Chlorox called Active 99, which are just trichlor. I got them at Lowes. I also got a floater that signals when the pucks were almost used up, also from Lowes.

I thought I was all set, and it would be great to add CYA, Chlorine, and acid all at the same time for a couple weeks, and get a break from adding them manually. I thought this would be almost maintenance free.

WRONG!!!

After three days my chlorine was near zero, and the pH way too high. The pucks weren't dissolving fast enough. I found that you can make the opening larger on the bottom of the floater by twisting the bottom cap. I turned it to wide open.

STILL DIDN'T WORK!

I also found that the floater got drawn to the skimmer, and stayed there, putting the chlorine and acid directly into the pool equipment. That's not good for the equipment, and is the very reason why you don't put pucks in a skimmer. It also changed the color of the plaster near the skimmer.

The bottom line is I have no idea how people use floaters and pucks to maintain their pools. It's an open loop system. I still had to add bleach and acid to keep the pool water balanced. Based on my results, I think I would have needed three floaters to keep up with it, and it would still diverge from balanced over time. Now I see why people who use floaters and pucks are always shocking their pools.

While the pucks did even out the chlorine levels slightly, overall I found the floater/puck system to be essentially useless.

Michael
 
Really, the ONLY pool a floating chlorine dispenser works anywhere near decently is in a fairly small above-ground pool. But even in above-ground pools an in-line chlorinator works much better than a floater, though since the filter system is below pool water level on most above-ground pool setups, to reduce chlorine damage to filter system, and to be able to put tablets in the chlorinator, you need valves to turn off water flow on both sides of the filter system and chlorinator, and it's a good idea to install a check-valve between the chlorinator and the filter system to prevent the strong chlorine saturated water from back-flowing from the chlorinator into the filter system, which is up-stream from the chlorinator so when filter is running, the water flows from filter system, through chlorinator, and directly out into the pool.

And with a Polaris pressure pool cleaner, it's a good idea to have the chlorinator down-stream from where the cleaner booster pump pulls the water out of the filter return line so the concentrated chlorine doesn't pass through the booster pump and pool cleaner causing pool cleaner parts to fail more rapidly.
 
My situation exactly, micheal1. I'm getting ready to start up my SWG and I thought it was a good time to use up the old trichlor pucks that the previous owner left in the shed, since I wanted to boost my CYA as well. They might just be old and no good anymore, but I put 4 pucks in a floater and they don't seem to be doing anything.
 
We have been having lots of rain here and Florida so my CYA has been diluted to the point that I was at 30. To boost the CYA and also use up some of the old pucks I keep around for vacations, I brought out the duck float and loaded her up. My duck float is the extra large one and holds 6 to 7 of the 3" tabs at a time. At CYA=30, the duck was able to easily hold my pool at 6-7ppm for 1 week. At CYA=40, the duck was still kicking it since I needed to be in the range of 5 to 7ppm. Now at CYA approaching 50, the duck sometimes needs a little help since he gets to the low end of the 6-8ppm range. Once I am "dead-on" CYA=50, I will remove the duck and continue with the TFP process.

My point is that I have a 19,348 gallon pool and the duck works fine as long as you get one that is large enough for your pool (i.e., holds 6 to 7 pucks for your 20,000 gallon).

IMPORTANT POINT - I am not condoning nor recommending a chlorine puck floater. I am just using it to raise my CYA or when I go on vacation. Following the TFP methods will guarantee that your pool remains sparkling clean.
 
I just replaced all the water in my pool this year. I found similar to the OP. Tried to use a floater with pucks (holds 4) and it just would not keep the FC level high enough. I think the inline chlorinators can get the pucks to dissolve more quickly, but of course need to be tracking the CYA.
 
jblizzle said:
I just replaced all the water in my pool this year. I found similar to the OP. Tried to use a floater with pucks (holds 4) and it just would not keep the FC level high enough. I think the inline chlorinators can get the pucks to dissolve more quickly, but of course need to be tracking the CYA.
Click to expand...

Jason,

4 pucks will never work for an 18k pool. If you look at the Web based Pool Math, "Effects of Adding Chemicals", you can get a good approximation of what you need. For instance with my pool, 7 pucks (i.e., 49 oz), will raise my FC to 17. However this is over the course of the pucks life. If it dissolved all in one day, I would get 17 FC. However it takes 5 days for my pucks to completely dissolve. So....

17 / 5 = 3.4 FC per day.

Which is what I normally lose during a course of a day in Summer. So if I start my pool out at FC=X (for my CYA, X=7), and add the pucks. I can stay at FC=X for 5 days. Then I add more, etc.
 
Jason,

I agree with the SWG cell. ;)

I was just pointing out that with a pool your size, 4 pucks is just not enough at the speed they dissolve. Get the big duck! LOL...
 

Enjoying this content?

Support TFP with a donation.

Give Support
You must log in or register to reply here.
Thread Status
Hello , This thread has been inactive for over 60 days. New postings here are unlikely to be seen or responded to by other members. For better visibility, consider Starting A New Thread.
Top Bottom
Back
Jump to latest Follow Reply