New Pool, have SO MANY questions! Any help would be greatly appreciated :)

[cyanide00]

New pool owner here been reading alot on TFP.com for a while now in anticipation, PB just finished my pool build over the weekend, filled her up and started up the pumps today. My PB has been excellent in the whole process, but leaves a little to be desired in the detailed answers department to all my questions. So here are a few of my questions, I truly appreciate anyone who replies in advance

1) How can I accurately estimate how many gallons my pool is, its irregular shape with a large Baja ledge, basically a diamond shape as you can see from the picture, shallow end 3.5ft and goes to 5.5ft. 21ft wide/21ft long. If it was a perfect square it would be about 15K gallons, but because its this shape I have no idea how to accurately get closer to true numbers, im assuming its only 10-12K?

2) I was looking at the schedule the PB put together and RPMs, both seemed like overkill and too high based on my reading on your site so far, should I run less often or lower the RPMS to save on electricity bill? Currently he has it running approx 8 hours a day, (5 hours low, 3 hours high)

Low Pool 2300 RPM 6-10am, 7:30pm-8:30pm
High Pool 3000 RPM 10am-12pm, 6pm-7:30pm
Low Spa 2000 RPM
High Spa 2900 RPM

3) Any reasoning behind when to run it? Its cold in Southern California (fontana) and we are not doing any swimming for now.

4) Anything else anyone suggests I do or prep or need to know?

Thank you,

Jacob

14k? Pool/Spa, Pentair Intelliflo VSF, Pentair Quad DE filter, Pentair Mastertemp 400, 5 Globrites (1 spa, 4 pool), 1 aux pump for two water sheers,

 

[kimkats]

Oh what a pretty pool you have there!

Here is a link to starting up plaster: Start-up New Plaster - Trouble Free Pool I also suggest you look up the start up guide for your brand of plaster.

Now here is a set of links for caring for this beauty:
Print these out:
Pool School - Basic Pool Care Schedule
Pool School - Recommended Levels

Bookmark these:
Pool School - Recommended Pool Chemicals
Trouble Free Pool
Pool School - ABCs of Pool Water Chemistry

When you are starting up new plaster it is important to run the pump for a longer time to help filter out the plaster dust from you brushing the pool and the plaster curing. You should be brushing your pool 3 or so times a day.

Do you have a test kit yet? If so which one?

Kim

 

[Jimrahbe]

Jacob,

How are you currently sanitizing your pool? I assume you have a chlorine tablet feeder... anything else??

Pump speed and run times have a lot to do with how you are adding chlorine to your pool.

For now I would just leave it alone until the pool is over 30 days old..

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[cyanide00]

Hey guys, thank you both for the information and replies. I will be reading all the recommended links, thank you.

Jim to answer your question, our PB has just been having us check the pH levels for now, this morning it was a 7.6, I will need to find out what pool kit it is, but its very basic. And our PB has not given us the tablet chlorine feeder yet, we have not put any chlorine yet.

 

[Dtkokay]

Maintaining proper chlorine level is by far the most important part of pool care. I can’t stress that enough. I would get some chlorine in there immediately, and get a proper test kit (TF-100) so that you can accurately measure it. You can buy liquid chlorine to immediately get some in there. Tablets are slow.

And congrats on the pool - looks great!

 

[cyanide00]

Merged threads. TFP Mod
Hi everyone, Im sure this topic has been covered before so sorry for the redundancy.

I just had my pool built and completed and couldn't be more excited, after reading alot on your site. I get the feeling that our PB set the RPMs way too high and I am wasting electricity during my runs.


Current settings

Pump Low mode = 2300 RPM (seems high?)
Pump High mode = 3100 RPM

What should the spa mode RPM be set at?
He currently has it to be 2000 RPM

Hope this question makes sense.

 

[JJ_Tex]

I have the same pump on my pool/spa and I would agree that you are wasting electricity. You should play around with what works best for your pool, but here is mine:

Pool (Low) - 1,400 RPSM - This is just enough to properly skim and hold down the weird door and make chlorine. I'm at this 24/7 except when one of the others kicks on.
Pool (High) - 2,400 RPMs - I spend a few hours a day here just to skim a little better, especially if there is any debris stuck on my spa overflow
Spa - 2,500 RPMs

The only time I run higher would be if we are swimming and I turn on the water features, I may kick it up to about 2,800 but I do this manually as I do not want it scheduled to come on.

 

[ajw22]

Do you have a SWG? How do you chlorinate your pool?

Low mode can be 200 rpm above the minimum for your heater to run properly. My heater needs about 1800 rpm.

High mode is whatever you find skims your pool well.

Spa speed is personal preference and I have a dedicated spa jet pump for that.

 

[Jimrahbe]

00,

You can set your pump speed to whatever works best for you.. We can give you some basic ideas, but you need to have fun and experiment and see what speeds work for you.

The first reason to run a pump is to chlorinate your pool. You need to run it fast enough and long enough to make that happen.. You don't say how you are chlorinating your pool.. If you use a tab feeder, you might have to run a little faster so that the tablets erode like they should.

The second reason to run the pump is to keep the pool skimmed. Often this happens during the time it takes to generate the chlorine.

The lowest speed that you should run is the speed that you are using to generate chlorine..

In my case, I have a Saltwater Chlorine Generator or SWCG, and I like to run my pump 24/7.. This allows me to generate a little chlorine all the time.. I do this at 1200 RPM.. This same speed also keeps my pool skimmed, so it is where my pool runs most of the time.. I have three other speeds.. Skim low 1600 RPM, Skim high 1800, and Waterfall at 2800.

I schedule the Skim low to come on a couple of times a day to help skimming, but really don't need it.. I set up Skim high to help skimming, but the only time I use it is when I want to get a "Lazy River" effect when we are using our floats. Obviously, when I want the waterfall on, I need to run the pump at 2800RPM.

Your pool should have similar speeds that make your pool work the way you want.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[cyanide00]

Hi guys, have a question about low pump RPM settings and high pump RPM settings, my PB set it to a certain schedule with certain RPMS but compared to everything im reading on your forums seems very high.

I moved the schedule around so most of the pump would be running during the off peak hours to save on electricity, but can any of you give me some feedback on the RPMs?

Currently:

Pool High is 3100 RPMS, 10am-12pm, 10pm-11:30pm
Pool Low is 2300 RPMS, 4am - 8am, 8pm-9:30pm

Spa High 2900 RPM. Wasn't sure what people use for Spa mode?

Thank you in advance,

 

[JJ_Tex]

The mods merged your similar question from last week into a single thread:

New Pool, have SO MANY questions! Any help would be greatly appreciated :)

New pool owner here been reading alot on TFP.com for a while now in anticipation, PB just finished my pool build over the weekend, filled her up and started up the pumps today. My PB has been excellent in the whole process, but leaves a little to be desired in the detailed answers department to...

www.troublefreepool.com

 

[cyanide00]

Sorry never got any alerts that you guys replied to my other post! Thanks guys! As for chlorination, I do not have swg, so yes just floater with tablets.

 

[kimkats]

@cyanide00 look at post #9 just in case you did not see it. Very good advice for speeds there.

 

[pjt]

The best way to determine the volume of your pool is checking your water meter before and after filling (and compensating for household water use). If you have a smart meter, you should be able to determine your volume from that data.