Notes on new propane heater

[rbinn]

A month ago I had a Raypak 106A propane pool heater installed. Purchase price was 1039.00 install with rent and full tank of propane was 993.00. So under 2000 Canadian. I have solar as well and a Sun touch controller with remote plug in.
Our first 2 weeks were wet and cold, I kept the pool in the mid 80's after boosting from about 60. I won't do this again as nobody was swimming, and there was no solar to balance the fuel use under the solar preferred function. Since then the weather has been great and we are swimming in 86-90 ° water everyday.The heater and solar (when available) works flawlessly.

I'm very happy with the purchase. Heater is perfect size for my little pool. Downside is the propane usage. I have burned through $300.00 in 1 month...big learning curve here.

 

[jblizzle]

Do you have a cover for the pool? If not, you could get one fairly cheap and it will help retain a lot of heat in the pool ... lowering your propane costs.

 

[rbinn]

Yes i have cover, works pretty good to keep the heat in. I think its more a matter of balancing when i set the schedule on the heater. We usually dont swim until the afternoon, so i need to dial it in.

Pool cover is still the cheapest best investment. The pool heater is just the icing on the cake.

Anybody else want to chime in on their scheduling?

 

[AftonJeeper]

My pool is quite different from yours and I'm still learning about schedules and how quick it heats up but I run the heater from 1 to 6pm Monday to Friday and 9am to noon on the weekends. My pump is off over night and my auto cover is shut whenever we (or the dogs) are not in the pool.

 

[rbinn]

Thanks for the input. I start my pump at 8 on solar preferred and have the heater power up at 9. Pump runs till 12am heater shuts down at 11pm. I'm going to switch it up to have pump start at 9 when solar is usually available and then kick the heater on at maybe 1pm. I can raise the temp 2-3° an hour so it should work out.

Will need to figure out the limitations of the Sun Touch...

Cheers
Rob