Pentair INTELLIph Acid Despenser System

[MontanaLarryG]

New Saltwater pool with automation - adding acid daily to reduce ph. Running pump 24/7 to keep pool heated to 84 degrees. There is a waterfall feature (negative edge) which runs 8am to 10pm.

Considering adding the Pentair acid dispenser system.

If you have any experience with this system, or knowledge regarding it and it's use, please provide any recommendations.

Thanks!

 

[mknauss]

With those parameters your evaporation losses must be very high.

Be sure you are using softened water for make up water.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

I’m in Tucson as well and have never installed an IntelliPH. Acid demand is tough in the first year but it gets better. Once you get the TA down to the 60ppm range, the pH rise gets easier to deal with. Also, make sure you control any sources of aeration with proper valve automation.

As Marty alluded to above, calcium hardness is your biggest enemy. I had a whole house softener installed and had the plumber hook my autofill up to it. My calcium went from skyrocketing every year to barely budging. Keep your CH and TA under tight control and your SWG will have no problem keeping the pool santized. Let your CH and TA get out of control and the SWG will be spitting calcium snowflakes all day and eventually it will get fouled up.

You can get 4-ups of muriatic acid from eKonomy Pools in refillable containers. Not cheap, but then again neither is HD or Lowe’s or any pool store. Not having to constantly throw away old chemical jugs is a plus. Liquid chlorine is best gotten from either Safeway’s or Ace Hardware. Always check production codes on the box for manufacturing dates. Some places will keep liquid chlorine around for over a year or more at which point it has degraded to mostly salt water.

 

[MontanaLarryG]

Interesting. Every thing I have read suggests staying away from softened water in a saltwater pool.

 

[mknauss]

A heated pool in the winter with a constant overflowing edge you are having huge evaporation losses. The high CH and TA fill water you are using is pushing your CH levels up rapidly and your TA levels up daily requiring large amounts of acid.

CH levels only come down by draining the pool and replacing the water with lower CH water.

Softened water simply removes the calcium. What is the downside? Once you have the CH at or near 250 ppm, you need no more calcium in the water.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Interesting. Every thing I have read suggests staying away from softened water in a saltwater pool.

There’s lots of really bad advice on the internet …

Saline pool water and calcium removal have no issues whatsoever. You certainly don’t want to FILL a plaster pool with softened water but it’s completely ok to maintain a pool using softened water. Calcium, along with other minerals, does not leave the pool water unless there is splash out or water exchange where the incoming water has lower calcium hardness than the outgoing water. So, over time, calcium builds up. The problem with calcium is that after a certain concentration level and when other parameters are out of range, most notable pH and TA, the calcium that is in the pool water will precipitate out as calcium carbonate scale. Scaling is bad for everything in your pool.

Softened water top offs keep the calcium levels in check and has no other interaction with the pool. Pool builders often tell customers not to use softened water because they simply don’t understand the chemistry … they build pools, they aren’t chemists.

 

[Jimrahbe]

Larry,

I did not see that you were in Tucson, I just saw your user name and thought "What idiot would heat a pool to 84 degrees in Montana, this time of year?"

Even in Tucson, that has got to be pretty expensive does it not???

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Larry,

I did not see that you were in Tucson, I just saw your user name and thought "What idiot would heat a pool to 84 degrees in Montana, this time of year?"

Even in Tucson, that has got to be pretty expensive does it not???

Thanks,

Jim R.

I would never run my heater in the winter ... I might as well light my bank account fire and get the same effect. Pools go dormant here in the winter for the most part. Some people do try to swim on Christmas or New Years, especially when trying to impress family from colder climates, but it's simply not worth it. Many pools with attached spas will heat their spas over the winter but I found that to be a pain in the keister as neither of us likes to sit out in the cold. So I don't heat the pool much at all, not even in the spring when the air is warm but the pool water still has its winter chill. The kids are in school and busy all the way up until June and could care less about swimming so the gas heater gets very little use. I think I fire it up more times simply to run it so it doesn't become a rats nest.

Honestly, if the heater died, I'd probably opt not to replace it. Let the next guy do that ...

 

[MontanaLarryG]

Larry,

I did not see that you were in Tucson, I just saw your user name and thought "What idiot would heat a pool to 84 degrees in Montana, this time of year?"

Even in Tucson, that has got to be pretty expensive does it not???

Thanks,

Jim R.

We moved to Tucson from Montana, explaining my email tag. ;0)

 

[MontanaLarryG]

I would never run my heater in the winter ... I might as well light my bank account fire and get the same effect. Pools go dormant here in the winter for the most part. Some people do try to swim on Christmas or New Years, especially when trying to impress family from colder climates, but it's simply not worth it. Many pools with attached spas will heat their spas over the winter but I found that to be a pain in the keister as neither of us likes to sit out in the cold. So I don't heat the pool much at all, not even in the spring when the air is warm but the pool water still has its winter chill. The kids are in school and busy all the way up until June and could care less about swimming so the gas heater gets very little use. I think I fire it up more times simply to run it so it doesn't become a rats nest.

Honestly, if the heater died, I'd probably opt not to replace it. Let the next guy do that ...

I totally understand not wanting to spend the money to heat the pool in the winter if you are not interested in actually using the pool. I am not sure what the cost will be as of yet, but I plan to keep it heated and ready to use! I put in a pool to utilize it rather than simply look at it. I may change my mind if the cost outweighs the benefit!

 

[ajw22]

Pentair Intelliph - Further Reading

www.troublefreepool.com

@Dirk will be by shortly.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

I totally understand not wanting to spend the money to heat the pool in the winter if you are not interested in actually using the pool. I am not sure what the cost will be as of yet, but I plan to keep it heated and ready to use! I put in a pool to utilize it rather than simply look at it. I may change my mind if the cost outweighs the benefit!

Some rough numbers -

Tucson NG costs around $2.50 per therm. A 400,000BTU/hr gas heater uses 400 cubic feet of gas. or 4 CCF (centacubic feet). 4 CCF of natural gas is roughly 4.15 therms (depends on the temperature and specific density of the gas but it's pretty close). So every hour that you run a 400kBTU gas heater you spend a little over $10.

1 BTU raises the temperature of 1 pound of water 1 degree Fahrenheit

11,600 gallons of water weighs approximately 96,744 pounds.

So, to raise the temperature of your pool 1 deg F, requires roughly 97,000 BTUs. A 400kBTU gas heater is only around 80% efficient so your heater delivers about 360,000BTUs/hr to the water. So it will take roughly 16mins for the heater to raise the temp 1 deg F (I suspect a bit longer with conduction and evaporation losses). Based on the gas consumption rate, that's going to cost you $2.69.

So getting a pool from "cold" to swimmable might cost you $50 in gas or more. However, to maintain the temperature the gas heater, and pool pump, have to run all the time. And during the inverted months when the dew point temperature and air temperatures are lower than the pool water temp, you will get significant heat loss from evaporation. That heat loss can easily be 6-8 F overnight during the warm weather months (because the RH is so low) and double that during the winter months.

If you want to maintain a swimmable pool all year round, then you absolutely will need to cover the pool with a bubble cover, assuming the pool doesn't have an automatic cover. You'll probably see gas costs from the pool alone running at $40-$80 per month during the cold weather (Nov-April) and then almost zero cost over the summer when the sun and heat kick in.

And, as a given, with a heater running all the time like that, especially when its cold and flue gas can accidentally condense, you'll be lucky to get 4-5 years of service life from the heater before its shot. So figure every 5 years or so you'll be replacing that heater to the tune of ~$5,000.

Those are just spitball numbers and for some, they're not a problem. I've got other more pressing things to spend m y money on so a swimmable pool is not a priority for me. YMMV.

 

[MontanaLarryG]

Some rough numbers -

Tucson NG costs around $2.50 per therm. A 400,000BTU/hr gas heater uses 400 cubic feet of gas. or 4 CCF (centacubic feet). 4 CCF of natural gas is roughly 4.15 therms (depends on the temperature and specific density of the gas but it's pretty close). So every hour that you run a 400kBTU gas heater you spend a little over $10.

1 BTU raises the temperature of 1 pound of water 1 degree Fahrenheit

11,600 gallons of water weighs approximately 96,744 pounds.

So, to raise the temperature of your pool 1 deg F, requires roughly 97,000 BTUs. A 400kBTU gas heater is only around 80% efficient so your heater delivers about 360,000BTUs/hr to the water. So it will take roughly 16mins for the heater to raise the temp 1 deg F (I suspect a bit longer with conduction and evaporation losses). Based on the gas consumption rate, that's going to cost you $2.69.

So getting a pool from "cold" to swimmable might cost you $50 in gas or more. However, to maintain the temperature the gas heater, and pool pump, have to run all the time. And during the inverted months when the dew point temperature and air temperatures are lower than the pool water temp, you will get significant heat loss from evaporation. That heat loss can easily be 6-8 F overnight during the warm weather months (because the RH is so low) and double that during the winter months.

If you want to maintain a swimmable pool all year round, then you absolutely will need to cover the pool with a bubble cover, assuming the pool doesn't have an automatic cover. You'll probably see gas costs from the pool alone running at $40-$80 per month during the cold weather (Nov-April) and then almost zero cost over the summer when the sun and heat kick in.

And, as a given, with a heater running all the time like that, especially when its cold and flue gas can accidentally condense, you'll be lucky to get 4-5 years of service life from the heater before its shot. So figure every 5 years or so you'll be replacing that heater to the tune of ~$5,000.

Those are just spitball numbers and for some, they're not a problem. I've got other more pressing things to spend m y money on so a swimmable pool is not a priority for me. YMMV.

You are way, way smarter than me. If the monthly cost is 5 times what your calculations show, I will be thrilled. I also have no problem replacing my heater every 4 years. I’m old, and dying with any money not spent is an absolute failure on my part.

My post is regarding the experience of using the INTELLIph system.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

You are way, way smarter than me. If the monthly cost is 5 times what your calculations show, I will be thrilled. I also have no problem replacing my heater every 4 years. I’m old, and dying with any money not spent is an absolute failure on my part.

My post is regarding the experience of using the INTELLIph system.

An IntelliPH system, as long as it is properly paired with whatever automation controls you are using, will make the application of acid to the pool water more automated and regular. However, the systems are not without their required maintenance. The acid tank needs to be monitored and filled as-needed. The tubing used by the peristaltic pump needs to be replaced at least annually and possibly more frequently depending on how much heat and sun exposure the equipment gets. There is an injection/check-valve at the plumbing that needs to be checked and replaced as-needed. Installation is fairly easy.

Some downsides to the system is that the SWG controls are routed through the iPH controller so that chlorine generation is stopped when acid is being dispensed. There are also internal hard-limits built into the controller on how much acid can be dispensed in any 24-hr period and how much can be dispensed at one time. There is also a cold water cutoff that happens where the iPH won't dispense acid during the colder months (again, going to back to year-round pool heating). So it does take some initial tweaking to get the dispense rate right and then measurements and adjustments throughout the season to keep the pH and TA at the right level. You really shouldn't need it at all during the winter as cold pool water has very slow changes in pH.

One problem that has been noted in the past is that since the control of the SWG power is routed through the iPH controller, there is a very poorly designed on-board connector on the inside of the iPH control box that can get burned out very easily. It basically happens because all the power for the SWG cell runs through this connector and it is simply not properly spec'ed to handle the power load so the connection gets roasted to death slowly. It often shows up as a "CHECK CELL" error on the controller with nothing visibly wrong at the SWG cell. But because the connector is fried, it looks like the cell isn't working. It tends to happen more with the higher production rate SWG's (like the IC-60) but we have gotten reports of it happening to IC-20's as well. There is a work-around to it if you like fiddling with soldering irons and doing printed circuit board repair work OR you can just buy a new control board for the iPH. The control boards are very expensive for what they do and how poorly they're made, but some people just opt to live with it.

I personally see the iPH as something that fixes one issue (manual addition of acid) but creates a lot of other issues (maintenance). So it's more of a personal choice between balancing simplicity and complexity.

 

[dmk]

I ran the IPH system for a few years in my old house. Worked pretty well, and my acid demand was extremely predictable so it was a good fit. It did eventually fail, the board went in the cheap controller and it also took the cell transformer with it.

Another benefit of the system was it seemed to keep the cell clean.

All that being said, I’m in a new house and haven’t bothered to buy another one. Maybe if it were a bit less expensive it would be worth a few years of service.