Salt

[dennis-o]

Hello Everyone,

I have been considering a SWG and was concerned that my wife would be bothered by the salt taste. She hates going to our neighborhood pool because she says it tastes salty (like pee in her words). So I bought a saltwater test kit and using it, created a gallon of 3000 PPM salt water and I was right, she was less than enthusiastic about a 2nd sip. So I abandoned the idea of a SWG. In the process, I discovered that my pool water is currently 1400 PPM. It is about a year old and doing very rough calculations I figure that I have added about 50 gallons of 10% bleach over the year. This equates to approximately 1300 PPM salt added through chlorine.

My question is, next year at this time will my pool be approaching 3000 PPM? Is there anything that can be done about this besides dump and refill? Given the water situation in California, that's not very practical.

Thanks.....Dennis

 

[wireform]

What salt kit are you testing with.

 

[dennis-o]

The Taylor drop kit - I don't remember the number

 

[ajw22]

Every gallon of 10% liquid chlorine raises FC by 12 ppm and adds 21 ppm of salt to your 8,000 gallon pool.

Even if you used Trichlor, 21 ppm of FC from Trichlor would add 18 ppm of salt to your pool.

Salt comes with every form of chlorine. You can't get away from it.

There are some low salt model SWG's, primarily for the Canada markets. Certain communities in the Ontario area have passed low salt requirements for discharge into the sewer system. Toronto being one.

The low salt SWG operates with salt levels of 1200-1800 ppm. It puts out less chlorine but should be adequate for your 6,000 gallon pool.

The Hayward Aquarite S3 has a low salt mode....

Search results for: 'AquaRite® S3'

www.hayward-pool.com

 

[JamesW]

Just get a regular Aquarite with a T-15 cell and set the cell size to T-9 to run at lower salinity.

 

[mgtfp]

Have you also offered her a glass of your current pool water? Run a salt test of your "no-salt" pool water - you might be surprised what's already in there.

 

[Britali]

All I can say is I am glad I do not have that association with my pool hehe. But I have not tasted it or pee either lol.

 

[phonedave]

Not sure why your wife is drinking the pool water in any significant amount (or why she knows what pee tastes like) but as for your original question. The only way to reduce salt in a pool is to do a partial drain and refill.

 

[dennis-o]

Thanks everyone.....I am going to look into low salinity SWG's. Are most people with non-SWG dumping water to reduce salinity?

 

[Bperry]

Thanks everyone.....I am going to look into low salinity SWG's. Are most people with non-SWG dumping water to reduce salinity?

I don’t think anyones ever complained about tasting salinity so I’d be surprised if anyone is doing anything to reduce it. I’m sure you can’t be the first though. Any way to just have your wife deal with it? Easier said than done, I realize.

 

[gingrbredman]

I guess everyone is different, but never heard anyone mention my water actually "tastes like salt". My salinity is around 3,200, and the only comment I get about the water is that it feels great. Could be a placebo effect kind of thing, if you know it should taste like salt, it will, but in comparison, and not actually knowing, probably wouldn't even notice the difference. Especially considering we don't actually drink the water, but just sometimes taste it.

are most people with non-SWG dumping water to reduce salinity?

There really isn't a lot of posts or discussions about dumping water due to salinity for non-salt pools. A lot of "chlorine pool" owners actually are surprised their salinity levels are higher than they thought they would be, but didn't notice it because of a taste thing.

 

[mknauss]

Are most people with non-SWG dumping water to reduce salinity?

In most of the country, they get rain. That overflows the pool occasionally. Or the close for winter, when they drain some water.

For those in areas it does not rain, or not much, and all you do is add water due to evaporation, the salinity will increase. Once it gets to 5000 ppm or so, you do need to drain some off as above that salt level can start to cause issues.

 

[phonedave]

I do not drain water for the express purpose of decreasing salinity. Before I had a SWCG, salinity was not even something I looked at.

With a SWCG I do measure my salt concentration, but it never gets too high. It does get too low at times (rain causing overflow). I have to add a bag or two of salt each season to keep it where it needs to be.

I can taste the salt in my pool, very slightly but it has never been an issue, as we don't drink the pool water on a normal basis. It is nothing like swimming in the ocean, which is way saltier.

 

[Flying Tivo]

So I bought a saltwater test kit and using it, created a gallon of 3000 PPM salt water and I was right, she was less than enthusiastic about a 2nd sip.

Try 2800ppm of salt. That is what i run mine and can not taste it.

 

[JamesW]

Thanks everyone.....I am going to look into low salinity SWG's.

Get a regular Aquarite with a T-15 cell and you can run the salinity at about 1,600 if you change the cell type to T-5.

You can run at about 2,400 with the cell type set to T-9.

 

[Silver_2000]

our pool is typically over 3000 ppm, we correct to 3500 and ours falls regularly due to a leak and an autofill, and I can't taste the salt. I haven't had anyone notice it and mention it.

 

[randytsuch]

I'm in So Cal, so rains but not very much. Before converting my pool to salt, I measured 1000 ppm. And is been many many years since I've drained. Before SWG this year, was using mostly liquid chlorine, but some cal hypo too.
Not sure why it didn't get higher than 1000?

If my wife didn't like the taste of salt, I wouldn't convert. Just my opinion. Even if you can't really taste it, she would complain about it.

Randy