Solar heating questions

[Sammy2]

You're welcome. Here is a better pic.

View attachment 59217

Where is the VRV in your setup?

Sent from my SM-G930P using Tapatalk

 

[pooldv]

It is in the upper left corner on post 4 in my pool thread at the end of the upper header. Water enters lower left and exits upper right.

 

[Sammy2]

So just below the eave? I don't see it in the picture but trust it is there.

So my parts list looks like this:

4 4'x12' or 4'x16' (do they exist?) panels
JVA
3-wire cable from JVA to PCB (or is it included with the JVA?)
Solar 3-way Valve
Black Solar Temp Sensor
2 Check Valves
Vacuum Relief Valve
Pipe and Fittings to do the job
PVC primer and glue
Proper hoses and clamps for inter-panel connections

Anything else come to mind?

 

[pooldv]

No, it is in the upper left, behind the tree trunk. On the upper header. List looks good. I can't remember if the motors come with wire or not.

 

[Sammy2]

Jandy rs-8 solar operation is built in and easy to utilize. You need panels, temp sensor (for the roof), 3-way valve (with small hole to allow panel drain back) and a jva controller. As stated above, The contoller reads roof temp and desired pool temp then determines whether to turn on the solar or off. When the rs-8 is set up to assign the jva to solar operation, you will have an option on the screen to enable solar.

You dont have to set the pool to max temp, just what your desired set point otherwise the pool can get too warm. I set mine at 85 degrees year round. Dont let an installer talk you into buying a separate controller- you dont need one! It's also much cleaner to have one system to controll all pool functions.

as far as cost, its literally free compared to LPG or Propane (virtually zero cost when normally filtering water- and just electricity costs if you are extending pump run time to collect more heat). I ran 10 4' x 12' panels on our 18,000 pool and it is swimmable from march through october. You can also supplement with a solar blanket and increase heat production ~50%. We've had a cold and wet winter in norcal but the pool is still 73 compared to outside temps in high 60's. Thats only running 4 hours a day. A standard 4 x 12 panel puts out about 1000btu/sqft per day. 8 panels would generate ~ 3MM btus a day. Running a 400k btu gas heater for 7 1/2 hrs a day provides a comparable output.

there are many DIY kits and videos on installation, sizing, etc. Also with electrical solar becoming so popular, many used panels are showing up on craigslist when removed to utilize the space for electrical solar. After 10 years on my DIY system, I just bought 6 used panels on craigslist for $300 to replace the old ones which had started leaking. You can buy a system for less than 1/2 of the price normally quoted by installers. I finished my installation in a weekend fwiw.

So I went ahead and assigned the JVA even though I don't have the solar installed and I'm not getting anywhere. Is this maybe because there's no temperature sensor connected to the Solar Temp Sensor on the board? BTW, the reason I did this was to look into the settings in my Vera to control pump speeds. That can only be done when the Solar is first set up in the Jandy iAqualink.



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No, it is in the upper left, behind the tree trunk. On the upper header. List looks good. I can't remember if the motors come with wire or not.

Thanks. It looks like just a couple of elbows to make a u-turn in the pipe flow direction.

 

[Rossterman]

The temp sensor mounts on the roof adjacent to the panels. This tells the controller if there is enough heat on the roof to run water through the panels. The roof temp will normally be hotter than the ambient air temp sensor so the need for two air sensors with solar.

also as others have said, a solar blanket is a low cost option to maintain and heat the pool. Most solar sizing calculators indicate that you can reduce the solar panel to 50% of the pool surface if you run a cover in conjuction with the panels.