SWG Installation Help

[derek533]

Long story short, I bought a complete Aquarite Gold system and T-15 cell at a garage sale for $40 a few years back! The guy's story was that he had it installed but could never get it the way he wanted and was selling the home. He didn't like the buyers of his home so he pulled it off and converted back to chlorine.

Anyway, I've had it for about 4 years and never got around to installing it as i had my pool perfect on chlorine. I'm finally tired of lugging liquid chlorine bottles around and want to get the SWG installed. I had the local pool cell test the cell and it's perfectly fine. I've tested the controller and it works just fine as well.

My question is, what are your recommendations as to where I should put the cell and controller box. My pool is about 24K gallons give or take and was built in the early 80's if not late 70's. My equipment setup is nice and simple. One three way valve for the bottom drain and skimmer before the pump. Coming out of the filter, it's just a straight shot to the auto chlorinator then out into the returns. My plumbing lines are 1.5". I don't have a whole lot of excess pipe to remove to fit the cell and unions that I'll need for the 2" to 1.5" conversion. Take a look at my picture and tell me (if you can) where you'd put it. Also, wiring is all 220v with just a switch to turn on the pump coming out of the junction box connected to the switch.

So, three questions:

1. Where would you guys route enough pipe to put the cell.
2. Should I wire it into the box along with the pump so when the pump is on, the control box is on or could I simply just wire it with a pigtail going to a regular protected 110 outlet?

Thanks!

 

[Jimrahbe]

Derek,

Cells are normally the last item before the water goes back to the pool.. In your case it should be a replacement for your tab feeder.

Since you have a single speed pump, you should wire the control box to the same power the runs the pump. The idea is that the salt system must never get AC power when the pump is off.

Your system is rated for a 40K pool, but in real life it is more like a 20K pool. This means your cell will be just a little small, but should work fine. You will just have to run it longer and harder to generate the amount of chlorine your pool will need.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[Rattus Suffocatus]

After the filter and before the returns. Agree from the picture that replacing the tab filter is the correct place. You might have to put the flow switch in the feed to the tab feeder. Make sure no valve setting can block flow to the cell with it on! Go and look at the install instructions for the Circupool Universal40 since that is a very similar system to the Hayward. (Google the manual). If you follow those instructions you should be good. The cell is a "little small" for the pool size you have but is greater than the practical minimum of 1.5x the size... it should work if turned up... That's about a $900 system. Nice find! Even if the cell is bad but the controller is good it's really easy to find sub $400 replacement cells for the T-15 if you don't mind aftermarket.