SWG or Stick with Liquid Chlorine

[goodyFH]

I had a mess this week, went on vacation, came back green pool.

thats all fixed now, but my drum that i thought would last til winter is empty and its got me thinking about a SWG. I bought a stenner pump with tank earlier this year which is great but it ran out (due to my math being wrong) during vacation.
I wont do anything until spring so i got time to save up but is it worth it? i did buy my drum for $200 so that was good

In my opinion the pros and cons are:

Pros-
1. no messing with a drum, which i have a tractor now with a loader and wont be as big of a pain
2. no strength of bleach loss with none to store
3. no more ruined clothes because im messy. haha
4. no more bleach smell in my garage
5. hopefully no more green pools after vacation

Cons-
1. Initial cost
2. gotta buy more acid for ph increase
3. power usage increase which i dont think will really amount to much
4. corrosive but only thing i can think of would be my pump itself

am i missing anything

Is a SWG a good fit for me? if so which one?

14,000gal above ground pool in Southern Kentucky

thanks!

 

[mknauss]

gotta buy more acid for ph increase

If you have been using only liquid chlorine, there will be no perceptible difference in pH rise using a SWCG.

What is corrosive? The salt water? No, it is not. Low pH is corrosive.

 

[goodyFH]

If you have been using only liquid chlorine, there will be no perceptible difference in pH rise using a SWCG.

ok cool, thats one con off the list. haha thanks

 

[goodyFH]

If you have been using only liquid chlorine, there will be no perceptible difference in pH rise using a SWCG.

What is corrosive? The salt water? No, it is not. Low pH is corrosive.

i can get acid pretty cheap at my local hardware store so that not really a big issue anyways, just was trying to come up with cons

 

[drsipe]

I made the swap from bleach to SWCG this spring. Last year while on bleach, I added 2 1/2 gallons of 31.45% Muriatic Acid over the swimming season (mid May to late September) . This year "so far" on the SWCG I have only added slightly over 1 quart of 31.45% Muriatic Acid.

I had expected my acid consumption to increase with the addition of the SWCG, but I followed some advice on this forum, and left my TA find it's sweet spot, for me that was 70, and now my PH is pretty solid.

Last year my TA was high, from BAD pool store advice, once the TA was reduced and under control, my acid consumption dropped to nearly zero.

Don't let the fear of adding acid deter you, I know there is a lot of debate about SWCGs, the only real con is the upfront cost, and if you can afford the upfront costs, then it should be an easy decision.

 

[cowboycasey]

How long do you run your pump now? If you get a 45k or 60k SWG you could run it less than your are now...

 

[goodyFH]

I'm running it about 12 hrs a day

 

[cowboycasey]

so a 45k unit you could run about 6 hours a day or stay at 12 hours a day and run at 50% or so

 

[jark87]

As far as I’m concerned, any cons are FAR outweighed by the convenience. To your original point, I love being able to leave my pool for relatively long periods and not worry about it. Then factor in that my only chemical maintenance task is adding a pint of MA once a week, which is mostly due to my chiller and the aeration it causes, and I get to truly enjoy my pool.

 

[huggies]

If you can afford it, just do it.

I just got my system operational after using liquid for the first 5 yrs. The supposed benefit of liquid over tablets is the accumulated cya issue when using tabs. Well after 5 yrs of nothing but liquid chlorine and occasional acid in the AZ sun, my salt levels were insane. So either way, you end up draining water to control one or the other. I had to drain a ton of water over several weeks, vinyl liner so couldn't straight drain, to get my salt levels down enough for my new SWG. I wouldn't worry about the salt level necessary for a SWG Your pool maintenance will get a lot easier/quicker. Goodbye liquidator and trips for chlorine every week.

There's really only one negative, upfront cost.