Wonder why this hasn’t really caught on

[Orion7319]

 

[mguzzy]

Probably because not everyone has their pool equipment next to their AC units. ... My pool's equipment pad is WAAAAAAAY in the corner of the yard, away from the house so the noise is minimal...meanwhile my AC units are on the roof of the house. Any advantage gained from the heat transfer would be lost in pumping the coolant back and forth across the yard. That is at least for me.

 

[Oly]

Why would you want to heat your pool water if it is hot enough outside to run the AC? 107 air temp today and pool water a perfect 80.
I know of underground diesel power plants that are cooled using pool water from large public pools but they run in the winter months.

 

[Orion7319]

Probably because not everyone has their pool equipment next to their AC units. ... My pool's equipment pad is WAAAAAAAY in the corner of the yard, away from the house so the noise is minimal...meanwhile my AC units are on the roof of the house. Any advantage gained from the heat transfer would be lost in pumping the coolant back and forth across the yard. That is at least for me.

That’s exactly what my problem would be to be honest. But with a new pool build?

 

[mommahocker]

I just watched this last night! Hubs is in the geo-thermal business...
It's ideal for people who might want a year-round pool in a climate that might otherwise prohibit. It's definitely a planned-out process and yes, your equipment needs to all be in this location-type scenario. Energy consumption and geographical location play a big part in this type of engineering, also. Any time you can re-use energy, you're saving $. We've already added this to our build plans!

 

[Orion7319]

Why would you want to heat your pool water if it is hot enough outside to run the AC? 107 air temp today and pool water a perfect 80.
I know of underground diesel power plants that are cooled using pool water from large public pools but they run in the winter months.

Where I live in May and September it’s not uncommon to have days where the temps are in the 80’s and 90’s but the pool is in the 70’s. Right now it’s 84 and my pool is 82. I’m running the AC and would love to bump the pool up to 85. I don’t have any heater at all right now and would love to have something that worked and didn’t cost an arm and a leg to run.

 

[PoolGate]

Why would you want to heat your pool water if it is hot enough outside to run the AC? 107 air temp today and pool water a perfect 80.
I know of underground diesel power plants that are cooled using pool water from large public pools but they run in the winter months.

Ha ha not all of us like to swim in freezing cold water!

 

[PoolGate]

Also I wonder how well this works. Not very is my opinion. This seems like it would be good to maybe heat a kiddie pool. That heat exchanger box won't put much heat at all in the water. If both the product and installation was free yeah it might be ok to put a few extra degrees into the pool. But I suspect you would be lucky if you could get 1 degree a day from this in a larger (20k plus gallon) pool. ROI is probably.....never?

Being featured on "this old house" virtually guarantees it doesn't work.

 

[Orion7319]

I just watched this last night! Hubs is in the geo-thermal business...
It's ideal for people who might want a year-round pool in a climate that might otherwise prohibit. It's definitely a planned-out process and yes, your equipment needs to all be in this location-type scenario. Energy consumption and geographical location play a big part in this type of engineering, also. Any time you can re-use energy, you're saving $. We've already added this to our build plans!

Cool! Let us know how it works!

 

[Orion7319]

Also I wonder how well this works. Not very is my opinion. This seems like it would be good to maybe heat a kiddie pool. That heat exchanger box won't put much heat at all in the water. If both the product and installation was free yeah it might be ok to put a few extra degrees into the pool. But I suspect you would be lucky if you could get 1 degree a day from this in a larger (20k plus gallon) pool. ROI is probably.....never?

Being featured on "this old house" virtually guarantees it doesn't work.

See that’s why I’m wondering why this hasn’t caught on. I’m thinking if there wasn’t some kind of catch we would see a lot more of these going in. In my case a 2 to 5 degree increase would make a huge difference in the length of time for the swim season. My pool at 82 on an 84 degree day still feels cold to me. I know that’s probably perfect temps for little kids and folks living in Canada… but I can’t take it!

 

[PoolGate]

See that’s why I’m wondering why this hasn’t caught on. I’m thinking if there wasn’t some kind of catch we would see a lot more of these going in. In my case a 2 to 5 degree increase would make a huge difference in the length of time for the swim season. My pool at 82 on an 84 degree day still feels cold to me. I know that’s probably perfect temps for little kids and folks living in Canada… but I can’t take it!

Keep in mind your air conditioner has to be running and cooling for this to work at all.

 

[Orion7319]

Keep in mind your air conditioner has to be running and cooling for this to work at all.

Yes I know. You can’t heat your pool when your running your heat in your house. That’s a fatal flaw I’m sure for most northern climates. Here though we run our air a lot when the pool is still cold. This in most likelihood won’t work for me because the AC unit is so far removed from the pool equipment, 50 or 60 ft or so. Probably the only thing that would work for my situation and be somewhat economical is a solar system on the roof of my shed. Eventually we will probably get one, one of these days. I’m just curious about this is all.

 

[JamesW]

FPH - Hotspot Energy Install Begins!

So, it has been a long three two months of planning to get ready for our pool building. What is unique about this build is that I will be installing the Hotspot Energy FPH System as the primary mode of heading our 12,000 gallon fiberglass pool. It is my hope to provide some empirical insight...

www.troublefreepool.com

Intelliflo Pump Needs Two Brains

My Pump needs two Brains for the FPH?? I have an Intellicenter as the brains of my system with all the benefits therein. My question is can the Pentair Intelliflo PUMP have two sources to turn the pump on and off as my heating system will require the pump to be activated IF the pump is...

www.troublefreepool.com

 

[JamesW]

So the directions and manual are not written for lay persons. They are written for an engineer and took a little time to figure out. Once I understood how an HVAX system works, it made plenty of sense.
1. Make sure you understand that you actually have to fill and eventually drain if necessary both sides of the system. (Side when when FPH is not active and Side two when system is active). Make sure you have a port on the side of the FPH for filling freon.
2. Make sure you joints are clear and free of leaks. I would have used more bending of pipes versus joints.
3. I positioned my unit on the wall behind my outside condenser at waist level for easy access. I am always manually touching the copper pipes to feel for heat to confirm if it’s working. (My personal pleasure abs double check)

Please feel free to ask any questions. It’s a great system and worth every penny. I have had some challenges, but I had the time and energy to figure them out. My pool sits at 87-89 regularly.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Another issue is finding anyone in the HVAC contractor world willing and knowledgeable enough to set this up. Most HVAC guys won’t touch pool equipment and any modifications to your HVAC condenser unit will almost certainly void the warranty. Reducing the temperature of your coolant going to the condenser sounds like it’s an efficiency gain but, on some types of AC systems, lowering the head loss of the coolant reduces its flow rate through the system which, in turn, reduces the amount of cooling that can occur at the air handler inside the evaporator. So one had to be really, really knowledgeable about AC systems to know if you’re actually going to get the “efficiency boost” promised. As others have mentioned, there’s often too little overlap in the seasons where you want to heat a pool and cool a home to make an installation like this affordable.

 

[Orion7319]

FPH - Hotspot Energy Install Begins!

So, it has been a long three two months of planning to get ready for our pool building. What is unique about this build is that I will be installing the Hotspot Energy FPH System as the primary mode of heading our 12,000 gallon fiberglass pool. It is my hope to provide some empirical insight...

www.troublefreepool.com

Intelliflo Pump Needs Two Brains

My Pump needs two Brains for the FPH?? I have an Intellicenter as the brains of my system with all the benefits therein. My question is can the Pentair Intelliflo PUMP have two sources to turn the pump on and off as my heating system will require the pump to be activated IF the pump is...

www.troublefreepool.com

So it does seem to work with the pool equipment and the AC units far apart. It looks like it takes an exorbitant amount of head scratching though to figure out how to get it all to work. Also the unit he was using was I think 70,000 BTUs. Is that the max they can go or was that just sized for his pool? Either way this looks really cool. I probably wouldn’t be adventurous enough to install one right now myself however even if I had the means. I learned a long time ago that there are worlds of difference between cutting edge, bleeding edge and Guinea pig… lol!

 

[mguzzy]

I want to figure out how to suck the heat that is stored in the concrete sport court next to my pool,,.. INTO my pool water.... that is a product I would buy.

 

[CTFocusST]

I want to figure out how to suck the heat that is stored in the concrete sport court next to my pool,,.. INTO my pool water.... that is a product I would buy.

Something like an in floor radiant heat system in reverse would probably do that but too late if it's already built unfortunately

 

[Orion7319]

Something like an in floor radiant heat system in reverse would probably do that but too late if it's already built unfortunately

It’s never too late if he just has enough tubes!