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Electric bill f me... Pool related

rivermobster

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I have no doubt he was getting screwed. Seen a lots of these here in Havasu, everyone I've talked to says they have had recurring problems. Personally I don't see why anyone would waste there money on one when its expensive, problematic and totally unnecessary.

To each his own. .

They do it cause Normally, they are less maintenance. But, the trade off is it's more expensive.

I use a liquid chlorine dispenser.

There is no Easy answer, you just have to stay on top of your stuff yourself and get rid of the so called "pool guy". Your only a paycheck to him. 😉
 

Don Batman

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When I put Variable speed pump in , I added McMaster-Carr to the pump output. Set the pump to about 3/4 speed and took a reading. Then set pump to about 1/4 speed and took a reading. Set time for 3/4 speed at 2 hours then figured out how long to run at low speed to circulate 1 volume of water. ( 20,000 gal. ) Pool runs from 6am - 2pm. Has a vacuum plugged into wall of pool. With my setup , the only time I have to do anything , is after high wind - remove crap that blows in to skimmer and pump strainer basket , and remove floating stuff. Add 1 bag of Leslie shock per week. I think that is minimal effort as it gets. A few months ago I added a weir to the skimmer . Made a notable difference in amount of floating stuff after pump shuts off.
 

Melloyellovector

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I have no doubt he was getting screwed. Seen a lots of these here in Havasu, everyone I've talked to says they have had recurring problems. Personally I don't see why anyone would waste there money on one when its expensive, problematic and totally unnecessary.

To each his own. .
Don’t know why anyone would purchase an A/C either when you can use dry ice in front of a fan. 😅😂
technology is only useless when those trying to use it don’t know what they’re doing.
or use a shitty unit.
5 years it’s a wash using tablets and liquid versus salt system. Salt is up front costs, money saved over 5 years. Liquid and tablets is monthly expense spread over lifetime. 5 years = same same
 

BasilHayden

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1620085223576.png

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Sorry was busy this weekend with serious work stuff, saw your question and in short you need solar, yes the roof will be an issue but maybe not as big as you think depending on variables unknown at this time. Yes fix the pump schedule and get it away from the peak time of use windows.

For real info send me your contact info via PM and I will reach out. If you prefer general fuckery then I can recommend a number of companies.

Btw this car is unreal fast for being a tad under 60 years old. 1968 Ginetta G16, fast lap this weekend was 1:35.7 at Laguna Seca. Once we work the bugs out I honestly believe sub 1:30 is quite possible. Those who know, that is pretty amazing, especially for a car of this age and using a BMW M10 for power. The CanAm boys took notice.
 

Paradox

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Don’t know why anyone would purchase an A/C either when you can use dry ice in front of a fan. 😅😂
technology is only useless when those trying to use it don’t know what they’re doing.
or use a shitty unit.
5 years it’s a wash using tablets and liquid versus salt system. Salt is up front costs, money saved over 5 years. Liquid and tablets is monthly expense spread over lifetime. 5 years = same same

I went through two salt exchangers and neither lasted 5 years. About $900 each. Went with chlorine after the the 2nd one failed.
 

petie6464

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I went through two salt exchangers and neither lasted 5 years. About $900 each. Went with chlorine after the the 2nd one failed.

Technology, isn't needed when all you need is a $5.00 chlorine floater and a bucket of tabs that lasts over a year. . You can always tell a salesman when he's trying to sell you his high dollar snake oil by blowing smoke and waving mirrors. 🤡

You can't shit the old shitter.
 

CobraDave

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Technology, isn't needed when all you need is a $5.00 chlorine floater and a bucket of tabs that lasts over a year. . You can always tell a salesman when he's trying to sell you his high dollar snake oil by blowing smoke and waving mirrors. [emoji1782]

You can't shit the old shitter.

They are equal in price just paying at different times. Those tabs can add cyn and other fillers to your pool and create other problems. Snake oil it is not. Yeah Salt cells should last longer and it’s silly they cost soo much. But the convenance of steady chlorine where I am just confirming levels is nice. But if I had too salt cells go out in a short time period I could see myself being motivated to make a change.

I feel like I know what I am doing and can address issues myself. No pool guy will ever step foot on my property. Now the MellowyelloVector type, they are always welcome.


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Melloyellovector

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I went through two salt exchangers and neither lasted 5 years. About $900 each. Went with chlorine after the the 2nd one failed.

What salt system?

I am far from trying to sell anyone anything. I could give 2 shits about what people use to sanitize. Simply stating facts and real world knowledge of salt systems. They do absolutely work. All they do is convert salt to chlorine, chlorine dies back to salt. Never ending cycle. Salt cell has a life just like a light bulb. If ran at 100 percent it will last x amount of time. Get a 40k gal cell, Lower the output to 50-75% and it will last5 years plus.
Average pools are under 20kgallons. If you had a 15k cell and ran at max, and ran pump long filter cycles then yes it will go out before expected life span.
The times when salt systems wouldnt be beneficial. If pool is leaking salt dumps so your always chasing adding salt, system shutting down or not working. Fix the leak and problem solved
Other would be if you have a shit ton of kids using pool daily splashing water out like crazy. Problem will be salt loss, and salt deposits all over deck etc.
 
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Uncle Dave

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My experience with a salt system was that hard water caused more maintenance and shorter life of the cell and required slightly altered chems to keep acid demand in check, pretty sure I was using borates but its been so long I cant recall.

It started out about the same overall cost and my water caused it to be a little more intensive as the cell aged.

I never did get 5 years out of a cell, but about 3.5

I went back to standard chems and could get about a month out of 4 gallons of chlorine, and one gallon of acid.
 

rrrr

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minor. and i know you said you will be doing a clean up - but maybe throw a coat of spry paint on your PVC plumbing to help from it getting brittle

We had new fencing installed when we bought our house, and I had an enclosure built for the pool equipment. It's covered by corrugated PVC sheeting.

That was 23 years ago. The cover has helped preserve the equipment. The filter and pumps were replaced a couple of years ago, but the heater is 22 years old and still kicking. Right now it's not plumbed in. When the power failed during the freeze, I cut the piping and capped it so I could drain the heat exchanger before it could be damaged. I put in new gravel last week.

As for the fence, we have the preservative sealer and stain redone every three or four years. It's still in great condition. I'm amazed how many people around here spend $10-$15K for a new board on board cedar fence and do nothing to protect it. After five years those fences are irretrievably bleached out.

IMG_20210501_184913039_MP.jpg


IMG_20210501_185053590_MP.jpg
 
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rrrr

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View attachment 998753
View attachment 998752


Sorry was busy this weekend with serious work stuff, saw your question and in short you need solar, yes the roof will be an issue but maybe not as big as you think depending on variables unknown at this time. Yes fix the pump schedule and get it away from the peak time of use windows.

For real info send me your contact info via PM and I will reach out. If you prefer general fuckery then I can recommend a number of companies.

Btw this car is unreal fast for being a tad under 60 years old. 1968 Ginetta G16, fast lap this weekend was 1:35.7 at Laguna Seca. Once we work the bugs out I honestly believe sub 1:30 is quite possible. Those who know, that is pretty amazing, especially for a car of this age and using a BMW M10 for power. The CanAm boys took notice.

That's a badass little race car. Good luck this season, race safely.
 

rivermobster

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My experience with a salt system was that hard water caused more maintenance and shorter life of the cell and required slightly altered chems to keep acid demand in check, pretty sure I was using borates but its been so long I cant recall.

It started out about the same overall cost and my water caused it to be a little more intensive as the cell aged.

I never did get 5 years out of a cell, but about 3.5

I went back to standard chems and could get about a month out of 4 gallons of chlorine, and one gallon of acid.

Didn't your need for acid about double as well? That's the other draw back I've heard about those systems, they require a lot of acid. Doesn't really make much sense why.

*shrug*
 

Uncle Dave

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Didn't your need for acid about double as well? That's the other draw back I've heard about those systems, they require a lot of acid. Doesn't really make much sense why.

*shrug*

Thats what the borates (pretty sure ) did - cut the acid demand.
Otherwise yes.
 

Uncle Dave

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We had new fencing installed when we bought our house, and I had an enclosure built for the pool equipment. It's covered by corrugated PVC sheeting.

That was 23 years ago. The cover has helped preserve the equipment. The filter and pumps were replaced a couple of years ago, but the heater is 22 years old and still kicking. Right now it's not plumbed in. When the power failed during the freeze, I cut the piping and capped it so I could drain the heat exchanger before it could be damaged. I put in new gravel last week.

As for the fence, we have the preservative sealer and stain redone every three or four years. It's still in great condition. I'm amazed how many people around here spend $10-$15K for a new board on board cedar fence and do nothing to protect it. After five years those fences are irretrievably bleached out.

View attachment 998969

View attachment 998974


I loved my old raypack heater - zero downtime.

A diving board! love it. Pretty much all taken out in Cali due to legal.
 

rrrr

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I loved my old raypack heater - zero downtime.

A diving board! love it. Pretty much all taken out in Cali due to legal.

That end of the pool is 10½' deep. Back when the Roman Empire ruled the world and I wasn't a broken down old f*ck, I did a back flip off the roof into the deep end. I thought my wife was gonna kill me. 😁
 

Mr. C

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We had new fencing installed when we bought our house, and I had an enclosure built for the pool equipment. It's covered by corrugated PVC sheeting.

That was 23 years ago. The cover has helped preserve the equipment. The filter and pumps were replaced a couple of years ago, but the heater is 22 years old and still kicking. Right now it's not plumbed in. When the power failed during the freeze, I cut the piping and capped it so I could drain the heat exchanger before it could be damaged. I put in new gravel last week.

As for the fence, we have the preservative sealer and stain redone every three or four years. It's still in great condition. I'm amazed how many people around here spend $10-$15K for a new board on board cedar fence and do nothing to protect it. After five years those fences are irretrievably bleached out.

View attachment 998969

View attachment 998974

I’ve thought of covering mine with a roof type patio but just never got around to it. It secluded on 3 sides and all my equipment is 21 years old except the heater is new last year. Finally burnt it out. Lol.
image-2021-05-04-13:19:07-259.jpg

And I think it was you. I also add about a gallon of chlorine a week and a 1/4 gallon of acid. Twice a year I think I add a stabilizer.
Also chose no diving board. Insurance cost. It still went close to 10 ft in the deepend
View attachment 999009




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Melloyellovector

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Old school cell, if you paid 900 per cell each time you got screwed for sure. Obsolete now, when you could still get it,was 500 range Retail
the problem with old cells is they were limited on size. So yes they burnt out quicker. You couldn't get cells that truly handled 40k,60k gallons where you could operate at lower output levels and extend the life span of the cell.

there’s a misconception about life span, functionality, ph levels etc
salt systems convert salt (NaCl), into chlorine. salt cells, work by electrolysis. The salt water is electrically charged, which splits the salt molecules and generates chlorine (Cl) Salt water chlorine process produces an excess of hydroxyl ions,( raises ph ) byproduct of producing chlorine gas. thus requiring the addition of more acid ( to lower ph ) then a liquid maintained pool. With chemical automation, chlorine demand can be controlled to turn cell on and off as needed. And you can add acid feed system to automatically feed as needed. As far as pools with hard water issues that would effect/ kill old cells Prematurely. Most systems now have automatic reverse polarity that switches back and forth to kick calcium off the plates. With hard water yes you will need to clean cell more often. Like every 3 months or so. Literally just pour acid mix through the cell and done. All stuff your average service guy should handle and do on his own and include in the service. As far as life every cell has a known span. If ran at 100% it will last minimum of X amount of hours. Run that same cell at 50% and nearly double the life expectancy. Many people builders, service guys, and pool owners buy the less expensive cell because it’s cheaper. And like anything you get what you pay for. Now it has to be ran at 100% and run for 12 hours a day because it’s fighting to keep up with demand. Then 2 years later it’s this salt system sucks cut it out. It’s snake oil. No it’s you don’t know what your doing, your service guy didn’t know or just had bad advise.

Am I trying to sell anyone a salt system nope. If liquid or tablets or granular works for you and you like working on your pool every week. Then enjoy.
personally i want to enjoy, look and use only. I don’t want to clean or do shit. I attempt to build every pool with that same thought for end user.

your backyard looks pretty good for 16 years old. Still in style with current times. Nice
 

Paradox

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Old school cell, if you paid 900 per cell each time you got screwed for sure. Obsolete now, when you could still get it,was 500 range Retail
the problem with old cells is they were limited on size. So yes they burnt out quicker. You couldn't get cells that truly handled 40k,60k gallons where you could operate at lower output levels and extend the life span of the cell.

there’s a misconception about life span, functionality, ph levels etc
salt systems convert salt (NaCl), into chlorine. salt cells, work by electrolysis. The salt water is electrically charged, which splits the salt molecules and generates chlorine (Cl) Salt water chlorine process produces an excess of hydroxyl ions,( raises ph ) byproduct of producing chlorine gas. thus requiring the addition of more acid ( to lower ph ) then a liquid maintained pool. With chemical automation, chlorine demand can be controlled to turn cell on and off as needed. And you can add acid feed system to automatically feed as needed. As far as pools with hard water issues that would effect/ kill old cells Prematurely. Most systems now have automatic reverse polarity that switches back and forth to kick calcium off the plates. With hard water yes you will need to clean cell more often. Like every 3 months or so. Literally just pour acid mix through the cell and done. All stuff your average service guy should handle and do on his own and include in the service. As far as life every cell has a known span. If ran at 100% it will last minimum of X amount of hours. Run that same cell at 50% and nearly double the life expectancy. Many people builders, service guys, and pool owners buy the less expensive cell because it’s cheaper. And like anything you get what you pay for. Now it has to be ran at 100% and run for 12 hours a day because it’s fighting to keep up with demand. Then 2 years later it’s this salt system sucks cut it out. It’s snake oil. No it’s you don’t know what your doing, your service guy didn’t know or just had bad advise.

Am I trying to sell anyone a salt system nope. If liquid or tablets or granular works for you and you like working on your pool every week. Then enjoy.
personally i want to enjoy, look and use only. I don’t want to clean or do shit. I attempt to build every pool with that same thought for end user.

your backyard looks pretty good for 16 years old. Still in style with current times. Nice

Yep. Perhaps. $800 and change (almost 9) including install and the excessive Ca. sales tax.

That said, our water is extremely hard and the pool fill and irrigation is a separate feed (by necessity) that doesn’t run through the softener. It hadn’t occurred to me that hard water was problematic but now that I think about it, it certainly makes sense.

I am (or at least was for many years) typically out of the house 12-14 hours a day working, along with most Saturdays if not out of town. As a result, I rely on a pool service since I don’t want to spend what free time I do have working on home exercises. The idea that the unit has to be (and should have been) flushed regularly probably would have expedited my decision to switch to chlorine.
 

Uncle Dave

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My wife had me talked into a pool. Then we started asking our friends what the electric bill was like.
Eff that noise!!! The electric bill makes the pool cost look cheap.

Running it isnt the problem - Not anymore - the old school fixed speed over powered pumps sucked juice like crazy. Lots were 2 HP about 1500-2000 watts continuous.
I can run my pool in la using 220 watts 10 hours a day or 2.2 KWH a day 35 cents or so. 1 400 watt panel can basically offset a pool now.

Not only does the new stuff run cheap - its quiet.

The problem/expense is keeping it warm.
Because if its cold you wont swim in and even if YOU swim in a cold pool chicks/wife wont and without that whats the point, I mean you guys are cool and all that but you know what Im sayin......
 
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