School me on salt water pools

STXDriver98544 · Jun 29, 2018

Another thing to keep in mind is the salt spray and how it will affect everything around it. My parents had one and it deteriorates furniture and surrounding things the same way it would if you owned a beach house. The spray even made it's way into the garage and rusted shelves and whatever it could get to. So keep in mind as to what is around the pool that will be exposed to the spray. I'm sure the distance of the pool from the house has a lot to do with how bad it would be. If you have let's say a couple acres and put the pool a good ways out in the yard it probably wouldn't be as bad.

03cobra#694 · Jun 29, 2018

STXDriver98544 said:
Another thing to keep in mind is the salt spray and how it will affect everything around it. My parents had one and it deteriorates furniture and surrounding things the same way it would if you owned a beach house. The spray even made it's way into the garage and rusted shelves and whatever it could get to. So keep in mind as to what is around the pool that will be exposed to the spray. I'm sure the distance of the pool from the house has a lot to do with how bad it would be. If you have let's say a couple acres and put the pool a good ways out in the yard it probably wouldn't be as bad.

Wrong, the salt concentration isn't that high compared to the oceans. I've been on salt for 15 years.

STXDriver98544 · Jun 29, 2018

I'm just going off of experience of what I saw, my dad maintained it instead of a pool company. They switched back to chlorine and everything stopped deteriorating, if it's not that high compared to the ocean is it possible to put too much salt in them or does the system regulate it for you?

DaleM · Jun 29, 2018

STXDriver98544 said:
I'm just going off of experience of what I saw, my dad maintained it instead of a pool company. They switched back to chlorine and everything stopped deteriorating, if it's not that high compared to the ocean is it possible to put too much salt in them or does the system regulate it for you?

You can put in too much salt. Most salt cells just shut off as not to ruin them. The only way to get the ppms down is to partially drain the pool and fill with fresh water.

03cobra#694 · Jun 29, 2018

I build and design this crap. A lot of them a year. I’m VP and head sales of a big builder in our area.

rdvenom99 · Jun 29, 2018

I've had a salt pool since the beginning of 2017 and love it. I didn't know what I was doing in the beginning with my cheapo test kit and something got in the water that was eating chlorine like mad. I had my chlorine generator at 100% for 10 hours a day and cl was still at 0-1ppm. I had to shock the pool constantly keeping the cl level at 20+ppm for 6 days straight before it could pass the overnight test and not lose 2ppm cl. Get a good test kit, recommend Taylor K-2006, keep your stabilizer level at 70-80ppm, cl around 7ppm, and ph between 7.4-7.8 and you will be set. I check my level once a week and usually just need to add a bit of acid to lower ph some. Only chems I need to keep on hand are stabilizer and muriatic acid. Also have a couple bags of salt for when we get a lot of rain and I need to drain water. Troublefreepool.com is a great resource if you need any help.

Equalbracket · Jun 30, 2018

STXDriver98544 said:
Another thing to keep in mind is the salt spray and how it will affect everything around it. My parents had one and it deteriorates furniture and surrounding things the same way it would if you owned a beach house. The spray even made it's way into the garage and rusted shelves and whatever it could get to. So keep in mind as to what is around the pool that will be exposed to the spray. I'm sure the distance of the pool from the house has a lot to do with how bad it would be. If you have let's say a couple acres and put the pool a good ways out in the yard it probably wouldn't be as bad.

Mine is 3000 PPM vs what 30k+ for actual salt water. Only time there is ever spray is if the skimmer's tail gets lodged in a rock and it doesn't deteriorate anything quicker then tap water from my personal experience. Both the pool and the hot tub would get used a lot less if they were chlorine systems.

STAMPEDE3 · Jul 3, 2018

STXDriver98544 said:
I'm just going off of experience of what I saw, my dad maintained it instead of a pool company. They switched back to chlorine and everything stopped deteriorating, if it's not that high compared to the ocean is it possible to put too much salt in them or does the system regulate it for you?

My shit deteriorated much more and faster when I was chlorine only.
Which reminds me, my cell is on its last leg, time to shell out $600 again. lol

Cost as someone else said before balances out over a 3-5 year period. Salt is much easier to maintain IMO until shit goes bad. lol
When it gets out of whack it is out of whack.

Junior00 · Jul 3, 2018

Psssh, my cells run about 82k each iirc and I’ve got 3 of ‘em.

lilcoop03 · Aug 20, 2018

Bump! So I'm in the new house and have been slowly learning the pool.. Its been hot as hell lately in SC and I've been having to add water to the pool daily to keep the water level high enough to go into the skimmer... I've also had to add about 120lbs of salt to it in the last week as the low salt light alarm was going off on the cell..

How often is often enough to run the pump? Looking to save on electricity costs of course... Read online that a good rule of thumb is 1 hour a day for every 10 degrees F in temperature...So if its 90 degrees out, it should run for 9 hours... And it should be running during the day when its hot and be off at night. Does that sound right? Can I get away with less? I believe it is 36,000 gallons..

Id also like to talk about closing the pool for the winter vs keeping it open if you guys can chime in on that.

Thanks!

DaleM · Aug 20, 2018

lilcoop03 said:
Bump! So I'm in the new house and have been slowly learning the pool.. Its been hot as hell lately in SC and I've been having to add water to the pool daily to keep the water level high enough to go into the skimmer... I've also had to add about 120lbs of salt to it in the last week as the low salt light alarm was going off on the cell..

How often is often enough to run the pump? Looking to save on electricity costs of course... Read online that a good rule of thumb is 1 hour a day for every 10 degrees F in temperature...So if its 90 degrees out, it should run for 9 hours... And it should be running during the day when its hot and be off at night. Does that sound right? Can I get away with less? I believe it is 36,000 gallons..

Id also like to talk about closing the pool for the winter vs keeping it open if you guys can chime in on that.

Thanks!

Uh oh. If the salt cell is bad or needs replacement the ppms will read incorrectly. You can end up chasing the salt.

Get some test strips just to start out and get a baseline reading before relying on the digital reading from the pool monitor.

Me with a mop is like a frog riding a bicycle.

rdvenom99 · Aug 20, 2018

lilcoop03 said:
Bump! So I'm in the new house and have been slowly learning the pool.. Its been hot as hell lately in SC and I've been having to add water to the pool daily to keep the water level high enough to go into the skimmer... I've also had to add about 120lbs of salt to it in the last week as the low salt light alarm was going off on the cell..

How often is often enough to run the pump? Looking to save on electricity costs of course... Read online that a good rule of thumb is 1 hour a day for every 10 degrees F in temperature...So if its 90 degrees out, it should run for 9 hours... And it should be running during the day when its hot and be off at night. Does that sound right? Can I get away with less? I believe it is 36,000 gallons..

Id also like to talk about closing the pool for the winter vs keeping it open if you guys can chime in on that.

Thanks!

You should not need to add salt to the pool unless you are draining water like after a lot of rain. If you are adding water daily and the salt level is showing low on the SWG then you need to get the water tested for accurate salt level. If you have way too much in there currently, which you might now, the only way to get rid of it is to drain the pool some and add fresh water. If your pH has been high >7.8 you can have scaling built up on your SWG cell and that can cause an inaccurate salt reading. Pull it off and take a look at that as well. If there's a lot you can try cleaning it off with a high power hose water spray or if that doesn't work soak in 1cup acid/ 5 cup water solution for a few minutes to dissolve it. Don't want to leave it in too long or can damage the cell surface.

That seems a bit excessive to need to add water daily like that I would make sure you don't have any leaks somewhere. When the rain stops here I usually need to add water maybe once a week at the most.

You only need to run your pump long enough to cycle all the pool water at least once and be able to keep the CL level in the correct range. This will depend on how large your pool is, how fast your pump is pumping water, and the ability of your SWG to keep it chlorinated. I run mine about 7 hours a day with the SWG at 65% in the summer and pump at 2300rpm.

lilcoop03 · Aug 21, 2018

rdvenom99 said:
You should not need to add salt to the pool unless you are draining water like after a lot of rain. If you are adding water daily and the salt level is showing low on the SWG then you need to get the water tested for accurate salt level. If you have way too much in there currently, which you might now, the only way to get rid of it is to drain the pool some and add fresh water. If your pH has been high >7.8 you can have scaling built up on your SWG cell and that can cause an inaccurate salt reading. Pull it off and take a look at that as well. If there's a lot you can try cleaning it off with a high power hose water spray or if that doesn't work soak in 1cup acid/ 5 cup water solution for a few minutes to dissolve it. Don't want to leave it in too long or can damage the cell surface.

That seems a bit excessive to need to add water daily like that I would make sure you don't have any leaks somewhere. When the rain stops here I usually need to add water maybe once a week at the most.

You only need to run your pump long enough to cycle all the pool water at least once and be able to keep the CL level in the correct range. This will depend on how large your pool is, how fast your pump is pumping water, and the ability of your SWG to keep it chlorinated. I run mine about 7 hours a day with the SWG at 65% in the summer and pump at 2300rpm.

I took a sample out this morning and will go have it tested on my way home from work today. The previous owner had it running 11 or 12 hours a day and I just think that's excessive. I set the timer this morning for it to run from 10am to 6:30pm and we will see how that goes. It is a Hayward 1.5 HP pump and it says it runs as 3450rpm for what its worth. I will also ask the local pool place about me having to add water to it so often and see what they say. There is no visual indicator of any type of leaks anywhere..

DaleM · Aug 21, 2018

lilcoop03 said:
I took a sample out this morning and will go have it tested on my way home from work today. The previous owner had it running 11 or 12 hours a day and I just think that's excessive. I set the timer this morning for it to run from 10am to 6:30pm and we will see how that goes. It is a Hayward 1.5 HP pump and it says it runs as 3450rpm for what its worth. I will also ask the local pool place about me having to add water to it so often and see what they say. There is no visual indicator of any type of leaks anywhere..

1/4 to 1/2 inch daily loss is considered normal.

Me with a mop is like a frog riding a bicycle.

lilcoop03 · Aug 21, 2018

DaleM said:
1/4 to 1/2 inch daily loss is considered normal.

Me with a mop is like a frog riding a bicycle.

I think I'm losing about an inch a day

DaleM · Aug 21, 2018

lilcoop03 said:
I think I'm losing about an inch a day

Is the pool used a lot? Heavy useage also contributes to losses.

There is a simple "bucket test" you can do at home. It basically shows what your daily evaporation is in the bucket and compares that with drop in pool level.

1inch a day sounds excessive at first look. Time to start digging a little deeper.

Me with a mop is like a frog riding a bicycle.

lilcoop03 · Aug 21, 2018

DaleM said:
Is the pool used a lot? Heavy useage also contributes to losses.

There is a simple "bucket test" you can do at home. It basically shows what your daily evaporation is in the bucket and compares that with drop in pool level.

1inch a day sounds excessive at first look. Time to start digging a little deeper.

Me with a mop is like a frog riding a bicycle.

Its used almost daily but no excessive splashing or getting in/out removing water from it. I'm going to mark the level with tape tonight when the pump turns off and see what the level is in the morning.

03cobra#694 · Aug 21, 2018

Do a bucket test like Dale said.
Fill a bucket with pool water and mark it and set it on the top step. Also mark the water level in the pool.
If they both go down the same, evaporation. If the pool goes down, but the bucket doesn't you have a leak.
The evaporation may be more up there because you don't have pool cages.

ford fanatic · Aug 21, 2018

Too many variables for us to know how long to run your pump to keep the pool clear, and to generate enough chlorine.

I'll say this again, get yourself a good test kit, know what's going on in your water. Stay out of the pool stores and don't waste your time with test strips. I recommend this kit TF-100 Test Kit ™ and get the salt water test kit K-1766 Taylor Salt Test

Do some reading on this site, you won't need to go anywhere else Trouble Free Pool

Start up and closing... Swimming Pool Start-up and Closing

Stanley · Aug 21, 2018

There is more info on the TFP forum then you will need. I've been using the TF-100 kit as well for a long time and also recommend it.

School me on salt water pools

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