The pool is up to speed

I recently had some work done on the pool pumps to increase the pumping, filtration, and heating efficiency.  This was important because commercial code for pool operation is to turn the total volume of the water over four times a day.  This means the pool pumps run constantly.  The more efficiently they can run the less operational cost there is to operate the pool.

The first step that was done a few months ago was to install variable speed pumps.  The pump motors on these units are controlled by a computer and can be slowed down so the pump consumes less electricity.   For example, the pool filtration pump runs now at close to 2/3 speed but consumes 1/5 of the electricity it would at full speed.  All the while providing enough flow to get the proper filtration.

 

Here is the computer display for the variable speed pump running at full speed.  Pay attention to the Watts, or amount of electricity consumed.  At this motor speed the pump is providing way more flow that in necessary for proper filtration.  Thus unnecessarily costing more money to operate.



Here is the same pump running at approximately 2/3 speed.  Notice the significant reduction in Wattage consumed.  The pump is using almost 1/5 the electricity while still providing enough flow to properly filter the pool water. 



 

In pool filtration, it's all about flow and not pressure. To increase the efficiency of the filtration I also had the four old filters replaced with two new high flow filters.

old filters

 

new filters - two new ones replace the capacity of the 4 old ones

 

This is the contractor who did the work, Stan from Caribbean Pools.  Here he's plumbing the spaghetti maze of pipes to all the new hardware.  Stan did a great job getting all of the old stuff removed and the new stuff installed correctly.  I was a tight fit for some of the job!

Lastly, Stan also re-plumbed the heaters for the pool.  We have two heaters, one electric and one gas.  It is more cost efficient to keep constant heat with an electric heater.  If you want instantaneous heat, say for a hot tub, it is more cost efficient to heat the water with a gas heater.  If you look at the plumbing between the two heaters you can see that they are connected.  The water goes in and out of the one on the left (the electric) and in and out the one on the right (the gas).  I had Stan plumb the heaters in series like this so we have a primary and a secondary back-up.  The electric heater on the left is the primary heater.  It is the first to come on and heats the water.  If the electric can not keep up with the heating demand, the gas heater will turn on and supply the additional required heating capacity to bring the pool up to temperature. 

The overall goal of the project was to reduce cost and improve performance.  With the cost savings in electricity alone, this entire project should pay for itself in less than a year.

Soap suds

One of the hardest things to do when spraying something is to make sure you get good coverage, without doubling up on the edges. That means you need to know where the edge of your spray pattern is. There's three ways of knowing where the edge of your pattern is...1) if there's dew on the ground you can see you tire tracks or the product you are spraying will knock the dew off of the leaf blade 2) you can dye the spray solution so the spray mix will sort of "paint" the ground 3) you can use a foam marker to identify the edge of the spray pattern. An example of the dew trick and the foam marker is in the picture below.

The dew trick really is the best since there's no extra cost to it. The negative of the dew trick is that it doesn't work very well past 9 o'clock when the sun is up and roaring burning off the dew. The spray dye indicator is a good one to use, but sometimes it gets on shoes or golf balls and people think the world is being poisoned. The best one is the foam markers because it's cheap, harmless and disappears so you'll never know something has been sprayed (unless you see the foam).

The foam is basically good 'ol fashioned soap suds. So the next time you see this white marshmallow looking stuff on the ground don't worry. It's not some sort of toxic puss oozing out of the ground. It's just an environmentally friendly way for my team to make sure they are correctly applying whatever they are spraying.