Can anybody tell me what my GPM is for my equipment?

[mastamoon]

Hey All,

Pump is a PE71-II-V (1.5HP SPL) 3450 RPM, I believe this http://www.speck-pumps.com/other/html/usa/pool%20products/E71.html is the pump, if you click the link on the right for "performance data" you can see the curves.

Filter is a Clear Water "High Rate Sand Filter" by Waterway. 22" round. MAX GPM is listed as 55, MAX Working Pressure is 35 PSI.

Clean filter pressure is about 10-12PSI, 1.5" flexy hose throughout. The few posts I found online says the Total Head in Feet for those specs should be around 45, and that lines up at 55 GPM. But those charts are based off of 3500 RPM, I doubt 50 RPM more makes a huge difference in GPM.

The reason I ask is I was thinking about picking up a "Slime Bag" to collect some algae that's on the bottom of my pool. I vacuumed a lot of it out to waste this weekend, but had to stop every 10 minutes to put water in the pool which took an hour or more to replenish. So I would like to try the 18"x30" X-tra Polishing Pool Vacuum Bag shown here http://www.cleanerpools.net/slimebag.php , and the specs show the max GPM it can handle is 60 GPM so I want to be sure it will "work" for me.

Looks like I will probably be fine but wanted to double check before spending over 50 bucks on this and finding out it wont work.

Thanks!

[mas985]

Without a suction measurement, it would be hard to say what the exact flow rate would be. I assume that you have a valve on the return line? Adjust the valve until you see about 20 PSI filter pressure and you can be assured that the flow rate is below 60 GPM.

[mastamoon]

I dont have any valves installed, though I have 2 waiting to be installed so maybe Ill do that first and adjust as recommended.

I ordered the Slime Bag regardless. I really need to get this crap outta my pool.

[PoolDoc]

Please let us know how well it works -- good, bad, or indifferent! Please!

(And pictures would be wonderful!)

[mastamoon]

Slime Bag and new 30' vacuum hose has been delivered. Hope to test them out this weekend.

PoolDoc, ill try and snap some before/after pictures.

[Watermom]

You can either post the pictures by way of Photobucket, Picasa, Flicker, etc. or email them to poolforum@gmail.com and reference the URL of this thread.

[PoolDoc]

PoolDoc, ill try and snap some before/after pictures.

Thanks!!

[mastamoon]

Update:

I finally got around to using the Slimebag to vacuum my pool. I hooked it up to the backwash/waste port and ran the hose to back into the pool. At first everything seemed great, I was finally going to have a clean pool floor! But about half way through I noticed the outside of the bag turning brown/green and slowly a greenish cloud started emanating from the bag. I figured it was still probably better than nothing so I quickly finished the rest of the pool.

The next hurdle/letdown was taking the bag out of the pool and seeing dark green water dump into the pool. I had read beforehand that people would end up trying to put a garbage bag around the slimebag before removing it from the pool. I suppose I will try that next time, but Ill have to be sure somebody is around to help me try and pull a garbage bag full of pool water out of the pool, I imagine it will be heavy.

The inside of the bag was disgusting! Lots of bits and pieces of debris and a dark green/brown sludge in the crease of the bottom of the bag. I washed it out pretty well by spraying the outside of the bag and watching the green water and debris drain. Cant get it totally clean however.

Knowing that it would take a day or so before I could actually see if I got most of the crap out of my pool, the spotless bottom of my pool made me happy but knew it would be short lived. A day later I was right. Although I would say it was MUCH cleaner than before, much cleaner than it would have been vacuuming normally into the filter.. plenty of crap ended up settling out of the water onto the bottom again.

So I guess this weekend I will vacuum again with it and see if it can handle whats left and try and get the bag out without it draining dirty water back into the pool. Although over the past few days, my pool water level is over the top of the skimmer so I was thinking I might just vacuum to waste as much as I can, I just hate wasting that much water knowing I might have to just put more water in if we go through another drought here in NJ.

I'm really tired an frustrated dealing with this pool. Costing me an arm and a leg in chemicals (buying like 10 3/4 gallon bottles of bleach a week) and still not able to just have a clean pool. Although I have the levels under control, it still stinks having people come over and letting them see a dirty pool.

Pictures.. well I'm sorry to say that I didn't get a good before/after shot. By the time I remembered I wanted some, I was half way done. The pictures I did take don't show my issues with the bottom of the pool or the bag all that well but here they are.

https://dl.dropbox.com.KILLED/u/13144052/2012-08-04%2013.14.02.jpg
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-5sgrgfQV6-E/UCE5BwBqjHI/AAAAAAAAD2A/HvtPzlP_rFk/s800/web%25202012-08-04%252013.14.02.jpg

https://dl.dropbox.com.KILLED/u/13144052/2012-08-04%2013.14.19.jpg
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-B4I4C4v7RK4/UCE5CII419I/AAAAAAAAD2I/oJSzwWUpLDU/s800/web%25202012-08-04%252013.14.19.jpg

https://dl.dropbox.com.KILLED/u/13144052/2012-08-04%2013.14.27.jpg
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-aNYvkqQGwZE/UCE5B7vdz6I/AAAAAAAAD2E/k1Zm8hjEIyI/s400/web%25202012-08-04%252013.14.27.jpg - https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-2Hsgfb9d718/UCE5CY8qFbI/AAAAAAAAD2Y/bJ9zAhqgmNg/s400/web%25202012-08-04%252013.14.30.jpg

https://dl.dropbox.com.KILLED/u/13144052/2012-08-04%2013.14.30.jpg

[PoolDoc]

It's not completely clear to me: do you feel like the slime bag was worth it?

[mastamoon]

It did keep my pool cleaner than it would have been if I would have vacuumed normally into the sand filter. But isn't the perfect solution. Having cloudy water billow out of it when it gets dirty and having green water spill back into the pool when you try to get the bag out means having to do it again. Lets say it got 90% of the stuff out this time around. 10% back in the pool.. next time I use it i get 90% of the 10% out, leaving the remainder in the pool... as you can tell, I don't think it will every fully get my pool clean. Or maybe now that only 10% remains, the cleaned bag will handle the load better? Time will tell.

I think I will vacuum to waste without the bag until the water level gets low then finish with the bag if necessary.

[mas985]

My concern would be why you have green anything coming out of your filter. That seems like it could be live algae which is a problem for any filter/slim bag unless of course you kill it first. What are the FC, CC and CYA levels?

[mastamoon]

My concern would be why you have green anything coming out of your filter. That seems like it could be live algae which is a problem for any filter/slim bag unless of course you kill it first. What are the FC, CC and CYA levels?

I had an algae bloom a few months back. Ive been fighting to get it out of the pool ever since. It seems the dead algae settles on the floor and other algae form around it.

My CYA is in the mid 50's, FC I keep around 5-6, and when I get that level, I usually add 2 3/4 jugs of Walmart bleach, then let it fall again. Currently not using any tablets. CC is 0. PH is 7.4 - 7.6.