New SWG, salt levels

[Big H]

Hi Guys,

I just installed an aquatrol swg for my a/g 24'. I added salt as per the table, roughly 360 lbs for a 14,400 gal pool. My salt reading is steady at 4100. It has stayed level for about a week. Is 4100 too high of a salt reading? I know I should be in the 3200-3400 range. Will 4100 cause any problems, other than a saltier tasting pool? Do I need to drain and refill to drop the level? Thank you very much in advance for your help.:)

[waste]

Hi Guys,

I just installed an aquatrol swg for my a/g 24'. I added salt as per the table, roughly 360 lbs for a 14,400 gal pool. My salt reading is steady at 4100. It has stayed level for about a week. Is 4100 too high of a salt reading? I know I should be in the 3200-3400 range. Will 4100 cause any problems, other than a saltier tasting pool? Do I need to drain and refill to drop the level? Thank you very much in advance for your help.:)

Big H, welcome to the forum! I'm just a guy who installs and works on these systems, so I'm not the 'go to' guy for whether you'll damage the unit by running it with high salt. However, the manufaturers manual I've got says to partially drain , and refill @ salt levels over 3600 ppm. I believe that it has to do with voltage passing through the unit (or maybe conductivity) at the higher salt levels that may shorten the cell's life. If it is feasable for you to do a partial drain and refill, I'd say that's the best way to go.
*** Here's the 'dirty little secret" -- most pool guys estimate the gallonage for any given pool (yeah, we've got formulas, but at some point in the calculating, numbers get rounded off and some people are better at it than others). Whoever told you that you have a 14,400 gal pool was either going on past experience with similar pools or over estimated one of the perameters of yours (in fairness, I strongly doubt that there was any 'malice aforethought'). As a result, whenever I need to do an initial salt dose for a SWG, I always add 50 - 100 lbs less than the salt chart says I need for that gallonage pool. You can always add more - getting it back out isn't as easy, as you are finding out :( .

[Big H]

Thanks for the info. I figured the pool volume using Michael's bleach calc. It is a 24' round by 52" deep. I am going to drain and refill starting tonight. I am using my city water to fill the pool. I made the assumption that my fill water was 0 salt. You what happens when you assume... I do not have a salt test kit, but I think that there may be some salt in my fill water. My control unit only goes down to 2600 ppm or so.

Harold

[mas985]

I have an Aqualogic unit that turns itself off if the salt level is too high or too low to protect the cell. You might want to check with your manufacture to see if they have the same feature.

[KPROMERO]

Big H, Check the size of your pool again. If it says it is 52'' deep in reality it will only be 48'' deep since you do not fill pool all the way to top which will say that you have more gallons of water then reality.

[waste]

Big H, Check the size of your pool again. If it says it is 52'' deep in reality it will only be 48'' deep since you do not fill pool all the way to top which will say that you have more gallons of water then reality.

Good catch, the highth of the walls is usually greater than the water depth!

Another note for AG pools is the cove at the bottom of the wall where it joins the floor - not a lot of water admittedly, but a little off on a few calculations could mean the difference for dosing purposes.