Soft(r) salt?

[Sumo1]

I've heard from individuals and read references here about the low cost of salt at Lowe's but when I went to buy it, all they had was coarse-grained salt labeled for water softeners. Is that ok to use? The salt I've used previously was "pool salt" and was very finely ground(@ $8.00/bag!). Other than the 'dissolve rate', is there any difference or are there any special words to watch for on the label? Thanks
Hal

[Sardian]

Other than the desolve rate I don't think there is a difference. I buy all mine at lowes (the blue bag) and dump it in the pool and brush it around a little to get it to desolve.

It works fine for me and it didn't change my water chemistry at all that I can tell.

Russell

[waterbear]

AS long as the salt is at least 99.5% pure and has no additives for removing iron or cleaning the water softener it is fine to use. I use solar salt because it dissolves almost as fast as pool salt, which has smaller crystals. You can even use pellets which tent to be 99.8% pure but they take a bit longer to dissolve. You do NOT want to use food grade salt because the anti-caking agent they put in it to keep it from clumping contains iron and can stain your pool. The main difference between pool salt and softener salt is the size of the crystals but I find that pool salt tends to cake into a large brick in the bag in the humidity here in Florida so it really doesn't dissovle any faster than the larger crystal salt!

[Sumo1]

I've never heard of solar salt. What else is it used for and where do you buy it(what type of store)? Cost per bag?
Hal

[waterbear]

I've never heard of solar salt. What else is it used for and where do you buy it(what type of store)? Cost per bag?
Hal
It is water softener salt that is not in pellet or block form but in crystal form and is NOT rock salt, which it too impure to use in a SWG. It will say solar salt on the bag. Both Morton and Diamond Crystal have solar salt. The Diamond Crystal comes in a blue bag. They also have 'Sun Gems' which is a larger crystal solar salt in a yellow bag. I pay about 4 dollars and change for a 40 lb bag (the 80 lb bag is cheaper by pound but hard to lift). You can buy it at hardware stores, grocery stores, Home Depot, Lowes, etc.

[NWMNMom]

We picked up the Morton solar salt for $3.70 for 40# bags last year. It dissolves pretty darn fast. We were some of those that have non SWG pools with salt in them.

[iwannapool]

If you don't have a SWG why do you add salt? Just curious.

[NWMNMom]

We had this seemingly large scale experiment last year regarding the correlation of pool salinity and comfort levels in the pool, skin/hair damage, etc. Surprisingly, we found that there was a noticable difference in all those areas with very negligable or no differences in the other pool chemistry issues (chlorine use, ph issues, etc) There were a lot of numbers posted on exact levels, which I am not qualified to even try to quote, but the end result was that it made the water feel really nice, hair and skin condition were improved over chlorine alone and there were no noticable problems with damage, corrosion or increased chemical needs or cleaning problems.

And I do need to correct my earlier post, the cost was $3.27 #40 bag - we used 3 for our pool and were leaning towards another. Cheap enough I would say for increased comfort. REALLY noticable comfort - especially for my teenagers, who enjoy swimming underwater with eyes open lol

[iwannapool]

So ballpark wise that's about 750 ppm of salt which is 1/4 of what a typical SWG pool has. I guess a little salt does a lot of good.

[NWMNMom]

Thats sounds about right. We really did see the difference so will be doing it again this year, but I'm thinking another #40.