Is table salt ok

[Coach]

Hi, I am tired of paying $10-$13 a bag for salt, Sam's has it for $3.39 a bag for Morton table salt. I would think this is ok salt is salt but I want to make sure. Thanks for any help.

[CarlD]

Nope, it is iodized and you do NOT want that much iodine in your water. Must go for sun salt, even the kind they sell in Home Depot for water softeners is supposed to be OK.

[AnnaK]

Hi, I am tired of paying $10-$13 a bag for salt, Sam's has it for $3.39 a bag for Morton table salt. I would think this is ok salt is salt but I want to make sure. Thanks for any help.


You probably should shop around for a better price. Lowe's sells Diamond Crystal SOLAR Salt (http://tinyurl.com/269cuzn) for around $5 /40 pound bag—that's the stuff in the blue bag.

Table salt, even the non-iodized version, contains anti-caking agents, primarily silica. You could get kosher salt but that would get really expensive for use in a pool.

[poolbee]

I found pool salt at Wally this year for abut 6.00 a 40 lb. bag. It is finer and dissolves faster but I have used solar salt in the past.

[waterbear]

Table salt is NOT ok. Table salt contains yellow prussiate of soda (Sodium Ferrocyanide -- an iron salt) as an anti caking agent and it can and will cause iron stains.
Use solar salt or salt pellets made for water softeners. Much cheaper than pool salt and often purer!
Personally, I use either Morton or Diamond Crystal solar salt (about $5/40 lb bag).
It's much faster dissolving than the pellets. Almost as fast dissolving as the much more expensive pool salt! Then again, does it really matter that much if the salt dissolves in 1 hour or 3 hours? It will still take a full day of circulation to really mix it throughout the water!

[Poolsean]

not to be difficult or argumentative, but the amount of iron in the YPS (Yellow Prussiate of Soda) is so minimal that although there is a slight chance of staining, it would be due to the salt not being stirred around to dissolve. If it sits on the bottom of the pool without being stirred around, there is a potential staining that may occur. However, stain remover will help get rid of it.

My reason for saying this is that for YEARS before there was "Pool Salt", guess what salt we used? Food Grade Table/Granular salt with YPS!

[waterbear]

not to be difficult or argumentative, but the amount of iron in the YPS (Yellow Prussiate of Soda) is so minimal that although there is a slight chance of staining, it would be due to the salt not being stirred around to dissolve.

Sean,
As you are most likely aware, fiberglass pools are VERY prone to iron staining so the use of table salt in a fiberglass pool can definitely lead to stains with even just a small amount of iron in the water so I would be cautious with a fiberglass pool.
Plaster and vinyl are much less prone to metal stains unless the water chemistry is off.

When did the industry make the switch from table salt to water softener salt, btw (since most manufacturers of SWGs now recommend the use of water softener salt and caution against table salt)?

[manicmndy]

I found 40lb. bags Morton's pool salt at our Local Sam's for $5

[CarlD]

Sean, Evan: I thought the iodine in table salt was the real problem. It's ok and necessary in a little bit of seasoning but is seriously problematic with an SWCG.

[waterbear]

Sean, Evan: I thought the iodine in table salt was the real problem. It's ok and necessary in a little bit of seasoning but is seriously problematic with an SWCG.

Never heard of iodine being a problem and there really is a minisucle amount in iodized salt.
POOL CARE HISTORY ALERT:
In fact, back in the 60s and 70s some companies (Biolab comes to mind) were experimenting with Iodine for pool sanitation (it is related to chlorine and bromine after all) but they ran into some problems and abandoned the research. I do believe that a commercial product did appear on the market for a very short time, however.
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cgi/reprint/52/7/1179.pdf
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1915259/
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cgi/reprint/60/3/535.pdf