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This is my 3rd season of being a pool owner. In the last 2 years we have run the filter 24hr a day. My husband would like to save on electricity and wants to put the filter on a timer. How many hours a day do you all run your filter? Is it best to run it several hours twice a day or all at once?
There's a calculation somewhere in one of the threads so that you can determine how many hours it would take your pump to move the entire volume of your pool water through it. You want to run your pump at least twice that time. For me that was 8 hours total so I run the pump 4 hours in the late morning into early afternoon then late afternoon into early evening. That way if I add chemicals at the end of the day, they get circulated. Do whatever works best for you.
Most pools require 1 to 2 turnovers per day. What is turnover?
Turnover is the time it takes for the volume of the pool to run through the pump once. However, this does not mean that all of the water has gone through the pump. Some water goes through once, some twice and some not at all. To determine turnover rate:
First, determine the head loss for your plumbing. It is usually between 45-65 feet of head. If you want a better estimate, take your filter PSI and multiply this by 2.31. If you do not have a vacuum gauge, add about 10' of head for suction head. Otherwise, multiple the vacuum (in. mg.) by 1.13 to get suction head. Add return head and suction head to get total head.
Second, look up the the flow rate from the pump head curve that is usually in the manual. The vertical axis is head loss and the horizontal axis is GPM.
Third, use the formula turnover (hrs) = Pool Volume (gallons) / (gpm * 60)
Yes, it is usually a good idea to split the filtering time into two parts evenly distributed within a 24 hr period.
My turnover is about 4 hours and I have solar so I run my pump 4-6 hours during the hottest part of the day to take advantage of the sun and skip the night cycle.