Any advantages?

Are there any real advantages to higher turn over rates?

I have an Intex 637R rated at 1000GPH free flow. I understand that when the filter and corrugated tubing is figured in, this rate drops significantly, best quick guestimate would put it somewhere between 400 - 600 GPH. With my pool being somewhere between 4.2K and 4.5K gallons, this puts the turn over rate at about 8 hours.

What I'd like to know is if there is any real advantage to a higher turn over rate, as in 3 - 4 hour.

I think this could be achieved by reducing the restrictions in the plumbing, by going to a 1.5" PVC system, with only short sections of corrugated at the pool wall and pump. My gesstimate would be given the restrictions of the remaining corrugated, and turns (ells) in the plumbing should bring it somewhere between 600 - 800 GPH. Giving a turn over around 5 hours.

I will probably have to buy a better pump anyway, as I am planning to add solar heating next year as well. Knowing that the 637R would not be able to drive the additional restrictions of the solar, I would still need to put in a more robust plumbing system.

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Originally Posted by Charlie_R

Are there any real advantages to higher turn over rates

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Depends on what you are talking about.

If you achieve a faster turnover with a bigger pump, then there is a disadvantage in energy use. It will cost more for a turnover than a smaller pump.

However, if you reduce head loss as you are proposing, then there CAN be an advantage depending on how you change the pump run time. Reducing head loss increases flow rate but it also increases energy use although not as much as flow rate. So to take advantage of this, you must reduce the pump run time. Otherwise, you may turnover the pool more often but you will also pay for it.

Depending on the filter size, sometimes higher flow rates can result in poorer filtering.

Skimmers usually work better at higher flow rates as long as the surface water velocity is not so high that debris just runs past the skimmer.

Lastly, with higher rates, you can usually run more water features but I suspect that is not a concern of yours.

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Originally Posted by mas985

Depends on what you are talking about.

If you achieve a faster turnover with a bigger pump, then there is a disadvantage in energy use. It will cost more for a turnover than a smaller pump.

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I do expect a slightly higher energy use, with either this pump or a larger one. I may be crazy, but cost wise I'm going to have to stick with Intex gear. I don't think I can justify a pump and filter that costs more than the pool did.

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However, if you reduce head loss as you are proposing, then there CAN be an advantage depending on how you change the pump run time. Reducing head loss increases flow rate but it also increases energy use although not as much as flow rate. So to take advantage of this, you must reduce the pump run time. Otherwise, you may turnover the pool more often but you will also pay for it.

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Yes, this is what I'm trying to do. The instructions that came with the pump even state that I would need to run this pump for 8 hours to achieve 1 turnover, using the supplied hoses etc. This is where I came up with the numbers. 4400 gal pool / 8 hr run for 1 turnover = 500 - 600 GPH. close to half the "rated" volume of the pump.

So, if I reduce the head loss, I possibly gain in filtration capacity, as long as I DON'T use the Intex carts. For next season I will be purchasing the Unicel carts, and keeping them rotated through the cleaning buckets.

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Depending on the filter size, sometimes higher flow rates can result in poorer filtering.

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This is one of the things I'm concerned about. If I need to come up with a multi cart system to give me more surface area, and thus lower overall flow rate through each filter, I can do that with materials on hand here.

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Skimmers usually work better at higher flow rates as long as the surface water velocity is not so high that debris just runs past the skimmer.

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This is something I hadn't figured. Shows what I don't know, and haven't guessed at yet.

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Lastly, with higher rates, you can usually run more water features but I suspect that is not a concern of yours.

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True. Not looking at water features for my pool, but am looking at some sort of heater, whether solar, or wood fired (I have access to plenty of burnables), I don't know yet. May have to build that myself. So less head loss in the basic system is a must do. I may have to run a second pump just for the heat, that remains to be seen. If I do, it wouldn't need to run as much as the filtration system, so energy costs would be minimal.

Side note: Water temperature for a few weeks was as high as 96F, felt really good for these arthritic joints! DW liked it that warm, too. Current temp is down to 80, and she won't get in now.

Thanks for your insight! Just what I was looking for.

One more thing. The Intex pump can only handle solar if the panels are on the ground. If you plan on having elevated solar panels, then you should probably be looking at other pumps.

If Intex rated this one in the same manner, it should do the job, but I doubt there would be any reserve capacity. Offhand I would derate anything like this by about 1/2, giving me an actual rate close to 1000gph with all plumbing/filtering accounted for.

Yes I would want to elevate the panels, but not more than about 8ft off the ground.

The Intex pumps are very low head pumps so I doubt even that one would be able to lift the water 8' at a decent flow rate.