SWG or Clorine Feeder??? In Southern Ontario.

Hello,

Been reading these forums like a mad man since I stumbled upon them. We are currently having a 16x34 vinyl inground pool installed. We are at the stage of the deck and shed pad getting poured.

There will be a few weeks lag time as the landscapers need to come and do there thing before the PB will install the liner and the equipment.

We had originally ordered just a plain chlorine feeder setup, but after reading here and a couple comments from other people we are debating going with the SWG setup.

I have read about most of the pro's to the setup and am ready to sway that way, but am curious as to any con's that might be location dependant as where we are the pool is open from May-Oct. Most of the posts I've read have been from people down in the warmer year round climates. Can anyone comment on how well it will work up here in Canada, specifically southern Ontario?

Thanks for any input.

Kevin

I live in NS.
I have a chlorine in-line auto-feeder. It's only $79cad.
love to have a SWG, but looking at at least $1500 cad, plus electrician to wire in another 230v(?) 240v (?) GFCI.

I think SWG are pretty cool. I like the concept. I'm not sure about how long cells last or how expensive to replace. I'm not crazy about having to test for salt & adding salt frequently ( but maybe the maintainance isn't as bad as the impression I get from this site).

I like my cheapy feeder. If it were to break, I wouldn't be out much money & regular maintainance is as easy as drop in some pucks every 9 to 14 days :D

perhaps I'll get a SWG down the road, but "easy" & "cheap" is what I need for now :)

Been running a SWCG since April 1998. Would not use anything else.

Check the thread in my signature regarding operation, pros and cons.

I see no reason why it would not work in your area, and you can shop around on the internet to get a better price.

Hope this helps.

Pat

Hi,being new to swg and a pool(17-33 inground vynl),I have only been running mine for four weeks now.500 lbs of salt with 17,800 gals of water keeps my Aquarite purring at 2800.My water is crystal clear and soft and all I had to add was approximatly 1/2 gal of muratic acid so far to keep the PH down.Makes my father in law jealous with his bromine slave pool.My chlorine has stayed in perfect range running at 20% from 9 am to 9 pm.next year I want to try and get it down to lesser pump time but i dont want to mess with a good thing with only a few weeks of swimming left before winter close up.I live in central Pennsylvania and our climate is close to yours as far as swimming season.I too researched the swg for a couple of months.My wife thought I was crazy spending so much time on the net.My father in law also thought I was crazy for trying something different.(he is old school).I really couldn't find any negatives.in fact,they have been saying that the cell life was approx. 5 years.That is for a full time pool.Since mine is only open for part of the year I think I might be able to stretch mine out for 8-9 years with proper preventive maintence.I say go for it,and enjoy more time at your pool doing what your supposed to,and save the work for punching the clock! Enjoy your pool! Matt

Hi Kevin,

I'm in Ottawa and know two people here that operate SWG units and are happy with them.

I just had a chat with a neighbour this week who had a pool put in last summer with an SWG, and is operating it full time this year. They are newbie pool owners who wanted to minimize the care for the pool, and they totally love the system. All they have done for chemicals is add stablizer and adjust the PH a couple of times. What really impressed them was going away for two weeks and the pool stayed clear.

hi kevin..i'm in southern alberta..aside from humidity, same boat as you with may to october season. i had an inline chlorinator and hated it..i felt it did a very average job of chlorinating my inground 18 x 30 pool and got tired of pucks and the expense. i am in the process of putting in an SWG and assuming it performs as advertised which i fully expect it will, it's the way to go. heck, even jugs of bleach is better from an expense standpoint combined with CYA to hold the bleach level. at 60 CYA, i find that my bleach consumption even with our hot temps this summer as you've had as well holds at 3-5ppm for 4-5 days, so i'm basically using a gallon of bleach a week. at a 1.97 for a jug from walmart, pretty cheap.

you're biggest expense with going to an SWG system maybe the electrical if you're not set up for it already. most if not all SWG systems appear pretty easy to hook up yourself, but in my case, i also have a new heater to install and at the same time, i'm putting in a new pump i got a heck of a deal on. the rub is that my original setup was not up to code or the installer didn't do it right using 14/2 wiring. the specs on the current pump say it should be 12/2wiring. my electrician said i was using every bit of the capability of the current wiring:) and the wiring in the shed in general is an octopus that needs to severe cleanup and organization.

so, i have an swg, a pump and a heater that require a good timer unit, a relay to shut off the heater in advance of the pump shutting off so i don't melt any pipes. i am going to have a rewire job right from the breaker box and converting at the same time from 110 to 220 volts for various reasons. so i am going to require some new breakers, 2 new wiring runs, a timer box that will hold everything i want for controls, shut off switches for the swg, heater and pump.

it's not a new installation, but my electrician says it's pretty darn close..i agree:) the cost..1600 for the electrical job, 600 for the ngas guy to do his thing.

the swg at 699 u.s. seems cheap at this point. if my wiring had been ready to go, i would have thought the expense relatively cheap.

i bought 10 bags of water softener salt on sale at canadian tire and it cost me under 40 dollars. it required 7 bags to get my pool up to 3500-3600 ppm. i have 3 spare bags in the garage for top up if i had to add a large amount of water to the pool.

i should mention one of the best investments for me this year for 350 u.s. was a solar pool cover and reel. the amount of evaporation and in turn chlorine loss, went down dramatically and that for sure saved me some money.

i look forward to a low expense, up to date pool setup for next season!

SWG without a doubt!

Well, after much debate, we have decided to go with the SWG. There seem to be way to many pluses to not putting it in. I just wanted to be sure it was not a location specific benefit setup.

It is about an extra $2000 in expenses, but looking at all the pro's and the very few con's we could come up with its the right thing to do for us.

Also it didn't make sense to put in the clorine puck system just to rip it out in a couple years to us. Even tho it is very cheap compared.

So, its SWG for us.

I believe they are using a Clearwater unit the builder said today.

Thanks all for your input. Much appreciated.


Kevin

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 73ELTIGRE

500 lbs of salt with 17,800 gals of water keeps my Aquarite purring at 2800.

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That salt level sounds a little low. You may want to verify the optimum range for your system.

Keeping your salt on the upper end of the recommended range will also prolong cell life. I keep mine at 3600 which is the upper end of the scale for my unit.