Quote Originally Posted by CarlD
I KNEW the electric dishwasher powder was used! I knew about it for carts, but not for DE, but it makes sense. Not Dawn or Palmolive liquid!

The muriatic acid wash is a standard for DE units. Some pool stores will do it for you (for a fee of course).

None of this is appropriate for sand, of course.
(Forgot about this thread)
I ended up soaking the filter element overnight in a 5 gallon bucket of hot water with four scoops of OxyClean. Worked great!

And for the record, I certainly would've thoroughly rinsed the filter had I chosen to try Dawn!

C.

PS, sorry no ideas about separating the used DE. You'll use a lot of water to flush it out so collecting it would be a bit of a problem, I think. But if you could strain it out somehow, it's a naturally occuring substance so disposing of it wouldn't be hard.