DE in a sand filter???

[Rangeball]

Every recommendation I've ever read said keep adding until you hit a 1 psi increase.

[CarlD]

Ok, OK, OK!!
I OFFICIALLY APOLOGIZE!

Al (Poconos) gets NO credit at all for the DE-in-the-Sand-Filter trick!

(even though he has been the Apostle for it! )

[faithfulfrank]

I added some more, and it is now 1 psi higher.
Now, I wait for the transition from clear and clean to sparkling!

Frank D.

[drband]

DE in my sand filter really works great... I just added about 1 cup total today and my pool cleared from slightly hazy to sparkling in 3-4 hours. (I had already shocked and cleaned it up... there was just some fine stuff suspended in the water that the sand filter would not catch.) I'm sold on this "trick." Thanks for all the posts, questions, and info.

[gerri]

I added 1/3 cup to my filter tonight. I hope i wake up to sparkling water. My dad uses DE in his aquarium filters and swears by it. He calls it "water polisher". He told me to mix the DE in a little bit of water before adding it so it doesn't gum up, so I did. When I poured it in the skimmer there was a little grit in the bottom of my cup but I just added a little more water and swished it around and the cup rinsed clean. I will post results tomorrow.

It won't be as great as it could be though as I am battling metal stains right now. I'm doing an asorbic acid treatment on Wednesday though in hopes of having the sparkling clean looking pool.

[gerri]

This morning my pool water is clearer than it's ever been. If not for the metal stains it would be just perfect!

[cschnurr]

Went to the 3 pool stores to pick up DE. They didn't have any, but had an "equivalent" thats supposedly better than DE.

I tried it on the weekend, waiting only about 5 minutes, before reading the pressure gauge. Pressure rose very little, so I put in another cup, 3 in total.

Later in evening, checked pressure gauge and it was up 8 lbs.
So I had to backwash it away and start over.

How long should to wait for the pressure to increase?

[AndieP]

I went to Lowes today to get some DE for our filter and all they had was a 25pound bag....it was cheap $13... but now I'm wondering how well it keeps. Will it keep through the winter until next summer since I'm sure I won't use even 1/4 of it the rest of this summer? How should it be stored? Should I take it back and keep searching for a small size?

[drband]

Should keep indefinitely... just keep it dry so it won't clump up.

[gerri]

DE is actually little microscopic skeletons so it's good basically forever.