I need some advice for my first backwashing adventures!
1. What do you do with your backwash water?
2. Any problems using untreated water for plants (when Chlorine & other chemicals are low)?
3. What do you do with normally chlorinated/treated waste water?
4. How do you route this deluge of water for 10-15min recommended by instructions for backwashing new sand/zeobrite?

I haven't done careful math yet, but rough guess from my 15 seconds of experience tells me I'll have (5gal/10sec)*(60sec/1min)*(10min backwash) = ~300 gallons of backwash waste!!!


MY SETUP/SITUATION:
I just finished assembling and filling my 12'x24'x54" AG pool yesterday. I installed 75lbs of Zeobrite (up to recommended 10" from top fill level) in my WaterWay (WaterCo?) sand filter and hooked up the matched 2hp pump. (Yes, pump likely overkill but that's what came with this pool from www.sunenterprises.com). I fired up the pump with filter set to backwash for the fist time... and watched 5+ gallons spew out from the waste port into my inadequate 5 gallon bucket then onto the dirt near my pool in under 10 seconds!

SHORT-TERM WORKAROUND: I added Chlorine this morning (since my 2-day old untreated water started turning a little green). My temporary solution was to use recirculate setting on filter to mix in 1.5gal of Chlorox Bleach (6%) until I properly backwash the filter medium. I'll get cloudy soon if I don't get the filter going in next day or two.

PLAN: My initial plan is to get fittings to adapt my vacuum hose to the waste port, then fill up 5gal buckets or preferrably just water everywhere I can as far as the hose will reach. I don't have much land lower than the pool so I'll create a pond at my rec-room patio if I dump within 20' of the pool.


PS: Sorry for the extra details. I included full details in case someone reads and sees an obvious problem with my first-time setup. I have no on-site experts. My prior experience was with 12' doughnut pool with tiny cartridge filter and pool store chemicals. PoolForum posters are my only support and sanity check .