Am I choosing a good combination? pump & filter size

[leena]

ok, my sand filter has arrived and I am expecting the pump today or tomorrow so Im excited about getting them hooked up and running. One thing I was wondering.......I need to scrub the walls of my pool to remove the residue from when the pool water was green, earlier this spring. Its been 2 or 3 weeks since I killed the algae, but the water is still chilly so I haven't gotten in and scrubbed the walls yet. I did vacuum to waste the bottom of the pool after killing the algae, but you can tell there is a slightly green tint to the walls. My question is this: Would it hurt to scrub the walls and let the new filter remove the dead algae or would it be better to let it settle to bottom and vacuum to waste? Starting out with a new filter I don't want to "gunk" it up with something that will be hard to get rid of. That may not even be an issue, it may rinse out easily, but I've never had a good filtering system (mine always just blew the dead algae back into the pool) so Im not familiar with how dead algae particles affect a sand filter...........

[leena]

ok everything is here and we are installing the new filter and pump! I immediately wasn't sure about how to hook it up etc but I did tell my husband what sunny said about using pvc pipe. Since my husband is a plumber, he was fine with that but he told me to leave him alone and just let him hook everything up how he wanted, lol! So I guess we will adjust from that point if any problems arise. SO excited, cant wait to turn it on!

I did get in the water and scrub the leftover green residue from pool walls. Some of it settled to the bottom but a lot of it is still floating in the water. SInce no one responded to my question about the dead algae particles above, I plan to vacuum to waste what is on the floor of pool and let the rest filter thru sand filter. Hope this is ok, if not I can put some floc in there and let it all settle to bottom, then vacuum.............

[FormerBromineUser]

Vacuuming to waste sounds just fine. You refill your pool regularly anyway so must have decent fill water. I would not use floc. Once the big stuff is gone, to help remove the finer particles you can add DE to your filter. Works a treat. http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthr...to-sand-filter

[leena]

ok thanks! pool had to be filled up several inches (because of the leak and hardly no rain for 2 weeks) so we didn't get to turn on the pump last night. Hopefully husband going to do all that when he gets home in a couple hrs.....

[leena]

ok the pump has been running for a couple of hrs. BOy is it quiet compared to the old one! Going to leave it on low all night and see how the water looks in morn. I did vacuum to waste (it vacuumed on low!) but the water is hazy since I scrubbed all that green residue from walls. Oh I had another question. We put 300lbs of sand in the filter but my husband said it was between 1/2 and 3/4 full. Is that normal? our 2 old sand filters (200lb) were more than 3/4 of the way filled up......

[FormerBromineUser]

Outta my league to answer that one. My sand filter is about 3/4. However if it's working.....

Let's see if someone with equipment expertise chimes in.

[leena]

after 24 hrs with the new pump and filter, it drastically improved the clarity of my water. Before I always had to add floc and let the remaining dead algae particles settle then vacuum to waste. Id repeat the letting it settle and vacuum constantly to keep my water clear. I only added floc once a yr. It seemed to stay in the water bc even the small particles would sink to the bottom for several weeks after using the floc.
However, this time I just wanted to see if the new filter and pump would do anything. So I didn't add the floc. I killed the algae then vacuumed to waste twice. However the water was still very hazy from the tiny dead algae particles that were floating around and wouldn't settle to the bottom. So I hooked up the new filter and pump and after 24 hrs, big difference, after 3 days.. clear water. That was running it on low. Running on low, the heavy stuff still sank to the bottom so I stirred it up but it didn't seem to filter it out bc the water flow was so gentle. The big stuff just sank back to bottom. So I stirred it up again and ran filter on high for 24 hrs. This did get more of the big stuff out, you could def see the water moving around the pool, but some still settled to the bottom. My electric co shows electrical use every 24 hrs so I could see that runnin it on high did increase my energy use more.
SO I think I will run on low for 3 hrs ea day or every other day, vacuum to waste anything that settles to bottom. This is the first time I'd gotten clear water after an algae outbreak without having to add something to make the tiny particles settle to bottom, so I know that a properly sized pump and sand filter DOES actually filter stuff out. My old setup (1.5hp single speed with 200lb sand filter)didn't appear to filter out anything, not even bugs much less small dead algae particles.
Still not sure about the sand though...........................it is working................so will leave it for now until I find more info on how much sand to put in the filter...........