A unique AGP - shipping container pool

[landboat]

Hey there! I'd like to get some thoughts from the forum on how to best run my shipping container pool (the land boat ) There is a very long story about how the pool came to be, but fast forwarding almost 2 years, we finally have the pool in place and have it filled. The company who made the pool seems to be out of business as of 2-3 months ago, so we're on our own. It sucks, but probably not as bad as someone who made a deposit and only has half a pool in a shop. They company was good at welding - not so great at pool making. I'm not assuming anything is right.

I've been reading a lot here and I think I'm on track with chemistry, but it would be good to get feedback on that and a few other things. So far this forum has been very helpful in giving me the confidence to take this on!

The pool is a little under 10,000 gallons. It has an epoxy paint coating. An inline chlorinator. Lots of pumps (3 - spa area, swim jets and general circulation) and 2 heaters.

On chemistry, the last set of logs in Pool Math (5/2) are when I used my new handy TF Test kit. You can probably ignore all the older logs from test strips. Here is my interpretation and plan:
- FC 2: This seems fine. I'm still dialing in the pump schedule and how to use the chlorine tabs. I'll watch this, but per other reading on this forum, I see I should stop using chlorine tabs once my CYA gets higher and just use liquid bleach instead to maintain FC without growing CYA.
- CYA 20: Will watch per note above.
- TA 100: I read on a few sites that higher alkalinity is best for epoxy paint pools (here and here) so I plan to try and keep this between 100-150.
- pH 7.5: OK
- CH 100: Should I want to try and raise this or just let it be (or perhaps change over time on its own)?

Circulation schedule. Because the main pump can also contribute to the swim jets, it's a big pump - 3HP. It seems excessive to run this the "default" 8 hours a day. Rough calculations make me think 2 hours might be enough. (Separately I wonder if it would be better to have the 1 HP pump be the main circulation pump that runs through the chlorinator and filter and have the 3 HP pump make the spa jets actually spa-like. Perhaps this is was even the plan but it was plumbed wrong.)

 

[AK-]

A CYA of 20 is a bit low and any sunlight will burn all your chlorine. Unless your pool doesn’t get any sunlight you should bring that to at least 30, but more likely 40 or 50 due to where you live.

The FC of 2 is the bare minimum for your CYA as in anything below that and you are risking an algae bloom. You should really target 5+ppm (as long as below SLAM you are Ok). If you keep your FC always above the lower end of the target for your CYA level you are not going to have to deal with nasties. See FC/CYA Levels

I can’t tell anything about epoxy, but increasing your TA will force your pH up, so be prepared for a constant battle with pH and TA (every time you add acid to drop your pH your TA will drop a little too). CH will depend on how epoxy will like it.

As for pump runtime, I used to run 2 hours my 1hp pump when I was using LC and a bit longer if I expect to have to filter out something from the water. That was enough… now I’m going to run it a little longer because of the SWG.

 

[Newdude]

Hey LB and Welcome !!!! We are gonna need pics of this BEAUT to fully understand it. Get a few shots from various angles of the equipment as well. Thanks in advance for bringing something so unique to the table.



Your #s look fine for now. Watch the CYA like you said, and keep the FC up at all times per the FC/CYA Levels. Use 30 as that's where you expect to land.

Epoxy paints lost their VOCs to help the environment, and also lost their durability. Most folks are lucky to get to year 2 before they start chaulking off when touched or rubbed. The Calcium levels won't save it.

 

[landboat]

Thanks AK & ND! I'll put words here and pics in the next post.

I should have clarified that by "fine" I meant that I haven't totally screwed things up yet. I had missed or forgotten the FC/CYA chart - super helpful for targets there. My install is somewhat short on sunlight since I have a lot of trees around and it's close to the house. This will actually be pretty nice in the summer. There is also a motorized cover that will eventually be back in operation. I'll still aim for 5 & 30. The weather is looking more pool-like a week from now.

The epoxy paint used is here. It lists VOCs, but this is from the pool manufacturer in Canada where it might still be legal. I'm not sure exactly what the painter down here in VA got. The paint is on top of a 98% successful application of EcoFinish so it at least won't be bare metal underneath the paint in most cases. I'll just have to see how it goes. I don't think I have a lot of other options.

Also thanks for the validation on the pump timing.

 

[landboat]

Here are pics from above and around. And to answer the question of how we got it here - we had to crane it over the house. It was quite a day.

 

[Newdude]

Here are pics from above and around

Besides being STUPENDOUS they will really come in handy when you're asking about XYZ jets of pump #2.

That pool window tho

 

[AK-]

I like how neat is the “pad”. Are all those GE Enbrighten Z-Wave switches?

 

[dfwnoob]

That's completely awesome. I love it!

 

[landboat]

Newdude - it's actually windows and there is one on the other side. I'll get a pic through the pool from under the deck tomorrow.

Yes AK, those are GE Z-wave switches. I had 2 from another project that were no longer needed so that made it a little less of an investment to buy 2 more. I was also able to get the electrician doing work on site to just add them in without too much trouble. I mess a lot with home automation and I can imagine other ways to add control, but this is pretty straightforward and works well so far. I should also be able to get energy monitoring data from them. I'll at least know how much money I'm burning when I fire everything up.

There is one heater that is over 40 amps so I can't switch that with a z-wave switch. The manual says there is an option to add a lower voltage control switch though, so that's on the to-do list at some point. Right now that heater is also tripping the breaker when I run it. The obvious culprit is that it asks for a 60 amp breaker and there's only a 50 in the panel. However it did work fine a previous weekend. Perhaps the water temp was warmer then and it didn't need to work as hard.