Power Consumption of Standard Pump

[Jcgage0]

Hey folks....I'm thinking about upgrading to a Variable speed (or maybe a 2-speed) pump. My current pump is working, but is load and not very energy efficient.

What I'm trying to decide is how much energy savings I should really expect to see with the variable pump. I was all set to go out and try to measure the current and voltage draw to calculate the wattage being pulled by the pump, but my crappy little multimeter is only rated for measuring current to 250 mA, so I'm back to looking at the specs of my Hayward Super II Pump.

The specs can be seen in the picture below. This is what I'm confused about. The pump is rated 1 HP, 0.75 KW so is it constantly pulling 0.75 KW. However, also in the spec is 15.0 Amps with a 115 Volt circuit and 7.5 Amps with a 230 Volt circuit. I'm hooked up to 230 Volts, but either of the options would result in the same power consumption of (7.5*230) = 1725 Watts.

Can someone with a little more electrical/pump savy help me out with this? Can I even on idea just from the specs. or is the power draw application specific. I know these two things. My pump is load like the bearings might be going bad, it runs very hot (like burn your flesh hot), and the pressure in the filter is running a little below 25 psi.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Download and use Mark's spreadsheet to calculate which pump would be best for you -

Hydraulics 101 - Have you lost your head?

To give you a data point - when my IntelliFlo runs at a speed above 2250RPM, the power consumption is well over 1kW. When I operate the pump at 1600RPM (which I do at times when the SWG is running), the pump draws a little under 300W. When I do really slow speed skimming, say around 1400RPM, the pump uses about as much power as a bright halogen lamp, about 150W.

 

[Dabonk1]

Not to hack this thread but I'm looking for some similar information. Joyful if you were to run your intelliflo(same variable I'm looking at) for 8 hours in a day. Do you know the average KW draw per hour? Anything close would greatly help. I'm currently at 2.645 an hour with a single speed 230 volt at 11.5 amps. Thank you

 

[kadavis]

Pentair - Residential Pool Pump Energy Savings Calculator

 

[jblizzle]

Not to hack this thread but I'm looking for some similar information. Joyful if you were to run your intelliflo(same variable I'm looking at) for 8 hours in a day. Do you know the average KW draw per hour? Anything close would greatly help. I'm currently at 2.645 an hour with a single speed 230 volt at 11.5 amps. Thank you

He just told you the watts per hour ...

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Not to hack this thread but I'm looking for some similar information. Joyful if you were to run your intelliflo(same variable I'm looking at) for 8 hours in a day. Do you know the average KW draw per hour? Anything close would greatly help. I'm currently at 2.645 an hour with a single speed 230 volt at 11.5 amps. Thank you

So my scheduling makes this a little complicated but here's how it goes -

9am-10am: Slow Skim, 1500RPM, 230W
10am-11am: SWG/POOL Mode, 1750RPM, 360W
11:00-12:30pm: Spillover, 2350RPM, 840W
12:30-2pm: SWG/POOL Mode, 1750RPM, 360W
2pm-4pm: Slow Skim, 1500RPM, 230W

So,

3*230 + 2.5*360 + 1.5*840 = 2,850W total power consumption

2,850/7 = 407W/hr

At this point I should decrease my POOL mode time on to only about 3 hours because my FC is really too high. I could also cut back my spillover time from 90mins to 60mins without any problem. I may actually add on some night slow skimming as the late afternoon has a lot of wind lately and I'm getting more late afternoon pollen and leaf litter in my pool.

But, as you can see, I use as much power in my entire day that you use in one hour of pump runtime....

 

[LapPoolMike]

Hi JoyfulNoise, I'm in process of dialing in my new VS pump schedule and am curious, what are your reasons for running in "Spillover" mode from 11am-12:30pm? Just for the looks/sound of it? Or are you trying to turn over the water in the attached spa? Or wanting to affect some water chemistry parameter (total alkalinity?) by aeration? Just curious. Thanks.

 

[Dabonk1]

Thank you very much that information is a great help.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Hi JoyfulNoise, I'm in process of dialing in my new VS pump schedule and am curious, what are your reasons for running in "Spillover" mode from 11am-12:30pm? Just for the looks/sound of it? Or are you trying to turn over the water in the attached spa? Or wanting to affect some water chemistry parameter (total alkalinity?) by aeration? Just curious. Thanks.

I run the spillover to ensure that water in the spa gets exchanged at least once per day (I also keep a bubble cover on the spa to cut down on FC loss). The turnover could be accomplished in about 15mins or so since the spa volume is only 650 gallons but I also like the waterfall effect so I let it run a little extra. I also have a waterfall as well but that's on a separate plumbing loop. Sadly, that is tied to a very wasteful single-speed, 3HP WhisperFlo pump which I need to rip out one of these days and plumb with a more energy efficient waterfall pump. I only run the waterfall a maximum of 1hr/day and I split that up into 3 run times - 15mins in the early AM, 30mins midday and then 15mins in the evening. At 2.3+ kWh of power consumption, I hate how much energy that pump wastes.

 

[LapPoolMike]

Ah, great stuff, thanks Matt!