Anyone have any pool heater info they wanna share with me?
Wifey has been lobbying for a heater and is armed with her mother's chequebook. In the interest of staying married I've caved in and decided that a heater might be a good thing for our kids... I just agreed to this 15 minutes ago, so haven't Googled anything yet.
Pool dimensions are 16 x 32 x 10 feet deep (3 feet at shallow end).
Ontario Canada. Typically our water is heated by the sun to 23 or 24, which I think is 76F. In hot days it can get to 80F. Want a heater that will give us 29 to 30 which I think is 85F but if not, at least to maintain 80F.
Natural gas. Chlorine, Sand filter.
One other question, are these things power vent or pvc exhaust or are they stack exhaust? Want to keep indoors but wonder about air breathing.
A heated pool is a system. A pool heat source is a PART of that system. If the mother's checkbook includes paying for the heat, your system gets simpler. If you're paying, you might want to do a LOT of research on the financial implications of a heated pool.
There are floating pool covers that absorb more heat from the sun and prevent some of the radiation. Keeping the heat in is as important as adding more heat. This is especially important if you expect 85 degree water in the winter.
You can calculate the volume of the pool and how many BTU's it takes to get from 76 to 85F. From then on it's all about losses. Minimize those losses.
Solar collectors can be very useful. You might decide that sacrificing a few swimming days or a degree or two, you can save significant operating $$$.
The thermal time constant of a pool with proper surface insulation is rather long. You're gonna pay for heat on days/weeks when you won't be using the pool.
Do the math on the thermodynamics and talk to people who have heated pools in your area before you dive in.
In about 1976 or so, we moved into a house with a pool heater. Gave about 1 degree F per hour of remp rise, hardly worth it.
Sounds like a lot of natural gas, for not much benefit. Solar cover might do more for you.
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Wifey has been lobbying for a heater and is armed with her mother's chequebook. In the interest of staying married I've caved in and decided that a heater might be a good thing for our kids... I just agreed to this 15 minutes ago, so haven't Googled anything yet.
Pool dimensions are 16 x 32 x 10 feet deep (3 feet at shallow end).
Ontario Canada. Typically our water is heated by the sun to 23 or 24, which I think is 76F. In hot days it can get to 80F. Want a heater that will give us 29 to 30 which I think is 85F but if not, at least to maintain 80F.
Natural gas. Chlorine, Sand filter.
One other question, are these things power vent or pvc exhaust or are they stack exhaust? Want to keep indoors but wonder about air breathing.
To answer your questions, all the gas heaters I've seen are simple stack vent type. All the ones I actually have familiarity with are outside, with the stack just ending about 2ft above the unit housing.
The really, really bad news is that these things are MASSIVE. Pool here is 48,000 gallons and has a 400,000 BTU heater. Compare that to the largest residential gas furnace which is probably
120K, maybe 150K, tops. Heating it is just too expensive, so the heater isn't used. You can easily spend thousands of dollars heating a pool. But then here in the nyc area, in summer the pool will be in the low 80s much of the time without heating.
I would look at solar. The ballpark guideline is that you need about as much solar collector area as the pool has surface area. I would think that would be plenty to give you the summer boost that you appear to be looking for. Maybe you can get away with less. If you want it do more, ie extend the season, not have it covered when not in use, etc then you would need more. I've seen calculators online that help in that regard.
The nice thing with solar is that you have to run the pump a good bit of the time for filtering, so the electric to run the pump is paid for, at least for part of the time. They also have multispeed pumps that can cut the cost of running it substantiallly by using low speed . Using that approach, solar is free compared to using a gas heater. And greener too. However, if you don't have the south or west exposure, no roof space or area on the ground, or can't do it because of aesthetics, then that's a factor too.
Put a solar loop on your (south facing) roof, connected into your circulating pump circuit - will keep your pool toasty most of the season (Waterloo Ontario) assuming the roof is not fully shaded by trees.
BTW you offered to help me with a black and decker part a week ago. Thanks for that offer. I found a solution thru ebay but I thot you should be thanked for offering. I'm about 45 minutes away from waterloo area.
Wouldn't have a pool without it. 85 is a pretty good temp but we extend the season into the 50's and I run that sucker up to 89. It's like a 20K gallon hot tub.
We're on our second Raypak, love it.
You'll Google that, but I don't know why you'd want to keep the heater indoors. -----
The same type of people who clean the snow off the cover of their hot tub on the rear deck in the NE winter so they can get in the warm water. But in the pool, you can do laps. You just don't get out and stand around while wet. :-)
I have a 330K BTUH heater here in Florida and I think it is a huge waste of money. It feels like I am just burning dollar bills to keep the pool warm. We seldom ever turn it on. I do have solars and they work pretty well if you keep the pool covered but I hate the cover too. Usually we are resigned that the pool is going to be too cold to use for 3-4 months a year. I switch the solars over to the spa and it is toasty all winter for free.
All right, here's my 2 cents. Been doing this for 15 years, not pool heaters exclusively, but installation, maintenance and repair of propane appliances. Look at Sta-Rite heaters. They aren't as large as other brands (BTU vs BTU), are power vented, and can be vented out a side wall if installed inside. The biggest issue is lack of care in the fall as critters will find a way inside and wreak havoc with insulation and wiring. I suggest to customers that they wrap the heater as tightly as possible and spread some moth balls or other rodent repellant to minimize invasion. As far as heating goes, about one and a half degrees per hour is average. A solar cover will help maintain the temp and you will use less energy maintaining the temperature than letting the temp drop and trying to reheat.
*I have a few customers with pool heaters and most of the time they don't use them except for parties due to operating costs. I have heard that painting the bottom of the pool black will help boost the temperature slightly. One customer has an array of solar water heater panels (More like mats) on the lawn next to the pool, but I don't know how well it works. As with anything that is heated, including your house, you need to minimize the heat loss to keep the expense down. You already have a cover to help with this. All of the gas heaters that I have seen are outdoors near the pool pump.
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