High Calcium Hardness and Salt Pools

Many people tell us that they think Reverse Osmosis (RO) filtration works best on saltwater pools. There is no doubt that it is extremely effective with salt pools but it wouldn’t be a fair statement to say that it’s better than chlorine pools because ultimately it works great on all swimming pools that are dealing with high levels of Calcium Hardness (CH), Total Dissolved Solids (TDS), Cyanuric Acid (CYA), and salt. Not to mention it is also extremely effective with high levels of phosphates, nitrates, and waterborne diseases too. Recently, we processed an 18,000-gallon saltwater pool because their Calcium Hardness and salt levels were extremely high causing the salt cell to malfunction. This isn’t an uncommon issue and that is why we decided to talk about it today.

Salt systems are strict on water chemistry and Calcium Hardness levels are one of the biggest factors. A majority of the systems recommend their levels to between 200 – 400 parts per million (ppm). Unfortunately, in the San Diego area and many parts of the country, the water coming out of the tap is 400 ppm and higher which means your water is already too hard for the system. That means, scaling will occur on the electrode plates, the system will struggle to work, and the salt cell will need to be cleaned. Depending on what type of system you have, you can use a tool to remove the calcium or an acid bath. Please note that the system itself can only handle a certain amount of acid baths because it will wear down the cell.

Puripool for Salt Pools

At Pure Water Industries, we have a great solution that we would like to share with you to help you with the Calcium Hardness issue.  Using our mobile filtration system that houses Reverse Osmosis (RO) filtration is by far the best way to lower Calcium Hardness in your swimming pool. Since we use RO membranes to lower Calcium Hardness, Total Dissolved Solids (TDS), Cyanuric Acid (CYA) and so much more we are able to bring down your calcium concentration to levels much lower than tap water. This will allow your salt cell to work much better too. This past week we filtered an 18,000-gallon salt pool that was struggling with high calcium and because of that their salt chlorinator wasn’t working correctly. The following were the results:

Calcium Hardness – 1180 ppm

CYA – 0 ppm

Salt – 6082 ppm

TDS – 8408 ppm

After filtering this swimming pool for 13 hours we were able to lower the above levels to the following:

Calcium Hardness – 150 ppm

CYA – 0 ppm

Salt – 872 ppm

TDS – 1416 ppm

The best part about RO filtration is the fact that their Calcium Harness is now at 150 ppm which will prevent scaling and allow the system to work optimally. Scaling is by far one of the biggest reasons why they don’t operate correctly. Now that their system is working again, we did recommend purifying their swimming pool every year to prevent this from happening again. If you should have any questions, please contact us today!