help with diy solar coils

[stickerflicker1]

this is my first post and hope someone can help me, here we go. i have a inground pool, 12000gal, stra rite 3 cartridge, max-e 1hp motor with a turbo clean popup cleaner. Today i installed a solar heater, 4 coils with approximately 200' per coil. now i set my system up like some of the others ive seen out their, running off my pool pump. now i ran 2" pvc out of my cartridge outlet to a horizonal check valve and 90degree up 5 feet to a ball valve (so i can stop water going to my coils). from the valve, the 2" pvc goes up 10' to my flat piched roof were it goes to a 1.5" manifold for my coils. the outlets of my coils are the same, (1.5 manifold to a 2"pvc, to a ball valve, to my turbo clean system). i also installed a bypass valve below the two other ball valves. now if your not confused please carry on with this. before i started this solar project, i was getting about 20psi of pressure in my stra rite cartridge housing. now after my project im getting about 32 to 35 psi, but now my popups won't go up in the pool. did i screw up using 2" pvc with a 1hp motor????.the rest of the existing plumbing is 2". what pressure is needed for the popups? should i cut out my 2" verticals going up the wall to and from my coils and put in 1.5" pvc? now im frustrated and now in a bind. ooooooh the other thing, i close off my 2 ball valves to and from my coils and use the bypass, the popups work. please any ideas will help.

[inetdog]

this is my first post and hope someone can help me, here we go. i have a inground pool, 12000gal, stra rite 3 cartridge, max-e 1hp motor with a turbo clean popup cleaner. Today i installed a solar heater, 4 coils with approximately 200' per coil. now i set my system up like some of the others ive seen out their, running off my pool pump. now i ran 2" pvc out of my cartridge outlet to a horizonal check valve and 90degree up 5 feet to a ball valve (so i can stop water going to my coils). from the valve, the 2" pvc goes up 10' to my flat piched roof were it goes to a 1.5" manifold for my coils. the outlets of my coils are the same, (1.5 manifold to a 2"pvc, to a ball valve, to my turbo clean system). i also installed a bypass valve below the two other ball valves. now if your not confused please carry on with this. before i started this solar project, i was getting about 20psi of pressure in my stra rite cartridge housing. now after my project im getting about 32 to 35 psi, but now my popups won't go up in the pool. did i screw up using 2" pvc with a 1hp motor????.the rest of the existing plumbing is 2". what pressure is needed for the popups? should i cut out my 2" verticals going up the wall to and from my coils and put in 1.5" pvc? now im frustrated and now in a bind. ooooooh the other thing, i close off my 2 ball valves to and from my coils and use the bypass, the popups work. please any ideas will help.

The popups require two things: Pressure and flow. The pressure has to be high enough to cause them to pop up and the available flow has to be high enough to maintain that pressure as the water runs through the popups and any alternate paths.

Your heating coils and the pipes feeding them together add up to more flow resistance than the system can tolerate. You can tell that there is more resistance to flow because the pressure at the cartridge is higher by 12-15 psi. You could try partially opening the bypass valve to reduce that pressure and get more flow and pressure to the popups. You may end up getting about as much heat to the pool with the lower flow through the coils. To determine that you need to measure the temperature at the inlet and outlet of the coils. If the temperature rise stays reasonable with the bypass partially open, your work is done. If not, then you have to either add a supplemental pump or re-organize your heater to give a lower flow resistance. The 200' coils (whose size you did not specify, but I assume a lot smaller than 1.5" since that is your manifold size) are going to restrict the flow a lot more than any of the 2" pipe you are using elsewhere.

[russ]

A couple of links that might help

http://www.mmattera.com/bin/Solar_Pool_Heater_Coils.jpg

http://rimstar.org/renewnrg/solar_pool_heater_diy_fp.htm

[stickerflicker1]

ok so stay with 2" pvc and should i make a 2" header manifold? The coils are 1/2" and plan to run 8 more 200' coils. now i see that some run their coils in series and or in parrellel to each other. which is better? with a suplemental pump, is that connected through my existing pool plumbing or is that seperate from the pool plumbing.

[inetdog]

ok so stay with 2" pvc and should i make a 2" header manifold? The coils are 1/2" and plan to run 8 more 200' coils. now i see that some run their coils in series and or in parrellel to each other. which is better? with a suplemental pump, is that connected through my existing pool plumbing or is that seperate from the pool plumbing.

The decision between putting coils in series and coils in parallel should be based on the flow/pressure curve of the pump you are using. If you have a high pressure low flow pump, put the coils in series. If you have a high flow. low pressure pump put the coils in parallel. But your first step should be to calculate the pressure versus flow values for a single 200' coil.