Thursday, September 12, 2019

Swimming Pool Filter Cleaning Tips


If you do pool service and clean 60 or 80 filters every 6 months, or if you are a homeowner who cleans their own filter, the process can be both messy and time-consuming. There are ways to speed up the process and I will share some tips here for you.



The first thing is staying clean and if you do 4-6 filters in one day that can be challenging. A few years ago I got smart and decided to wear a cooking apron. This allowed me to take apart filters all day and still stay relatively clean. I recently upgraded to a water-resistant vinyl apron which also now keeps me clean as well as dry. I also get aprons with pockets so that I can put the filter knob or bolt in a safe place while I clean the filter. Sometimes you will set the bolt or nut down somewhere and lose it. To prevent wasted time looking for the filter bolt, just stick it in your apron pocket. Also, a must are long pants and long sleeve shirts for those very rough fiberglass lids (to keep your arms from getting fiberglass splinters as you put the lid back on). I also wear waterproof boots that keep my feet dry all day and also give me great traction in wet and muddy areas.

I use an old shoulder bag to carry all of my gear back each time. Everything is in this bag. My drill, screwdrivers, extra parts, silicone spray, etc. This allows me to make one trip back and eliminates wasted time going back to my truck. Another good idea is to carry your own spray nozzle and hose, a lot of times the customer’s hose is in bad shape. To save time by using your own hose and nozzle versus spending extra time fighting with a torn hose or bad or weak nozzle.

The Multi-Tork Socket sets are a great tool to quickly remove the filter bold or clamp and to put it back on rapidly. These sockets are designed for the most common filter models. Just attach the socket to your cordless drill, set the socket over the filter bolt and turn it on to unscrew it in mere seconds. Once you start using the Multi-Tork Sockets you will be amazed at the time saved at each filter. In fact, if you do five filters a day and at each one, you save 3 minutes that is equal to over one hour each week. To learn more about the Multi-Tork Sockets: https://www.swimmingpoollearning.com/multi-tork

I also carry a variety of spare parts on my truck. Basically, everything I need is on my truck for every filter on my pool route. I carry grids of various sizes, o-rings for every tank and plenty of nuts and filter bolts. This saves loads of time because you are not going back later or the next day because of one small part. On occasion when I need to replace more than 1-2 grids I will have to leave the pool off and return with a full 8-grid set. But this is not very common. I care everything needed to complete the cleaning and this in itself is a great time saver.

Another big time saver is that I switched over to silicone spray lube vs the Magic Lube for the filter tank o-ring. Not only is it cleaner and quicker to apply, but the o-rings last a lot longer with the silicone spray. I am only changing 2-3 o-rings per 70 filters where before I was changing at least a 12-14. The silicone seems to extend the life of the filter tank o-ring and the lids are very easy to get back on the tank. My supplier currently stocks the BOS-60-3062 BOSS SILICONE LUBRICANT SPRAY but any silicone spray like the ones they sell for RV’s will work just fine. Using silicone spray is a great time saver.

Time is money and when you are cleaning multiple filters, anything you can do to shave off 5 or 10 minutes means the more filters you can clean per day.







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