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Salt Chlorine Generators


wish2fish

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While I'm not a fan of chlorine generators, I do find them in tubs occasionally.  If you install one, make sure you get a sacrificial anode.  That's basically a zinc disc that you put in the tub that will attract the free electrons emitted from the salt generator.  Over time, the zinc disintegrates, due to a chemical reaction with the zinc and the free electrons.  If you don't install a sacrificial anode, a piece of metal already in the tub, usually the heater element, will begin to attract those free electrons and begin to disintegrate and fail prematurely. 

You do realize that a salt generator will not give you a salt water tub, right?  It's just another way to introduce chlorine into the water, which is not the best type of disinfection for a hot tub.  It will eliminate the need to put bromine or MPS into the tub to sanitize it.  Of course, it introduces the need to put salt into the water.  Some people swear by them.   I just don't think they're the best method to keep your tub clean.

Dave

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From my personal experience - and from research - salt chlorine generators are better for pools while Bromine salt generators are better for spas.  My bromine salt generator has been working perfectly for 4 years so far - I can leave for weeks at a time & when I return the chemistry is perfect.  You can review my other posts for more details.

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Both are awful for most customers, in my opinion.  In no way, shape, or form will theyl come close to paying for themselves.  What most people get is over-sanitation, and premature component failures that never end.  I think the industry should rename salt water systems to pre-intslled chlorine factories.  That being said, they are covenant, and when special care is taken and regular maintenance is performed, damage is kept at a minimum.  But the generators lend themselves to a laissez-faire attitude that can turn very costly, very quickly.

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PreservedSwine, do you have specific experience with bromine salt systems? As for chlorine salt, I only read the manual and the maintenance requirements look over-the-top compared with the simplicity of the bromine salt systems. Are you sure these two systems can be put in the same basket?

As for costs, my father got one of the early bromine salt systems back in 2005 for about 800$. The system finally packed it in in 2015. 10 years of maintenance free service – seriously, 10 years and nothing broke or needed to be replaced. He spent about 60$ a year for two bromine charges. So, in total over a 10 year period he spent $140/year (60$ for bromine salt plus 80$ to cover capital costs over 10 years). His tub chemistry was always excellent – certainly not over-sanitized. He was always amazed when they went on extended 4 week vacations that the chemistry stayed perfect. Does that not sound worth it to you? Does 140$/year sound high given the luxury of not needing to add chemicals regularly?

Hence, when I got my tub in 2013, I went for bromine salt. 4 years later – it works perfectly. Nothing to replace or fix. The chemistry is always perfect week after week.

So that’s 14 years of first hand experience – for the life of me I just can’t imagine how bromine salt systems “are awful for most customers”. It is one of the greatest mysteries to me why these systems are not super popular. But they clearly are not – no one recommended bromine salt systems to me back in 2013. I was told it was a mistake by dealers. Fortunately I relied on my fathers experience.

Please enlighten me – what am I missing? Could it be that the problems are only with chlorine salt systems? Can you give examples of what is going wrong with peoples bromine salt systems? I’m just really curious.

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Yes, we have experience with bromine generators as well.  As mentioned above, if special care is taken, they are not terribly bad.  But bromine has a very low PH, and constant care must be taken to keep the PH balanced.  Good for you if you're the one of the few that's happy (long term) with your product, and results.  Unfortunately, you're in very select company.   You father is not a terribly large base on which to build an opinion.  We service roughly 4,000 spas per year, and have been doing so since the 1990's. You might feel differently after explaining to 30 or 40 customers per year why they're spending over $1,000 on repairs to a that's just few years old, all due to self inflicted damage from chlorine and bromine generators.  The main point of this is they are not set it and forget it items.  Even so, we still perform many warranty repairs on spas equipped with bromine and chlorine generators.  The failure rate on components on spas  equipped with salt water chlorine/bromine generators is exponentially higher than spas maintained with traditional methods. 

As far as specific failures, over-sanitation is a common theme.  Most units have no way to determine the amount of sanitizer in the water (only salt), and leave it up to the consumer to input an output value.  Virtually all spas have a cover over them.  When the spa goes unused, the sanitizer accumulates.  Unlike a swimming pool, where rain and the sun break down chlorine and bromine, no such process occurs in a spa.  It is not unusual to find chlorine and bromine levels over 50ppm.  Also, very few owners manuals speak of the importance of CYA (chlorine stabilizer).  CYA limits the effectiveness, and corrosive properties, of chlorine.  The salt itself eventually damages the metal components in the spa.

Anyway, many people do enjoy them, but unfortunately, there also very many who end up regretting the purchase.  As long as you maintain properly, your chances of being happy with your purchase will increase exponentially.

Good luck in your search

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PreservedSwine. Sorry, I still think you are lumping bromine salt generators together with chlorine salt generators. And your post is generalizing to the point of being uninformative & perhaps misleading. A few points:

Bromine is more stable at spa temperatures than chlorine and you do not get sanitizer accumulation under the spa lid. With bromine there’s no need for sun & rain to break it down. I can have the lid on for 4 weeks and there will be no significant increase in total bromine. This lid does not matter one bit. On or off is totally irrelevant.

You say it is not unusual to find bromine levels over 50ppm??? Wow, I have never had my bromine go past 10ppm. It always stays in the 3-5ppm range. Clearly your customers have not followed the instructions. It is impossible to follow the instructions and get readings like that. Chemistry is not about luck – it’s science. It’s not that I’m at all lucky – I just follow the instructions. Maybe this happens with the chlorine systems – not with the bromine ones.

As for CYA – that’s a chlorine salt problem. Nothing to do with bromine. That’s why, again, I am thinking that chlorine salt generators are really only suitable for lower temperature swimming pools.

And you are wrong, constant care is not required to keep the PH balanced on bromine salt generators – that is for sure. I’ve never had a low PH level reading in 4 years – neither has my father in his 10 years. It just does not happen.

You are correct – units do not have any way to determine the amount of sanitizer in the water. In my opinion, while desirable, it would be too complicated to integrate such a feature. But litmus strip testing is simple & easy. You need to follow the instructions & be patient when tuning your electrode power. Set your power, wait a day, perform litmus test, adjust setting & repeat – until you reach an appropriate steady state. Then you lock it in – and for the most part your good to go until your next water change – saving one or two small tweaks for fine tuning. It seems clear that you have clients that simply can’t follow instructions. Again, my father & I can’t just be lucky. Chemistry is science – luck has nothing to do with it. All I can think is that there are some customers that are ill-suited to the art of tuning something. But it’s actually pretty straight forward - just a small initial investment of time, patience & common logic.

I would really love to actually hear from people with first hand experience with bromine salt generators. It really appears that I’m the only one. I have not found one other post on this site from someone else with first hand experience. It’s very lonely.

And btw, PreservedSwine, I don’t think 14 years of first hand experience with bromine salt generators (if I count my fathers 10 years worth of experience) is anything to sneeze at. Customer experience is not the same as first hand experience.

Another question - what would you estimate is the ratio of chlorine salt generator complaints vs bromine salt generator complaints? – my guess - maybe 20:1.

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