On Sep 15, 3:48*pm, Winston wrote:
wolfgang wrote:

(...)

Now I am in the process of reducing the recurring bills. *Thank god
natural gas is cheap, *but electricity is a killer. *I just got my
bill of $330.00 covering from mid June to mid August. *This includes
air conditioning and a 3/4 HP pool pump that runs continuously for 6
months of the year. *Any suggestions on how to improve motor
efficiency here?

Do you get much use from the pool?
A friend of mine decided the pain and expense
wasn't worth it.
She chopped out the bottom of her pool and had
lots of clean fill dirt put in. *It improved
the efficiency mightily and boosted the sale
price of the place, when she did decide to move.

(...)

Here is a cute anecdote of our 35+ years together:
Whenever I appeared to be searching for something my wife would ask
"What are you looking for?" *To which I would reply with my standard
line of "fame, fortune, fast cars, and loose women". *To which my wife
would reply "Well dear, 2 out of 4 isn't bad, is it?????"



--Winston

Winston,

No we don't use the pool much anymore; it came with the house when we
bought it 18 years ago and it was old then, at least for a pool.

We thoroughly overhauled it in 1996 including a new liner, and at that
time thought about filling it in. But the pool is a nice visual
thing, much like a fountain in a park.

Back in '93 we planted lots of trees and a hedge which is now 12 feet
tall.

The yard looks like a clearing in the forest with a pool in the
middle... very pleasant indeed. The cost is not too bad for
chemicals and we open and close it ourselves.

To run the pump is about $400 for 6 months. I've tried to put the
pump on a timer but during hot weather the water doesn't like it and
turns green. I'm afraid to cycle the pump more than once every three
hours or so as this shortens the starting switch life expectancy.

I've thought of using a 3 phase high efficiency motor with VFD.
Anybody know what the max. efficiency is of one of these? Or possibly
a DC motor but the commutator life expectancy could be problematic.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Wolfgang