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The Pool Envy Podcast is where real, licensed pool professionals speak up. In an industry overflowing with DIY chatter and surface-level advice, we dive deep into code, compliance, and craftsmanship that set licensed contractors apart. Our goal is to educate and elevate the industry — teaching safety, sharing knowledge, and helping those who build and service pools do it the right way.
You're listening to the Pool Envy podcast. Code, compliance, craftsmanship, hosted by Jason Davies. Let's dive in.
Jason Davies:First comes the pool heater, and then seems to come the endless problems thereafter. Everybody wants to keep their pool warm, but what it turns into is an endless battle of repair work, and the blame continues on for eternity, basically. Let's take a little look at why that happens and what we can do to avoid it. I promise you this should be an interesting episode, and we'll keep it interesting for all audiences. Why do we want a pool heater to work?
Jason Davies:Well, obviously, because if they don't, bad things can happen. Can you imagine what would happen if Joe the handyman installed your gas furnace in your home and something was not done right? Do you imagine the consequences that can happen if carbon monoxide was leaking into your pool room? Well, let's try to avoid some of the common misnomers that happen with, and I'm not gonna consider the consequences. My telltale sign that a pool heater was not done right.
Jason Davies:So when I walk into a swimming pool room and wonder why the room is just covered with this white dust. Top of the pool heater, perhaps the galvanized vent stack for the room is like turning white and starting to develop its own patina and pattern. And I think to myself, that's gonna be an interesting project. That's why I do consultations first. I get a lot of calls of, hey, can you check out our pool heater?
Jason Davies:We have a brief little issue we'd like you to take care of. I promise you guys, it's never a brief issue. It's never a simple issue, and it's nothing uncomplicated. So the white powder I'm talking about gives me a hint. The white powder puts me on a little unique scavenger hunt, guess we'll call it.
Jason Davies:This white soot is actually called zinc oxide. Basically, pool heaters burn oxygen because if they didn't, they wouldn't work at all. What I'm talking about is makeup air. So we have to bring air into the pool room, we burn it, and we send it up the chimney. That's pretty much how it works.
Jason Davies:We'll dive into it deeper in some other podcast down the road. But for now, air comes in, air gets burned, air goes out. And what happens if we choke off that air supply? What if we don't have enough of the air supply? What if we don't have enough combustion air coming in?
Jason Davies:I'll tell you what happens. That white powder, that is your giveaway that something is going on in that pool room. And there's a million other ways you could look at it, but for simplicity's sake and me voicing this today, we're just gonna call it the white powders are dead giveaway that something is wrong. Pool rooms are often considered, I guess, the budget misnomer on pool projects. Commercial facilities especially, they're like coolers or locked up safes.
Jason Davies:Let's shove a bunch of equipment away far far from civilization so that we can't hear the of the equipment. Let's cram a heater into the corner. Let's run venting 7,000 feet, which is course is an exaggeration because there's what 5,280 feet in a mile. But let's just say we're running a really long distance of piping and we have to bring air in, we have to get air out and sometimes there's going to be what's called back pressure, which is just a fancy way of saying there's air outside pushing back, and that's gonna make it really hard to vent, probably gonna lead to some of that white sooting, etcetera, etcetera. Bottom line with that, tight buildings don't make excitement for pool heater combustion.
Jason Davies:Air has to come in, air gets burned, air goes out. And we need enough of it so that we have an ample supply of that makeup air. If we don't, we see fouling, we see sooting, we see white powder, we see an endless service call of, boy, this heater is really hot. Why isn't this going anywhere? Couple scenarios I run into.
Jason Davies:Just in the last, I don't know, month or so, I've run into a situation where unlicensed pool person installed a pool heater. The previous heater was about 300,000 BTUs or British thermal unit. It's the amount of energy used to heat some water up. That said, this heater has a certain ventilation requirement, and the homeowner got a different heater because it was convenient. Can't blame them.
Jason Davies:The pool guy though has a job to install a pool heater. He also has a responsibility to read the directions. There's a lot of safety things and directions that let pool builders know, hey. You're going to do something bad if you don't follow these. Anyway, enough on the safety stuff, but, just do what's right and do it often.
Jason Davies:This, heater was upgraded to a larger unit, same size ventilation as a smaller unit. What that led to was obviously an issue of carbon monoxide making its way back into the room. That's not a good thing. Thankfully, it's also code that carbon monoxide detectors are placed in pool equipment rooms, and we were able to resolve the situation by changing some ventilation around. Another telltale sign I had a call just this summer, and I know I heard a few people's feelings over this one.
Jason Davies:I don't apologize because I do what is safe, and I do what my license requires me to do. I had a photo of a pool room. Of course, the white soot was piled quite high over the heater. It was a situation where the heater wasn't heating. I get that.
Jason Davies:But what I had noticed was the pool plumbing on the wall was also melting. I could see that from scorch marks. I could see the PVC had actually changed shape. And that's a big concern to me in a commercial facility because I know that an equipment operator could be in that room and harmed if something very bad goes on. So in that particular situation, we knew that there was not enough makeup air.
Jason Davies:One of the other things I see are makeup air louvers. I like to think that a lot of people size these based on hopes and dreams without actual calculations. And then what happens often is the pool equipment room turns into a storage room. So people stack containers and cabinets and bookshelves, and all of a sudden, what we thought we had for makeup air doesn't actually exist. And then my, other scenario ran across just, well, just last week actually.
Jason Davies:This was a pool heater that went up some galvanized piping straight up. The issue with that though, the previous pool builder had just put a patch over the piping because there was a rust spot from previous corrosion. So they just slapped a piece of metal over it, drove in some screws, called it a day. That was right up at the top of the ceiling, right by the roof, right by the spot where the combustible wood material was, and it was just a really, really bad situation. We ended up having to cut several big holes in the side of this room because there was no makeup air.
Jason Davies:More interesting though, there was a fireplace vent that also ran through this room into the person's home. And what's troubling about that is the fleck we got from those pool builders. Oh, you're just going around scaring people. You know, I guess we are. Death can occur if you do something stupid.
Jason Davies:So there, be scared. Oh, perfect for October. Right? So in that particular instance, we added some ventilated louvers, brought in enough makeup air, and even with the fireplace running through there, all is well.
Voice Over:Today's code breakdown.
Jason Davies:We follow NFPA 54, IFGC fuel and gas line, and IMC for combustion air and venting. Plus, we read the manufacturer's instructions, air in, air out, and the fuel supply has to agree. What do we mean by that too? Always check for the right orifice on your appliance. If it's a gas heater, make sure it's hooked up to gas.
Jason Davies:And if it's a propane heater, make darn sure it's hooked up to propane and don't mix up the two. We'll save that for another episode of why. It's just not a good idea. So do you have reoccurring heater problems in your house? Here are some things that you wanna ask your contractors before you invest in a new pool heater.
Jason Davies:And I'll give you an interesting tip on this one. If they can't explain this to you, it's probably a really wise idea not to have them install your heater at all. Okay. Here's the first one. Are you licensed to install HVAC equipment?
Jason Davies:Scary, isn't it? Alright. Anyway, typically, if the installer can't explain makeup air to you, it's pretty simple. You you've learned it from this podcast. Air comes in, air gets burned, air goes out.
Jason Davies:If the person installing your pool heater doesn't know what makeup air is or has never heard of it or wants to question why do we care about that, that's a sign they're probably not the most qualified individual to install that heater. Another thing to ask them is, hey, what's all this white powder on my existing heater? If you're changing one out or if you have a service question, they should know the answer to that. Also, if you have a heater with repeated safety shutdowns, error codes, flame rollout fuses, you should ask your technician, why does this keep happening? What's going on?
Jason Davies:Typically, they'll be able to self incriminate or they may just simply be able to answer the question appropriately and say, because we don't have enough makeup air. And now it's your responsibility as the property owner and your duty of care to get that fixed. It's not something that can be avoided. In fact, I encourage technicians out there, get some red tags and put that on those appliances. If they're not safe, you're the last person to touch it, and likely you're gonna be responsible if something bad happens.
Jason Davies:Not mentioning any major hotel brands out there, but over the last year, use the word Google, and gas appliance, and the word carbon monoxide, and unhappy guests, and the line is getting quite quite prolific. So the big takeaway that I want you guys to all think about in this week's episode on makeup air, which is a really thrilling topic if you think about it. People ask if I'm a blast at parties, and the reality is I'm I'm not. I'd rather care about safety than a party. Air needs to come in.
Jason Davies:And in a lot of pool rooms, there might be new doors. There might be weather stripping added. These things are going to change the dynamics of the room that the equipment is in. So if someone seals up a room, cocks all the joints, make sure that little mice can't run into there, it's gonna change the dynamics of the room, and this may dramatically affect the heating or the heater or the gas appliance. Proper combustion leaves a nice blue flame and it's not gonna have these yellow and orange peaks that are huge on a pool heater.
Jason Davies:When the things are burning properly, it's gonna be a nice clean flame. When you're getting that, when you're getting sooting, it's a sign that there's not enough air. So some interesting safety tips on that. Number one, don't walk into a pool room without a CO monitor on you. It's a quick insurance policy, especially when you're walking into somewhere sketchy that says, oh, we've been having a problem for a while.
Jason Davies:Now what I also want you guys to think about is look at the bigger picture. When somebody asks you to service a pool heater, if you are qualified to do so, ask the questions first. Have there been any major changes to your pool equipment? Did someone get a new pump? Did somebody get a new salt system?
Jason Davies:Has anything changed in that room? It's a question that helps you understand the dynamics of the environment and what's going on before you. What you also wanna check about, has anything been done for sealing up joints? Has there been any insulation added? Has there been any weather stripping added?
Jason Davies:Have there been new doors? Has anyone decided to use that pool equipment room as a storage unit? One of the big things I run across, louvers being covered up by bookcases, for example. I recently had to turn down a pool heater replacement myself. I walked into a facility and I saw a bunch of insulation wrapped around ducting, completely inappropriate, not fireproof, and not safe.
Jason Davies:I also had to take a look at the way the heaters were structured compared to the venting, and I saw combined vents for those two heaters. It was a situation where let's get it done as soon as we can, but it was a situation where it could have turned very dangerous. Additionally, it was one of those tight little rooms with a bunch of other combustion appliances, and we know that it was going to be a big uphill battle to get things done correctly. Sometimes the client is very focused on they themselves and getting it done, and other times they're focused really on safety. But you have to remember as the pool guy, no matter whether you are licensed or whether you're not, it's your responsibility to know what you're doing, and it's your responsibility to know how to do what you're doing with what you're doing.
Jason Davies:A lot of people are very tempted to say, oh, that's an awesome opportunity for me to earn a thousand bucks. I'll go install a heater today. If you don't know all of the aspects of ventilation, makeup air, combustion, and many of the other safety features that go into pool heaters, stop. One of the things that can help out, asking a licensed person to work with you or have them do the job and have them train you. If you're in an area where you're not qualified to do the work, don't do the work.
Jason Davies:It's that simple. Alright. Well, that concludes this week's episode. If you wanna drop me a quick line to let us know how we did, you can find me at Pool Envy dot US. Next week's episode will follow, have a little interesting, story on makeup air continued along with gas heaters and gas lines, and we'll go from there.
Jason Davies:Wish you all the best of week. Have a great one, guys.
Voice Over:Thanks for listening to the Pool Envy podcast, where licensed pool professionals speak up. Hosted by Jason Davies, licensed across Wisconsin, Florida, and Texas. For more insights, subscribe and join us next time.