Jarred returns to the podcast to talk about dry weight vs. liquid volume, and how it relates to pool chemicals. We also discuss chlorine product percentages and what they mean.
00:00 - Introduction
02:29 - Three most profitable tools for pools
06:16 - Dry scoop vs. Liquid measuring cup
09:56 - Product percentages
12:59 - Closing
157. Measuring Chemicals: Volume vs. Weight
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[00:00:00] Eric Knight: Welcome back everybody to the Rule Your Pool podcast. I apologize for being AWOL for two weeks. Travel has overlapped with trying to get these things out every single week. I've been visiting a bunch of customers. Um, it's kind of nice being back in the field, visiting customers, teaching classes. That's always nice. But it has prevented me from being able to do this.
[00:00:18] I've also been working on a topic that we're going to talk about in the next episode with the same guy that we have on this episode. It's good to have you back, co host. Jarred...
[00:00:28] Jarred Morgan: oh man, I've had a long hiatus. Uh, some things have just been going on in the world. And, uh, I'm happy to be back. I know it's been a minute. I don't even remember the last time I did an episode, but I'm, I'm happy to be here to keep you in check.
[00:00:43] Eric Knight: Well, I don't know if you're going to be able to do that. But yes, it is good to have you back because we have had nothing but technical difficulties using this software that we're trying to do to have multiple people on the podcast at once virtually. We used to use zoom, but that was a lot of editing time after the fact, trying to merge the files and make it overlap correctly.
[00:01:01] And if this works, it's great. But it has failed me on four consecutive guests. That I haven't been able to release those episodes and I'm very frustrated with it. And it's hard to get those people back. I've had some cool guests and this software that supposedly is fixed now, we're going to hope that this works.
[00:01:20] In this episode, it's going to be a short one. But it's an important one. And the reason I say that is because I was just training customers this past couple of weeks, and most people did not realize this was a thing. And for the homeowners out there, this is very important, but for pool pros, it's critically important to understand the difference between volume and weight.
[00:01:40] We're talking about measuring chemicals. Jarred, anything to add before we go?
[00:01:45] Jarred Morgan: I obviously did not read the show notes. But I'm glad you told me what we're going to talk about. There's also another piece that we could probably touch on is paying attention to the active chlorine or percentage strength on your bottles and barrels. Because that does play a big part in how much money you're spending to do a certain thing.
[00:02:05] Eric Knight: Well, we can. We covered that in a previous episode and it was actually a pretty deep one and that would have been let's see That would have been in episode 131, way back in the day. I think that was recorded in December of 2023. We recorded that. So if you actually listened to the podcast, Jarred, you would know that we've already covered that. But we can cover it again today. That's fine.
[00:02:27] Jarred Morgan: Thank you.
[00:02:28] Eric Knight: All right, let's go.
Three most profitable tools for pools
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[00:02:29] Eric Knight: We talk a lot in the six bad habits that there are things that people don't really realize are a big deal. But they add up over time, especially for a pool professional. And these bad habits cost a lot of money and they cost a lot of risk as well. Because a lot of problems are caused by ignoring these things and they cost pretty much nothing to fix.
[00:03:12] One exception to that is a very low cost of using measuring cups. In most of the classes that I teach, I talk about the three most profitable tools that pool pros should use, but they rarely do. And those three tools are a clean white bucket, a thermometer, and measuring cups.
[00:03:33] Real quick recap. A white bucket, not an orange Home Depot bucket or a blue Lowe's bucket is important, and they're free because they're just old chemical buckets. They are going to be used to pre dissolve dry chemicals, to dilute acid, and the reason it needs to be white is to see color contrast in water. If you're doing something like the white bucket test.
[00:03:53] The thermometer should go without saying. We need to know the temperature to know the LSI. That's a pretty simple one,
[00:03:59] But measuring cups are often not used. And I don't understand why. Sometimes people will use a scoop and they'll just throw in a scoop, but they don't really realize how much that is, to Jarred's earlier point of not paying attention to the percentages of what you're throwing into that pool. But a lot of people that I see have a measuring cup, but it's a liquid measuring cup and they're scooping dry chemical with it.
[00:04:20] And that is a bad practice because that is not how you measure dry chemicals. So what we're really going to cover here is the difference between volume and weight. Jarred Why are all liquids measured by volume? Do you know?
[00:04:35] Jarred Morgan: Hmm, by volume? Because, there, well, that wouldn't make sense. The densities are different depending on which liquids you're using. But that still is a weight thing. Um, no. I don't know.
[00:04:50] Eric Knight: The real reason is when something is liquid, it will fill the exact volume of whatever container you put in it. That is not necessarily the case of dry stuff. So if you have flakes, for instance, there's going to be a higher volume. It's going to look like a bigger pile because there's a lot of air pockets in it. It cannot completely fill.
[00:05:06] Jarred Morgan: Prime example is DE. Very light.
[00:05:09] Eric Knight: Light and fluffy. Exactly. So you're going to have a higher volume for weight. So if you were going to standardize how you measure something with dry chemicals, you can always weigh an amount of dry chemicals, right? You just put it in whatever size you zero out the scale.
[00:05:21] You put it in until the weight is correct. That's a lot harder to do with liquid. Because Jarred, you know, PR-10,000 is a lot heavier than water. So there isn't really a standard weight to liquids. Gasoline is lighter than water. Chlorine is heavier, right? So how do we know based on weight? Well, we don't.
[00:05:38] So there really isn't a standard weight measurement for liquids. We just do volume and therefore all of the standards are based on volume because that is simple. A cup of milk is identical volume to a cup of water or a cup of chlorine or whatever. And we can do that because liquids will always fill the exact shape of a container.
[00:05:58] Dry chemicals cannot do that. All right. So there's going to be air pockets in there and that's the variability. So that's, that's the basic reason why. When you look at the Orenda Calculator, there's a note at the bottom of your dosing that says dry chemicals are by weight, liquids are by volume. So you need two measuring cups.
Dry scoop vs. liquid measuring cup
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[00:06:16] Eric Knight: You need a liquid one. And you need a dry one. Now in the pool industry, Jarred, you, you've been a pool pro for a long time. The dry chemical scoops. What's different about that versus the liquid?
[00:06:28] Jarred Morgan: Well, the dry chemical scoops they have a handle on them and they're rounded on the ends or they're flattened on the bottoms. And people generally just throw them in their buckets or their bags, depending on which chemical they're using. And the assumption is that a one pound scoop is a one pound scoop.
[00:06:42] A two pound scoop is a two pound scoop. That is specific to that chemical in which that scoop comes in. Okay.
[00:06:50] Eric Knight: For instance, granular cal hypo comes with a scoop that says it's one or two pounds, depending on the brand.
[00:06:56] Jarred Morgan: Or eight ounces or whatever it may be, that's for that chemical. You cannot take that one pound scoop and use it in DE and then go to calcium and then go to whatever, because those are not all one pound.
[00:07:07] Eric Knight: And hold on before, but going further, you're right. But you bring up a good point. You should never just transfer this stuff without rinsing the thing off and drying it first. You do not want to have residual Cal Hypo stuck to a wet cup and then go reach in and scoop granular trichlor. We had a customer post this on Facebook just within a month ago, and it blew up his cart because just a little bit of Cal Hypo was stuck to it, put it in dichlor and kaboom.
[00:07:31] So it ties back to chemical safety, but always clean the thing in between, but continue, Jarred.
[00:07:37] Jarred Morgan: Yeah, so in the pool industry, and I'm sure if you go to a retail store if you're a homeowner, you see the orange scoops or the blue scoops or the different colored scoops. It's always good obviously to measure out like Eric was saying earlier by weight, put it on a scale. It's not that complicated. Zero it out and for DE get a Sharpie and write a line. Say this is for DE, this is where you fill it for DE. This is where you fill it for bicarb, and so forth, to get your various weights. Um, on that scoop, or if you have a dedicated scoop, that's even better.
[00:08:07] Now, there are scoops that are sold, where they'll have the marks listed on the outside of the scoop for the various chemicals that we commonly use in the industry. Definitely a good tool to have.
[00:08:18] Eric Knight: One pound of DE is a much bigger volume than one pound of Cal Hypo. Cal Hypo looks like a much smaller amount, but it is one pound. And our calculator is based on weight. So one pound is one pound, even though it looks smaller than a pound of DE. And that's why these scoops have graduated lines.
[00:08:37] So, like I said, this is a short episode. Be aware, use a liquid measuring cup for liquids. Rinse it out every time in between, and then use a dry one with those graduated lines on it, which you can get at any pool store or pool distribution. And if your store doesn't have it, you can get it online. It's very easy.
[00:08:55] You want one that has a line for sodium bicarb, for Cal Hypo, calcium chloride, et cetera, DE if that's the case. And you should be able to use that and just make sure that the chemicals don't interact. These things are not expensive. It's not a bad idea to have more than one. Label it so, like, if you have a dedicated Cal Hypo scoop, keep it just dedicated to that. Do not interact it with anything else. In fact, just today, there was a massive fire from Cal Hypo at a distributor. Was there not? Who knows how that happened?
[00:09:24] Jarred Morgan: Yep. And that this isn't the only, like, this is a common thing. Like this stuff is volatile. Cal hypo specifically. It's not stable. Um, so any moisture, anything like that causes it to catch fire. This is, these are chemicals we deal with. They are very real.
[00:09:41] Eric Knight: Yeah. Yeah. So you don't rinse a dry scoop and immediately put it back into a chemical. It has to be dry when you use it. Um, so just be very careful. I would say common sense, but if you don't know what you don't know, common sense is not common. But anyway, that's pretty much all we have for this episode.
Product percentages
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[00:09:56] Jarred Morgan: I do have to touch on something I mentioned earlier about paying attention to the percentage of strengths that we mentioned in an earlier episode. But the only reason I bring it up now is because it's fresh on my mind. It's been a project that I've been working on and
[00:10:10] Eric Knight: Hold You work on projects?
[00:10:12] Jarred Morgan: I know that's, that's, why I haven't been here.
[00:10:14] Eric Knight: I didn't think you actually had a job anymore.
[00:10:16] Jarred Morgan: It consumes my whole, you know, two months or however long it's been since I've been on here. Um, Maybe I don't know how long it's been. But looking at the different strengths of chemicals and how they're not very clear when you buy them. It's very important.
[00:10:34] Like I was looking at this Cal Hypo because we're talking about it, for example. There's percentage strengths of Cal Hypo that range from 48 percent to 73 percent. That is a massive difference. And if you just walk into your retail store or your wholesale supplier, whoever you are and say, I need Cal Hypo. Well, they're going to give you what they have. But let's say you normally buy 73 percent Cal Hypo., And they give you 68 percent Cal Hypo. That is over a 7 percent difference in strength. So therefore you're paying 7% more.
[00:11:10] On the label, it looks like a 5 percent difference. But if you're looking at a dose rate to get where you want to go, it's actually over a 7 percent difference if you divide, the 68% by 73%, it's over 7 percent difference.
[00:11:25] Eric Knight: That's a good point because again, you're comparing the chlorines. If you're used to what that higher strength does, you're absolutely right. It is going to be a 7 percent reduction in strength.
[00:11:34] Jarred Morgan: You need 7 percent more. So if you walk in and just ask for something generically like that, be aware you could be paying more inadvertently. You might pay the same or a little less upfront, but you're going to be using more to accomplish the same thing.
[00:11:50] Eric Knight: Which is going to increase the amount of calcium that you're putting in your pool and the amount of salt because you're putting chlorides in as well.
[00:11:56] Jarred Morgan: The amount of money it's going to cost you. It's a lot of
[00:12:00] Eric Knight: Speaking of which, this is a good use for our new Chemiculator, which is the second option in the Orenda App under the main calculator. We added it this summer. And you can go in there and you can type in a custom percent for Cal Hypo, or liquid, or trichlor, or whatever you have. And you can type in that percent and then select one pound, for instance, or two pounds, whatever it is based on your pool. And it will show you in real time exactly the chemical impact that that's going to have on your water. That way you can see it for yourself. You will see that there's a big difference between the 65 percent and the 70%
[00:12:34] And that calculator is going to show it. So if you want to go over to the custom, because you're buying something from a retail store or Lowe's or whatever, and it's a lower number, just type it in right there on the percentage. And you will see on your own screen exactly what that percentage of Cal Hypo is going to do. Good point.
[00:12:51] Jarred Morgan: I'm glad we could rehash this, uh, after many, many moons and many episodes, but I felt like it was worthwhile since it was top of mind.
Closing
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[00:12:59] Eric Knight: Yeah. I hope this was informative for you and it should go without saying, but there are people that make this mistake and I just witnessed it in the past two weeks where people just didn't know. And we want you to be informed on this podcast. We want you to Rule Your Pool, and if you're pro, we want you to rule all your pools, plural. So we hope this helps you.
[00:13:17] Jarred Morgan: And not waste money by having different measurements and different volumes and thinking we're doing something that we're not. So this is part of, you know, standard operating procedures, being better at running your business and knowing what you're doing. And at the end of the day, hopefully that benefits you. That's the goal.
[00:13:34] Hope, hope you're not listening just to hear Eric's voice or me occasionally to pop on here to tell him he's an idiot because you're taking time out of your day and we hope that we provide some sort of value.
[00:13:45] Eric Knight: Well, you're not wrong. I am an idiot, but that's not why they're here. At least I don't think so. They're here for the music, and Jarred. I get too many comments of people like, bring Jarred back.
[00:13:54] Jarred Morgan: Hmm. Sorry.
[00:13:55] Eric Knight: Jarred doesn't even listen to the podcast. Why is he so much more popular than I am? I don't get it. You have a fan appeal, man. You got a big fan base of at least seven people.
[00:14:04] Jarred Morgan: It's because they get tired of listening to you without somebody interjecting at least keeping you in check, or trying to.
[00:14:09] Eric Knight: Yeah, that's fair. Anyway, this has been episode 157, I believe. And yeah, 157. Look at that. Thank you for your time. We appreciate it. And until next time, good luck.
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