Welcome to our forum.
I think we need to, after all how often do we get to see a Steve tyraid these days? (don't ya just love those! )If it drags him out of the Hydropool shadows to enlighten some poor unsuspecting fool with his unique brand of knowledge mixed with sarcasm then I'm all for it!
Please insert your average operating costs based on a family of 4 using the these spas 5 times a week at 32F. Let's suggest that each spa is used for a total of 1 hour per day and during this time, 2-4HP pumps are running for 30 minutes of that time.
On to filtering, Is a continious running circ pump and a huge filter or numerous filters all that advanced. Do you know why all circ pump filtered tubs have over sized filters, all it is for is to prolong the time between filters having to be cleaned,
as you know a circ pump is caring a heavy load,
and working against gravity located beneth the water,
larger filters take longer for depree to slow down water flow so to put less strain on the pump, so just because you have filter sizes rated for 10,000 gallons of water does not make the filtering better,
nor does running a circ pump all the time give you any more turn over rate,
We have a 900 sp ft filter that filters down to 1 micron, while you are still using paper filters.
It is a great concept but no tub has true no by pass filtering with all the pumps on high speed, so if you believe that, well its BUNK!!!
I have to run friends, will talk soon!!
I am very aware of Hotsprings, their piping is no by pass, but that does not mean that water at those gallons per minute are not being pushed around the filters, the Ideal of no by pass plumbing is a good one and the play out of it in it's form now is better than not to.
First of all any thermal panel tub that has insulation on the shell of it's tub will have very little heat transfer from air space to the water, By using a fiberglass shell with NO insulation on it you don't block the heat from the water away from the air space, nor the heat from the pumps from the water. The last coleman I saw had insulation on the shell, How can you argue that insulation will allow the same amount of heat transfer as fiberglass!!!