I made an excel file with links to purchase items.
Thanks for taking the time to do this. It is beyond helpful
2 Likes
Thanks man, just ordered all of it today directly from the links on your spreadsheet! You rock!
Welcome, good luck with it. Mine is still going strong.
Geeze - looks like these parts are flying off the shelves since nearly all of the components are back ordered from US Plastic. Like…all the parts! Wow.
Still impacts of shipping from Chyner. I’m waiting on a bunch of stuff from there too.
Just ordered everything on the list. Used 4 locations! 
pool zoom had the metering valves for $106 all 3 shipped. Kleen-rite had the check valves. They were the only one with the Hastelloy springs that I found, not that I looked for a long time. All in $204 and I ordered a few dollars of extra parts.
Those $40 Pentair valves use to be $20 on Amazon. Now, for about $200 more you can get the good metering valves.
Is there a way to message people on here? Tried but I just joined… I’m looking at an old tru green vehicle now and wanted to ask you some questions.
Thanks
@Patriotspwashing
Click on someones name and then message
You can’t message people when you first join until your post count reaches a certain number.
2 Likes
has anyone done a set up with just one Series 523 ball valve, one cheap pentair rainbow for soup and straight pipe for water since water valve is always fully open?
I’ve thought about it im sure it could be done. You still need a ball valve on the water though what if you want to transfer some chemicals but now you can’t turn the water off with it.
than a regular ball valve would work. just on and off
1 Like
What fitting connects the 1/2” I’d host into the 12v motor
And what fitting on the exit side of the 12v motor that goes to hose reel.
Also what fitting goes into hose reel from id hose that comes from proportioner
I’m having a hard time figuring out all the softwash and pressure washing fittings
Any help is appreciated
Wondering how your set-up has been doing? I’m about ready to build one and have heard bad comments on the Pentair valves cracking a lot. Some, I believe are knockoffs on Amazon that are cheap plastic from China.
Good morning Jayson,
I have been using the Pentair valves now for a couple of years and have heard the issues of them cracking also. I think it is because people are over tightening them and not because of the valves themselves. I have never had one crack on its own. My setup has worked well for me, I am still using it, although this year I have purchased an AR30 gas roof pump and a bigger manifold / proportioner for that. At the time, the Pentair valves were plentiful and the GF (Georg Fischer) valves were hard to come by. If I were doing it over I would go with a 1/2 inch GF metering valve for the SH, the same SMC needle valve and just a normal ball valve for the water. I have never had to use a mix greater than 6% (I am using 12.5 % SH), so with the SH wide open and the water wide open I would get 6%. Therefore a regular ball valve for the water works just fine. I have been using a Delavan 7 GPM 12 volt pump. I hope this helps, please feel free to drop me a line if you have any other questions.
1 Like
Thanks, I appreciate the feedback. I have been looking into this for the past week or so. It looks easy enough to build and I also wondered if people were just over tightening them…or they were the cheap knock-offs. I just need to decide if I want to spend the extra money on the GF valves. One video I say showed a guy using hose clamps on the valve to help keep it from expanding and cracking. Another video I saw showed a guy testing a ball valve vs a metering valve like you mentioned. The ball valve allowed more flow than a wide open Pentair valve so the ratios weren’t correct. Proportioner Build & Test - YouTube.
Jayson,
I have never tried placing a pipe clamp around a portion of the valve, but it seems like it would work. I have yet to use the metering aspect of the Pentair valve that controls the water, that is why I think a standard ball valve would work just as well (and save money).
What I did after I had my proportioner assembled, I used three 15 gallon drums. I filled two of them with water. I stuck my SH draw tube in one and my water draw tube in the other. And the output tube into the empty 15 gallon drum. Then with the water wide open I would set my Pentair SH valve to a number, say 3. I would turn on my 12 volt pump and let the pump run until one of the drums was filled. I would make note of how many gallons from the SH drum was gone and how many gallons of the water drum were gone. Write down the results and change your drums around so one is filled and two are empty and change the Pentair dial to 2. rinse and repeat. When you are done, plug the numbers in to the attached Excel spreadsheet. That will give you an idea of how strong your mix is. Don’t worry about the soap ratio. It is easy to adjust as you go. If you were to use the SMC needle valve, I found I get a good amount of soap by opening it one half turn. Initially I used a Pentair valve for my soap and opened it just a little bit. Well, that “little bit” drained about 2.5 gallons of Cling-on or Roof Snot or whatever soap I was using at the time. Way more than I should have used. That is why I found the SMC needle valve. Hope this helps.
Steve Kraus
(Attachment Calculating SH Percentages.xlsx is missing)
1 Like
Jayson,
I just got an email that my attachment was rejected. It was an Excel spreadsheet for calculating SH percentages. I am happy to send it to you if you want it, but I will need a different email address for you. I guess the forum won’t allow us to add attachments. Sorry for that, I didn’t know.
1 Like
