L’Arbre Croche gets an AQUAS Pool Package for Christmas

Case Studies

by Lochinvar Marketing Department | 05/13/2011

In November 2009, the original pool heater at the L’Arbre Croche resort finally ended its career. A new pool heater was needed but more importantly, it was needed fast.

L’Arbre Croche (French for “Crooked Tree”) is a beautiful resort community on the shores of Little Traverse Bay of Lake Michigan. L’Arbre Croche is nestled beside soft, white sand beaches and is a short drive from ski resorts to provide year round outdoor activity.

A high end resort, L’Arbre Croche was known for heating its outdoor pool year round. A time crunch was on to install a new pool heater in time for the Christmas holiday when the resort would be full with members and their guests.
 
Enter Rich Murphy, Lochinvar’s National Pool Sales Manager. Rich was approached about Lochinvar’s Copper-fin² pool heater. But Rich had another way.

Rich consulted with Mike McElroy, the Club’s property manager at L’Arbre Croche and presented the new Aquas pool heater package. The Aquas system features a Knight XL heating boiler skid-mounted and pre-piped to a secondary pool heat exchanger.

From the Knight XL Heating Boiler, hot water flows into the heat exchanger vessel. Pool water flows through copper-nickel tubes mounted inside the vessel. The pool water is separated from and indirectly heated by the boiler water which is important due to the high flow rates in the pool loop.

Mike McElroy was impressed with the Aquas package but was surprised by the model chosen. Rich offered the 399,999 Btu/hr Aquas to replace a pool heater originally firing at 1,000,000 Btu/hr. Due to the high efficiency of the indirect heating method, a lower Btu/hr input boiler could be used. In addition, the 5:1 turndown of the boiler’s input rate allowed the Aquas to track the heat loss of the pool and modulate the input rate to match the load. Operating at lower input rates reduced operating costs.

Local installer, Ballard’s Plumbing and Heating was contracted to install the Aquas and the installation proved easier than anticipated. First, the Aquas Package took less floor space than the original pool heater. The original metal vent pipe was replaced with easy to install 4” PVC. PVC pipe was also used for the combustion air which supplied the boiler with clean air, free of destructive pool chemicals. The simple water piping routed pool water straight through the Aquas pool heat exchanger.

The L”Arbre Croche 35,000 gallon pool was open and operating by the Christmas holiday. The pool temperature was kept at 101°F during daylight hours that often dropped as low as 0°F ambient.
 
“The Aquas Pool Package System was the best investment I made and my staff loves the simplicity and ease of maintenance.” Mike McElroy, Manager, L’Arbre Croche, Harbor Springs, MI.
 
For information about high-efficiency boilers and water heaters from Lochinvar, visit www.Lochinvar.com.