Salt generator problem?

I’m having a problem with keeping any chlorine in my pool.  Free and total chlorine are close to 0 ppm. I have an astralpools E25 salt generator and it has always worked well (year 3 now).  The salt, pH, alkalinity, etc… seem to be fine.  CYA was at ~ 40 so I added a little bit more, maybe this will help.  However, I just tried to read Cl levels right from the return and even that was only at 2 ppm.  The generator has a clear plastic shell and I can see the Cl gas being produced and the amount changing when I select different power modes.  Still not much Cl in the water.  There is no visible scale on the electrodes but I cleaned with muriatic acid anyway … no help.  Maybe the generator is going bad and just not producing enough?  Could it be something else?  Not sure what to do other than to buy another generator and try.

Hello

salt water generators require a higher CYA level to help the generator produce chlorine. The ideal range is 70-80 ppm. I would raise the CYA level first and see if that helps

Thanks for the help.  I tried testing the water coming right out of the return after the chlorinator.  I could measure some Cl but only ~ 2 ppm, seems like it should be much higher than that, though I can see the gas being made.  Also added 2 lbs of ca hypochlorite last night and FC/TC was between 5-10 ppm in the morning withoug chlorinator running.  It was still at least 5 ppm at 10:00 am but dropped to ~ 1 ppm when I got home from work at 5:00.  I have no idea what is going on.

Have you changed the run time for the filter? If the filter run time hasn’t changed, maybe the setting on the swg needs to be adjusted. Can you turn the setting up?

One other thing. From what I’ve read, the life span of the cell inside salt water generators is between 3and 5 years… Maybe someone else who has a salt water generator can tell you how to check the cell.

I have had it cranked up to 100%.  Seems to me the cell is going bad, maybe putting out only partial amount

Typically the life span of a salt cell is 3-5 years depending on how often you run the salt cell so it probably is time for a new cell. It seems as the astralpools E25 salt generator is for the Australian market and is a salt cell we don’t have access to. Here is a Google Search which came up with a few results of companies who may carry this salt cell

astralpool e25 salt generator replacement cell

I think I have solved the problem.  I shocked the pool pretty heavily and turned the cell off for a few days and washes the filter cartridges several times. .  After the cl levels started dropping I turned the cell on and it is now maintaining proper levels.  I guess I had to kill off a bunch of stuff.  Now I even need to turn the cell down to 60%