Hogwash. People drive the economy with demand. If people wanted cleaner more efficient America they would demand and get it. People hold the money and the big business wants it, to include the oil companies. The absolute primary reason we dont have a better option to power our world is because we demand the high performance, gas guzzling gigantic automobiles and trucks to haul our two children and all thier expensive toys. We are spoiled rotten to the core and blow energy resources like there is no tomorrow. But lawn mowers are not the way to clean air for our country and definitely not the great energy wasters of our time. America needs to learn how to go back to simpler forms of entertainment and learn contentment with fewer energy wasting toys. Get back on track with fuel efficient transportation and CLEAN UP THOSE SMOG LOVING FACTORIES! BUT what will it cost us besides money and a few toys? Well for one thing we will no longer have a problem with illegal immigrants, as there will be no more factories to leave us smog, no more jobs to fight over, and eventually no more America because we are willing and ready to keep buying products made all around the world where they dont give a tinkerers DAMN about the ecology, air polution, water and land polution, or worker safety, and especially dont give a damn about you Americans or your children! Keep on buying those cheap products specially designed to run in America, except most of us are going to be clawing around to find a way to buy food instead and only the elite rich will be buying. That is until the little guy finally gets fed up with being bottom feeders to the elite and they revolt and take their country back. Pity our poor children as we are rapidly digging them a hole they will never dig out of. America is becoming a cesspool and so many of us are not fighting it, just jumping in and swimming along with the rest of the lemmings! Good luck!

I have to say , whatever you choose, be very careful to follow the instructions that come with the filter "exactly" or even to the "conservative" side. I used a powerfilter years back, that relied on diatomaceous earth , and sometmes activated charcoal, to quickly clarify aquarium water , though it was meant to be only an occasional use and not a 24 hour a day application for the filter. At any rate it would remove the smallest possible particles suspended in the water, and the carbon various chemicals as well that discolored the water. It recommended only putting 1/4 the usual amount of carbon for the first use in the aquarium , as sometimes overly fast changes in chemestry etc. in the tank can harm the fish. Wanting a quick result I put the whole amount of carbon in at one application and left the house with the filter running to go to work. Living next door at the time to where I worked I had an uneasy feeling midway through work and managed to duck out for a while to check my aquarium , only to find many of my large prized angel fish swimming upside down and in circles and gasping for air. I ran them over to another tank , turned off the new filer , and then had to go back to work. Unfortunately more than half the affected fish were dead, when I returned home later that night. Perhaps this is an "obvious post" to many aquarium lovers and those with lots of experience, but even I with a science backgroud, got a little too eager and impatient for the health of my fish. I found the design of my diatom filter most odd and incovenient as well, and most likely newer designs are easier to use, but mine consisted of a glass jar with a bag attached inside the jar to a top pump with the inflo into the jar , which contained the diatom earth and then through a bag to the outflow back to the aquarium. The loose diatom earth, would be sucked at starting the pump so that it coated the outside of the bags where the water passed through to the inside and the outflow, but sometimes the bag would not coat properly and instead would force the diatom earth right through the bag and right into the aquarium, and that would allow the fish to get the stuff right into their gills, though I always watched at that first step of "coating the bag" to make sure they weren't exposed to large amounts of the earth;otherwise the fish might have been killed by the diatom earth or at least injured with much exposure , I'd think? Oh well this has been a lengthy post and I'm not familiar with all the newer designs for various filters etc. and most likely they're better designed nowdays and safer and easier to use, but if you've had another type of filter on your aquarium for any length of time, I'd consider keeping a close eye on your fish while trying new filers etc. so any quick changes in water quality and chemistry could be detected with any changes in the fishes behavior , so you could turn off the new filers, before disaster strikes. Most likely it won't!!

Lindsey, at least we know you're good at regurgitating Zeobrite marketing material. You see, in a commercial pool, water park, etc. there is so much crud in the water that it is simply impractical to use something like D.E. With D.E.'s superior filtering ability, the backwashing requirement alone would be too great, and too expensive. Sand has been the #1 choice in the commercial realm for years since, by its very nature, it doesn't filter as well, and thus doesn't require the same level of maintenance. Today however, there are increasing requirements on public pools, water parks, etc. to better control water contamination such as cryptosporidium. By bedding existing sand filters with Zeo, they gain filtering that is better than sand alone, but since Zeo doesn't filter any where as good as D.E., operators can still go longer between backwashing and/or other maintenance. As for its use in aquariums, it is commonly used in fresh water tanks, not as the primary filtering agent, but as a way to sequester ammonia. Fish tend to generate ammonia, and Zeolites assist in removing it by way of ion exchange. Zeo can't be used in salt tanks because the sodium ions will swap with the ammonium ions thus releasing them back into the water. The Zeobrite cleaning procedure, where you soak it in a strong salt solution, forces the ion exchange. The debate of course, is what if any benefit (past filtering) zeo is to a salt-water (SWG equipped) pools since any ammonium or calcium ions will probably be swapped back for the sodium, thus putting those items back in the pool. Anyway, I'm no expert in the field, but the above is based on lots of research on the subject, and not regurgitating someone's marketing material.

I suspect the grid network is what caused your rapid pressure rise, not that it was undersized. In addition to an annual tear down for cleaning, the grids also need degreasing. I suspect no one told you. The result was the fabric of the grids getting stretched. This cuts a grids usable filter area by more than 1/2, causing the rapid pressure rises and creating the leaking bottom. A new FNS48 Plus will likely be more than adequate. The 60 would have a tough time backwashing well. Given the age of the pool and the size of the pump, I would bet you have 1.5" plumbing. When you change the filter, I would bet that you would see a pressure drop to about 16 PSI. I doubt, with a clean and properly balanced pool, you would need to back wash more than once in 3 months. Scott