Nobody likes having a green pool, and when you first open it up, this is what it might look like. But opening your pool is an easy job if you know a few simple steps. Now, of course, you could pay someone else to open it, but that could cost you as much as $500. And if your pool turns green again, you’ll be paying them throughout the season.
So our today’s article, we’re going to show you how to open my own pool, save a lot of money doing it, and learn about taking care of the water so that it’s clear all season long. Now, of course, your pool installation will be different, plumbing can be different, but you can use this article as a general guide, but it will apply to in-ground and above-ground pools.
Taking care of any pool comes down to three C’s: cleaning, circulation, and chemistry.
Table of Contents
Cleaning
Let’s start with cleaning the pool water. In its natural state, pool water would have algae, fish, frogs, and other things. To make it clean and swimmable, we need to keep it physically clean and fight against nature.
The first step is to clean the top of the pool with a net as often as possible to pick up leaves and debris. I recommend using a skimmer net that holds the debris instead of letting it fall back into the pool.
Once a week, you’ll want to brush the walls of the pool. For the pool bottom, you can use a robot vacuum or a water vacuum to remove debris. I highly recommend investing in a robot vacuum if you can afford it, as it saves time and effort.
Most pools have a skimmer as the second line of defense in keeping the pool clean. It filters out leaves, grass, and insects. Empty the skimmer basket once a week and ensure the water level doesn’t get too low to avoid damaging the pump.
You’ll also need to empty the pool pump basket, which stops debris, and reprime the pump by adding water back. All pools have a filter, whether it’s a sand, cartridge, or DE filter. Cartridge filters need to be cleaned or replaced when they reach the end of their life. Monitor the baseline pressure of your filter housing, and if it gets too high, clean or replace the cartridge.
The first step to keep your pool nice and clean is to actually wipe it regularly with a cloth or to brush it with a pool brush, or any brush you can find, really.
After a few days, when you have your swimming pool set up like this, small microorganisms start to actually grow on the surfaces or on the bottom of the pool. They’re called algae, and if you leave them on, they can grow further.
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But if you brush them off with a wipe or with a brush itself, then they’ll get suspended in the water, and it’s much harder for them to grow.
Circulation
Circulation is crucial for maintaining a clean and clear pool. Running the pump 24/7 would be ideal, but it may not be feasible due to power costs. Aim to run the pump for at least 6 hours a day and increase the time as the water temperature rises in summer.
Good circulation allows the cleaning equipment to do its job. Reduce the pump running time in winter, but don’t shut it off completely unless you’ve winterized the pool for freezing temperatures.
Role of filter pump
Alright, so step number three, and that is to actually add a filter pump to your pool. So what the filter pump does is actually circulate the water in the pool, and that means that if there is any dirt floating around in the pool itself, the moving water will pick it up, and it will suck it through the tubes into this pump and clean it out of the pool.
And the second thing that also happens is to have good circulation with the water and the chemicals in the pool so they can mix properly, and the chlorine can actually do its work to keep the water nice and healthy and nice and clear.
One thing you have to remember, though, with, of course, the dirt that comes out of the pool and sucked into the filter pump, the dirt does not just disappear; it actually stays inside the filter pump.
So you do have to regularly clean the filter inside and especially when you notice that the flow going into the pool or out of the pool has become quite a bit less, it’s most likely that the filter inside the pump is a little bit dirty.
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So you have to actually open it up, take the filter out, just rinse it with a powerful jet of water or just under the tap, whatever you actually have available, put it back in, and switch the pump back on.
And it would be really good if you can actually do this daily. Then you’ll definitely get the best results. If you cannot, slightly less than that is probably fine as well. So like every other day or so.
Pool Water Detection
While some people may like diving into a swimming pool to refresh themselves, others may prefer a spa for deep relaxation. Having these amenities infuses a touch of luxury into your house and also offers fantastic experiences. Earlier, the maintenance and water testing task seemed daunting as it needed to be done manually. But now, advanced technologies are available to simplify this process.
For example, you can simply install apps available for Spa and Pool Water Testing, that help you monitor the quality of your pool water. For this, simply use a 6-way test strip that detects chemicals such as chlorine and bromine and measure pH, alkalinity, and calcium hardness.
So just dip these strips into your pool water, capture its photo using the app, and there you get your results. The app will also suggest your pool’s existing problems and give personalized recommendations for maintenance.
Chemistry
Chemistry is the most intimidating part of pool care. Keeping the pool’s chemistry balanced is essential for cleanliness, safety, and health. You can have your water tested at a local pool store to determine what needs to be added. Initially, seek professional help and guidance, and then you can take over.
Testing kits like dropper kits or test strips make it easy to test the water regularly. Balancing pH, alkalinity, and chlorine levels is crucial. Using a UV inhibitor, such as cyanuric acid, helps protect chlorine from breaking down in the sun. In a saltwater pool, you may need to add salt occasionally. When adding dry acid, follow the instructions carefully and dissolve it in a bucket before pouring it into the skimmer.
Adding chemicals
The most common pool chemical to use is actually chlorine. Chlorine normally comes in tablets.
Of course, what you don’t want to do is just take the tablet and throw it into the pool because then it starts eating away at the pool canvas and it ends up with a white spot instead of blue. And if you leave it a little bit longer, I’m pretty sure it’s going to even eat a hole into the pool, so that’s going to destroy it very quickly.
So what you actually need is one of these chemical floaters. So you just dump the tablet in there. You can open it, put the tablet in, and close it again.
And then you can set the opening if you want it to dispense fast or very slowly, and that mainly depends on the size of your pool and then secondary also on your local climate but mainly the size of the pool.
And then you make sure that it dissolves into the water nice and gradually, and it keeps going.
