Opening pool - vacuum/siphon off bottom layer?

[GlennK]

I have no problems maintaining pool after initial opening. My pool contractor does the pool closing and opening for me (removes cover, starts pump, adds algecide and shocks). The pool is in pretty good shape at closing.
However, at opening, I must spend a lot of effort in vacuuming stuff which has settled to the bottom after the shocking. I have a mesh safety cover and DE filter. I use a leaf net to scoop up the worms that have crawled under the safety cover during the winter before I vacuum. But I still end up vacuuming a fair amount of debris off the bottom. My problem is really the frequent need for regeneration with the DE filter during the spring cleanup.I don't have a port to vacuum to waste. But with the land layout around my pool, I might be able to
use siphoning to vacuum the bottom layer of crud. My pool is about 15,000 gal and only 4.5 ft in the deep end, so with some extra hose I think the siphoning might work. Is this a good idea, or am I missing something?

Thanks

[PoolDoc]

That should work fine -- just go slowly, since you probably won't have much 'suction.

[JimK]

I have no problems maintaining pool after initial opening. My pool contractor does the pool closing and opening for me (removes cover, starts pump, adds algecide and shocks). The pool is in pretty good shape at closing.
However, at opening, I must spend a lot of effort in vacuuming stuff which has settled to the bottom after the shocking. I have a mesh safety cover and DE filter. I use a leaf net to scoop up the worms that have crawled under the safety cover during the winter before I vacuum. But I still end up vacuuming a fair amount of debris off the bottom. My problem is really the frequent need for regeneration with the DE filter during the spring cleanup.I don't have a port to vacuum to waste. But with the land layout around my pool, I might be able to
use siphoning to vacuum the bottom layer of crud. My pool is about 15,000 gal and only 4.5 ft in the deep end, so with some extra hose I think the siphoning might work. Is this a good idea, or am I missing something?

Thanks

When we had our pool installed in 2004, we opted to go with the mesh cover and DE filter. Like you, spring cleaning was a royal pain and I had to backwash and recharge the filter several times. The problem is all the fine debris that gets through the mesh cover over the winter. Also, rain dilutes the winter chemicals/algacide and enough light gets through to encourage algae growth necessitating opening the pool much earlier than I would like to prevent it from becoming pea soup (in our area, SE VA, that means opening the pool in early March.....brrrrrrrr).

As an experiment a few seasons ago, I bought a inexpensive solid cover and put it on top of the mesh cover. Since then spring cleaning has become MUCH easier and I can open the pool later (May instead of March). It now takes about 1/2 the time to get the pool ready for swimming. Personally, I'll never go back to a mesh cover.

You do have to pump water off of the solid cover, but with the mesh cover we had to monitor the water level in the pool and pump it down multiple times over the winter, so in that respect it's really no different.

I know this doesn't directly address your question, but I thought it might be a useful tip for you and others using a mesh cover.