Cover Options and Cover Types

[Steveromo]

I need some expert opinions about winter covers and ways to use them. My first winter I used the cover the standard way, air pillow in the middle, cable wench around the outside of the pool. Every rain resulted in multiple puddles and pumping and re-positioning and pumping some more - over and over each rain! The I decided to build a frame using 1" PVC pipes set upon two air pillows to raise the cover about 6 inches above the pool sides and I attached about 12 half-filled jugs of water around the perimeter grommets to pull the cover taut. It worked great! Rainwater ran right off and I never needed to pump any puddles. But last winter was very snowy, and the snow does not run off. Instead, it bent the PVC and deflated the air pillows. I'm afraid of what could have happened if the pvc snapped and punctured the liner! Now I don't know which method to use. I HATE pumping the water off after each rain, but the PVC frame presents a danger to the liner. I also need a new cover this year and I want one that will be strong enough to hold a large puddle or a heavy pile of snow without ripping. I also would like a thicker edge where the grommets are so they don't rip off like my starter cover did. I see terms like 12x12 scrim and 8x8 scrim and I don't know what they mean. Any advice on this issue would be greatly appreciated!

[Watermom]

Or........ don't cover the pool. I never cover mine and haven't for years with no issues. Another of the former moderators, Poconos, who lives in NE Pennsylvania also never covered his. Just something to ponder.

[CarlD]

I'm not covering mine this year!;);):evil:

[Steveromo]

Interesting... I will ponder, but still would like opinions about my cover options. However, I'd like to know more... if uncovered, do you have to continue running the pump / filter? How often do you fish out the leaves and debris? Do you drain the water level after heavy rain / snow? --- All things that take time to do in cold weather as opposed to my maintenance-free PVC cover method. Point / counterpoint comments welcomed!

[swimdaddy]

I am going to try a mesh cover this year which is supposed to let the water through, so no siphoning. However, when things are frozen and its snowing the mesh won't matter much so I will still use a pillow, but when it warms up a little I am hoping it will drain through. Makes sense to me, but I have never used a mesh cover before. I am still considering not covering, like Watermom, but for some reason that is a mental hurdle for me. Leaves, animals, kids, liability, all tumbling around around in my head saying "cover you pool"!

[BigDave]

I felt the need to chime in here regarding the safety issue. Even covered you still need to exclude people especially unsupervised children from the pool area.

I cover my AG pool. I leave quite a bit of water on top of the cover, I only pump it off when the cover gets tight. The water on top keeps the wind from filpping the cover up.

[Watermom]

I have a maple tree right beside pool that drops leaves into the pool. I just let them go in and then stay after getting the leaves out in the fall. Not a big deal. I have a leaf rake and I also have a Polaris 65 that does a great job getting leaves and big debris out. Once the leaves are off the tree, the pool stays pretty clean all winter. I do have to vacuum some dirt out in the spring but that is easy. I leave the pump on until we start having freezing temps at night which for us is probably around November. (That way I can continue to chlorinate throughout the fall when needed. But with the days getting cooler, the chlorine use drops considerably.) I drop the water level some, shock the pool, raise the pH up to about 7.9 (we have acidic rain here) and at that point, I don't have to do anything to the pool until spring.

For me, the cover is just not worth the hassle. Plus, I'd rather look at water through the winter instead of a pool cover. I also don't like the nuisance of having to pump water off the cover during the winter. That is a hassle. Plus, the occasional few leaves that get on the cover disintegrate and the water on top of the cover gets nasty. Invariably, removing the cover in the spring seemed to always dump nasty water into the nice clear water.

I do close the pool late and open early but my water is always clear. I know some people aren't interested in having an uncovered pool in the winter but for me it works. To each his own. :)

[swimdaddy]

Thanks Watermom, makes sense and seems practical with less hassle. So my question is why would anyone cover there pool? It seems like some do and some don't, so what are some reasons someone would want to cover their pool.

[JimK]

I'm not covering mine this year!;);):evil:

Yeah, Carl has solved the water drainage issue by removing the pool walls...lol. :D


Thanks Watermom, makes sense and seems practical with less hassle. So my question is why would anyone cover there pool? It seems like some do and some don't, so what are some reasons someone would want to cover their pool.

I think a lot has to do with the environment around the pool. It seems like around here there's always something in the pool year round.

When I was using a mesh cover, a lot of fine dirt would accumulate in the pool which was a big PITA to manually vacuum in the spring (I hate manually vacuuming). Also, it meant closing much later and opening much earlier, so there were several months of pool maintenance when it was too cold to enjoy. Switching to a solid cover made spring cleanup much easier and faster, and I can close/open when I want (usually Oct/May).

That said, the cover can also be a pain. ;) If our pool didn't get so dirty with the mesh cover, I'd be inclined to try Watermom's coverless method. :)

[CarlD]

Yeah, Carl has solved the water drainage issue by removing the pool walls...lol. :D

Yeah, but I wouldn't recommend it on a seasonal basis!

[Steveromo]

Great discussion about to cover or not to cover. But, if I DO cover, I'd still like some feedback on my proposed methods of covering. Has anyone else used (or heard about) the PVC frame method? If so, what are you thoughts?

[CarlD]

Not heard of the PVC frame method, but if snow builds up on it and turns to ice it could collapse, I'd think. Remember: 1 cubic <foot--sorry> YARD of water weighs about 1750 lbs--7/8 of a ton!

[JimK]

Not heard of the PVC frame method, but if snow builds up on it and turns to ice it could collapse, I'd think. Remember: 1 cubic foot of water weighs about 1750 lbs--7/8 of a ton!

Actually, 1 cubic foot weighs 62.3 pounds. ;)

http://www.ask.com/science/much-cubic-foot-water-weigh-ac1656c2efc1f7c8

Sorry. I typed "foot", meant "yard" and there are 27 cubic feet in a cubic yard.

(BTW, the 62.3lbs is for distilled water, not water loaded with chlorine, calcium, salt, etc, which is closer to 65lbs)

[swimdaddy]

I am not sure you could safely build a "tent" to avoid puddling without endangering your liner. I suppose you could go nuts and buy enough pillows to fill the entire surface of your pool, and as long as they were taller than the pool side you would get some drainage. However, once again snow would not drain off, and any dips or valleys in your cover between pillows would suffer a lot of pressure and potential damage. The point of the "pillow in the middle" with slack in the cover is so that the cover is always supported from underneath by the water/ice or the pillow, and its not pulling too much on the pool sides. Puddling may just be an unavoidable consequence.

[kathyet]

We cover our pool every year with the loop loc cover..It keeps the neighbors leaves out of it and we tend to get a lot of wind. It stays reasonably clean, we add our chemicals if needed through the skimmer usually just the chlorine tabs. We do chemical it before covering for the season. We run the pool 5-6 hours every day/night we switch to night time for the cold, we have an intelliflo variable speed pump.. The only problem we have is trying to set the pump from summer to winter time, we find that very confusing we got this pump last year.... We remove the cover in the spring before we turn on our solar heater for the season, usually in April sometime and we change the water every three to fours years ..We really like our cover it does save a lot when getting ready to open for the season..We live in Las Vegas