A good way to pump water off of the pool cover

Friday night I wanted to get the remnants of water off of the cover and take the cover off so that Saturday am, I could fill the pool, hook up the pump, etc.

I have a deck & walk around so this worked rather well:

I used the submersible pump but there is debris that would plug it up after a while. I do keep the leaves off of the cover until it freezes but this is all of the other stuff that lands in over the winter an up until recently.

I came up with this method that worked very well for me yesterday.

I took a HD 5 gallon bucket, my submersible pump, garden hose and the leaf net.
http://www.skijay.com/pool060207a.jpg
I then inserted the pump in side the bucket
http://www.skijay.com/pool060207b.jpg
Place the leaf net on top and use another bucket to collect water off of the cover and pour into the pump bucket. The leaf net strains the water and there are no plug ups of the pump. My pump is fairly fast and takes about 45 seconds to empty out 5 gallons. You have to move quick!
http://www.skijay.com/pool060207c.jpg
I would have taken the pics yesterday in use, but I had an hour to do empty off the cover and did it.

I have a question. Whats the point of the pump, if your just taking buckets of water from the top of the cover any way?

I think he's using the pump to move the water away from the pool instead of just bailing buckets onto the ground, right?

How does the water get in the bucket?

I am using another 5 gallon bucket to gather the water. So that is about 40lbs of water I have to move with each bucket full. I have to scoop it up, stand up walk about 5 feet and throw it away from the pool.

By setting up the pump in a bucket all I have to do is scoop up some water an pour it into the bucket. A lot easier on the back!

Here's an even better way

Drill a number of 1/2" holes (many many many) in your Home depot bucket, set your pump with hose attached in the bucket, put 3/4" pea gravel around the pump for weight
Set the bucket on the cover - it should push down a fair amount if you added enough weight to it, turn your pump on.

It should keep debris from entering the bucket/pump.

Of course, you do have to donate 1 complete bucket to the cause of cleaning your cover.

Simpler yet - with a Arctic Armor Micromesh winter cover. Water and melting snow drops through, debris is either swept off as it collects or dries and is pulled off with cover. A leaf net over that in late fall/early winter is even better to catch the leaves/debris but not required. We opened to crystal clear water with a tiny bit of fine silt in a few spots on the bottom.

Matt,

That is a great idea. The stones will filter out the debris. Sort of like how a sump pump is set up.

Pretty much the same idea and a lot less of a pain in the back - instead of dunking and lifting, one can sit back with a beer!