Spring Vacuum Question and Liner Question

[DougM]

Hey everyone -
I'm in the process of opening my pool and opened to a green mess (Chicago area). It's starting to clear up with plenty of liquid chlorine being applied/tested/reapplied.

The question I have is should I get the hose and vacuum out or should I just throw the Polaris in and let him do the job?

Also - when I took the cover off a section of liner that wasn't loose and stretched down last year was unattached and stretched down 4 inches at the most over 3 feet. What could have caused this? I didn't close the pool - I had the pool store do it...could chemicals they used when they closed it in October have caused this somehow? The liner also seems extra faded compared to last year. Could they have nuked it with their power shock at close?

Lots of questions but so glad to have found this place - BBB all the way!

[aylad]

Hi, and welcome to the forum!!

Depending on how much debris you have in the bottom of the pool (I would expect very little if it's been covered), I would scoop out as much as you can with a leaf net, and then let Polaris do the rest for you. No sense in wasting water (with lots of chlorine in it, I might add) with a vacuum yet. Later,after you get the water cleared up and aren't still shocking, if you see that there's really fine stuff the Polaris didn't get, then you can always vac.

It's not uncommon for a section of liner to come loose and out of the channel--you can find posts by a user called Waste that will outline how to put it back in place. I've had spots after about 4 or 5 years that would come out, and putting it back in wasn't tough--then after I started getting large leaks in the liner and the water pushed up from under, very large sections like you're describing started coming loose. Does the liner look like it follows the contour of ground and then make a sharp turn to go up a wall,or does it look rounded where the floor meets the wall, like it would if there were water underneath?

As for the liner fading, it's possible the pool store did it, but to prove it you'd have to know what your CYA level was and what the chlorine level was after they finished shocking it.

We don't mind questions at all, so please post if you have more--glad to have you on the forum!!

Janet

[DougM]

I would guess only the smallest of debris. Just dead green stuff that the bleach killed. I was very tenacious before closing to make sure it was spotless on the bottom. One other piece of info. I have a cartridge filter and would be vacuuming to the filter but it sounds like putting the robot in to stir things up is the way to go. Thanks!

[aylad]

Yeah, with a cart filter, I would definitely make use of the Polaris!!

Janet

[waste]

Welcome to the Forum!

The liner out of track info is the second sticky in the Pool Construction and Repair section - if you have trouble getting the liner back in track after reading that, give a holler and I'll see what else I can come up with for you

[DougM]

Yea - so I realized that my filter (hasn't been cleaned since we moved in) probably needs to be cleaned. When I took the plugs out of the returns I never put the nozzles back in and when I was putting them back in today (I feel better touching the water today) I realized the pressure coming out is pretty low.

Later on I decided to vacuum because the pool store lost the drain plug from the Polaris pump and I rigged a plug the other day (a drill bit with a bunch of teflon tape works great) and when I remembered about it the store was already closed. So when vacuuming the dead algae off the bottom it was spitting out of the returns.

So I know what I'm doing tomorrow morning! :-)

[DougM]

Welcome to the Forum!

The liner out of track info is the second sticky in the Pool Construction and Repair section - if you have trouble getting the liner back in track after reading that, give a holler and I'll see what else I can come up with for you

Awesome - heading there now!