NEWBIE Solar Blanket Reel Question.......

[tenax]

john, in event you don't go that route, you might check out intheswim.com

i am in alberta and bought a solar reel, cover and blanket from them. the reel was the midlevel for 200 u.s. and it's working great. i found that a lot cheaper than the local pool store.they ship fedex so i did get some brokerage fees (would be about say 35 canadian for this value of item) but their shipping and handling was only 8.99! i've now bought twice from them. the 2nd purchase was 2 bags of zeobrite for my sand filter. the first option i checked out was to get it from an online pool store in winnipeg, but they wanted 100 bucks for shipping!

[NWMNMom]

We built ours with steel pipe/posts mounted into the ground about 2.5-3' back from end of pool, 20' steel pipe reel with 2.5" pvc mounted over/around it (welded washers onto pipe to support pvc), a crank handle and rivetted strapping between the pvc and blanket. Cranks up VERY nicely, pulls out very nicely. Nothing mounted on my pool rails and nothing to take off the pool when its rolled up. All mounted/installed on back end of pool so its out of direct view. If you do something like this, my suggestion would be to be sure to be high enough up from rail so blanket does not "catch" under rails as it rolls up. Matt has different rails so his won't but ours do - we are only a bit more than a foot higher than the rail. 1.5-2 feet would be better.