I'm Ready For Nice Weather!

[CarlD]

Hurting, in pain, AND this lousy weather? Ouch! We had a few gorgeous lovely days after lots of storms, then more storming and lousy weather. We lost three trees just over a week ago.

[AnnaK]

It sure was good to hear from you, Lisa! Though I am sorry to read about the aches and pains and all that in addition to what you're already going through. I have sciatica now and then as a result of a slipped disc and OUCH! You have my sympathies!

No robins here yet but the forsythia have that distinct yellowish tinge they get just a couple of days before the blossoms open. And the lilac buds are about to burst.

We opened out pool over the weekend. That's just a manner of speaking because we don't cover it over winter. We connected the plumbing and are in the process of topping it off it from the well which will take several days. The tests I did this afternoon are all within acceptable ranges, FC is way low, of course, so I think I'll go dump in a bottle of bleach and stir it up with the leaf net. Gives me something to do on a sunny afternoon and keeps me off the streets, as they say.

Anna

[Poconos]

The stupid robin birds arrived here a couple weeks ago and unlike prior years, the day after was nice with no ice. Got all my equipment hooked up yesterday and the only thing I'm dealing with is a tiny leak at the pump outlet fitting. We're supposed to get a little snow in the next couple days though. Won't last, temps are too high but at night it will dip into the 20's. Probably will take the plow off the tractor and put the mower deck on in the next couple days. I sure am enjoying warm days for a change. Yes, 50's seem warm.
Al

[AnnaK]

Sigh.

The weather is messing with my head and I am not happy! This business of opening in March is great and all but then the weather people tell me it's gonna drop to 22 F tonight and all I can think of is the water that's now in my pump and filter.

We haven't done a leak check yet, haven't run the pump yet, I'm contemplating plugging in a heating pad to cover the pump. Pardon me, but this sucks!

Is a night's worth of 22 F enough to crack the PVC pipes?

[Poconos]

Can you just run the pump? Water in pipes has to freeze solid before they break. The temp probably won't be low enough and long enough to do damage. The mass of water in the pump and filter won't even come close to freezing in one night. If your gauge is on the filter you'll probably lose that. It's a low thermal mass and water in the tube will freeze and screw up the zero and calibration. Cheap to replace or if it's good now just unscrew it and take it inside. If you have a multiport valve on top of the filter put the handle in an intermediate position to let water drain out of the valve assembly. Being north of you all I plan to do tonight is wake up around 3 and run the pump for a couple minutes and go back to sleep. Being lazy I'll just put the laptop by the bed and won't even have to get out from under the covers to do this.
Al

[AnnaK]

We did get enough water in the pool to run the pump on low. No leaks, oh yay! I took the opportunity to dump in a large bottle of bleach and get that whole process started. The chems tested out pretty much as expected except the pH is kind of high at 8.2 but the water is really cold still so that might not be an accurate measurement.

Now, as to your remote controlled pump, I am so impressed!!! But why are you waking up at 0300? Can you not activate some sort of timer software to turn the pump on and off? That way you could snooze right on through.

[Poconos]

Certain things should have human intervention like looking at the pressure to make sure nothing is frozen. I do have a mechanical timer on it too but don't use it much. At 9:45 it's already down to about 30.
Al