When closing your swimming pool for the season, it's all about preparation. Just a little bit...
Prepping your pool before winterizing can actually make winterizing easier plus it will you help you have a more successful opening and start up the following spring.
There are 4 basic or essential steps that will help prepare your pool for winterizing. The steps are easy to follow and I think they'll make sense. Start about 2 weeks ahead of closing for best results. If you don't want to read, you can watch the video .
Here are 4 Essential Steps (after the video):
1.Take care of & treat any existing pool water problems. If you've been dealing with algae or cloudy water, get the water cleared up. Contrary to popular belief, the cold water will NOT kill the algae or excess bacteria leading to cloudy water. The only thing the cold or freezing water will do is maybe make that algae and bacteria become dormant.
Can't maintain a stable chlorine or bromine reading? Deal with those demand issues before closing the pool. They will only worsen over the course of time that the pool is closed.
Keep in mind that most of the United States does not experience long-term, below-freezing temperatures. If the water isn't frozen, algae is going to grow; slowly, but it will grow.
2. Balance the Water. Nothing helps make winterizing more successful than balanced water. That's right, pH, total alkalinity & calcium hardness are important even when the pool is closed. You may have the algae & excess bacteria under control, but if the water isn't balanced, your pool's surfaces will take the brunt of poor water balance. The vinyl liner will be affected, not to mention the paint or the plaster finish. Even the gelcoat of a one-piece fiberglass pool can be affected by poor water balance. Read more (or watch the video) about water balance here.
3. Maintain good & proper sanitizer levels. Whether you're using chlorine, bromine, biguanide (BioGuard Soft Swim or Arch Chemical Baquacil), salt/chlorine, Pristine Blue, ionizer, whatever you use, maintain a proper level.
4. Combat biofilms & other "unseen" problems. If you've been experiencing "chronic" algae problems or are unable to maintain a solid chlorine reading, you more than likely have a load of biofilms in the plumbing lines & other hidden places.
Consider using borates such as BioGuard Optimizer Plus which is a great preventive product for controlling algae. With a proper Optimizer Plus level, green plants (algae) aren't able to photosynthesize. That's a good thing. Optimizer Plus is also effective in helping the overall water balance.
Biofilms & other "organic" build-ups can be successfully treated & prevented with AquaFinesse Pool Water Care Tablets and Naturally Pure Enzyme Cleaner. The AquaFinesse is able to remove the biofilms from the hidden surfaces and the Naturally Pure is then able to eat-up or consume the removed waste. It's a great One-Two punch in combating, treating and preventing a slew of pool water care problems. Watch the Biofilm video here.
Two more winterizing tips. When it comes time to finally close down the pool for the winter or off-season, really consider performing the following cleaning tasks:
1. Chemically clean the Solar Blanket. Chemically cleaning the Solar blanket will remove algae & biofilms that would otherwise remain on the blanket over the weekend and then contaminate your pool next spring.
2. Chemically clean the Filter. Regardless what type of filter you have - sand, DE or cartridge - it needs to be chemically cleaned. Chemical cleaning removes accumulated greases and oils from the filter media. If you have a sand filter, and the sand is 3 years old or older, then consider changing it next year.
Here are a few links to other articles and videos to help you out:
Chlorine demand - what chlorine demand is. How important it is treat to it completely.
Algae - algae growth will use more chlorine. Here's a video.
Cloudy water - find out the causes. Take a look at a video.
Bio films - the underlying cause of most pool care problems. Here's a video.
Take a look at our Pool Care Videos here.
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