Swimming pools, maintenance, water problems and general pool stuff
All the lovely snow has melted, adding valuable water to the the ground water table and the lakes nearby.
A quick tour of nearby pools showed no sign of snow of freeze damage and everything appears to be in great shape.
The extra precipitation with the snow also means more water for filling our pools this summer. I can hardly wait to go swimming again.
The latest snowfall has turned the world around us into a winter wonderland. There hasn’t been that much snow, but just enough to make everything look white and “clean”.
The pool water is real green, which is normal for our pools during the winter. I would much prefer that they were winterized, but I suppose we never really get to see them, so their blue-water summer state is the main priority. As long as the water is clean and sanitized throughout the swimming months, I can live with the slime in our subdivision through the cooler winter months.
This is our smallest swimming pool, also green. But at over 775,000 gallons winterizing is no easy task. Mind you, spring cleaning is a nightmare at best too. Team effort and a week’s work turns this pool into a sparkling blue pool safe for even my kids to swim in.
The snow will melt in a few days and we will be back to our mild winter weather once again. I have yet to see the pool water freeze enough to support my weight. Well, with all this turmoil of seasons out of alignment, you never know…
Whenever you get pool supplies, the instructions say x ounces per 1,000 gallons or something similar. So how many gallons of water does my swimming pool hold?
There are a lot of sites on the internet that tell you how to work out your pool volume. These easy to use pool volume calculators from the Pool Wizard make life so much easier.
You just put in the measurements and it spits out the answer. I tested it out and it consistently gives ‘clean’ results to the nearest 100 gallons. I found this very nifty, after all, who wants a result like 11,489 gallons. It seems unwieldy and unnecessary to have such an accurate result as opposed to 11,500 gallons, which is just as good when it comes to swimming pool volume and chemical dosing.
The Pool Wizard site have also made provision for those who use metric values. You put in the measurements in meters and it gives metric pool volume results (in cubic meters) as well as the conversion into gallons.
I think the volumes are given in US gallons, though they do not say. Perhaps I’ll send them a note and get them to confirm (or deny) this.
The cooler winter months are ideal for building concrete pools. The concrete cures perfectly without risk of drying out. This is a pool we have recently begun. This picture was taken while the rebar was being laid out prior to the plumbing and PVC piping.
The next photo was taken while pouring the concrete. The base has been completed and the walls are bing filled. The workers are using a vibrator to eliminate air pockets from the concrete. The plumbing and electric lighting have all been put in place before the concrete arrives.
After a few days it’s on to the overflow channels and the top slab. The end result will be a 20 x 40 foot overflow pool 6.5 feet deep. The inground structure includes the overflow tank, freshwater tank for all the household and garden needs, pool pump room, garden sprinkler pump room, and living area consisting of a rec room, wet bar/ kitchen and bathroom/ shower facilities.