Anything worth owning is worth maintaining. That is true of a car, a home, and a swimming pool. All of these things can bring great joy and comfort to a person’s life, but owning any of them comes with the requirement of keeping them in good running order.
Most people have been around cars and homes enough to have a pretty good idea about what to do for basic upkeep—which sometimes just means knowing when to bring a professional in to take care of an issue.
But when it comes to a pool maintenance system, many people simply don’t know where to begin. And the fact of the matter is that there are a lot of smaller jobs that go into effective pool maintenance.
You have to take into account the pH balance of the water and what chemicals you want to use to maintain that balance, the operation of your pool filtration system, the sides of your pool, the surface of the water, and how much time you are willing to put into taking care of your pool.
With everything involved in the job, keeping your pool in tip-top shape can seem like an intimidating amount of work. But, once you find the system that is right for you, pool maintenance becomes a pretty simple routine that pays its dividends in the joy that owning your own swimming pool provides.
Why is a pool maintenance system necessary? Why can’t you just skim leaves off the surface of the water and call the job done? Keeping your swimming pool clean beyond the surface level is important to keep your pool looking good and to keep everyone who swims in it healthy.
Swimming pool cleaning systems help ensure that there is not a buildup of harmful algae and bacteria. When you allow these organisms to build up in your pool you run the risk of making anyone who swims in your pool extremely sick.
Not only that, but the water will be brackish and ugly. It will attract insects and make for a great breeding ground for mosquitos. And that doesn’t even get into the smell. Now most people may think that this is what chlorine is for—and, to a certain extent, it is, but that’s just the beginning.
You need to properly balance the chemicals in your pool’s water. But you also need to keep the surfaces under the water clean and filter out the spores and leaves and other assorted detritus that can introduce harmful elements into your pool.
This is where automatic pool cleaning systems can make a huge difference in your life as a pool owner. They can address the cleaning needs of your pool both on and below the surface for you—dramatically reducing the time you need to spend on pool maintenance yourself.
So what’s the best way to keep your pool clean? That depends on what you want to prioritize. Similar to yardwork, some people genuinely relish in the activity of manual pool maintenance while others want to think of it as little as possible.
But in order to know what pool maintenance system you want to adopt, you need to be informed about the positives and negatives of multiple cleaning strategies and systems.
This is the most time-consuming strategy and method of cleaning a swimming pool. And naturally, the larger your pool, the more time you will need to dedicate to maintaining its cleanliness.
In order to keep your pool clean, you will need a skimmer that can reach any spot in your pool. That means you’ll want to invest in a good telescoping pole. You will use your skimmer net to grab the debris floating on your pool’s surface.
You will also need a brush that you can affix to your trusty telescoping pole. This is because you need to scrub the sides and bottom of your pool to prevent bacteria or algae from building up.
Be aware that you may need a brush made of a specific material depending on what your pool is made of. Unpainted pools made of concrete require brushes that combine nylon with stainless steel while painted or fiberglass pools should only be scrubbed with a pure nylon brush.
You will then need to use a pool vacuum to suck up any debris that you have loosened up.
Cleaning your pool manually is a lot of work—and it needs to be done often. Skimming your pool daily, scrubbing a few times a week, and vacuuming as frequently as every other day are recommended.
For some people, the work of manual pool maintenance is enjoyable and helps them appreciate the pleasures that owning a swimming pool provides. But for many other people, it’s just too much. For those people, a different pool maintenance system is a must.
Automatic pool cleaning systems alleviate the physical demands required by manual cleaning. Most automatic pool cleaners connect to your pool filtration system, which allows them to move around the surfaces of your pool to clean them of algae and debris.
When you look at types of pool cleaners, there are suction cleaners and pressure cleaners. These different side cleaners connect to different parts of your filtration system, but are both affordable and greatly reduce the amount of physical labor you will need to put into pool maintenance.
Pressure side cleaners utilize the recirculating jets of your filtration system. This kind of pool automatic cleaner has a sweep hose and filter bag. The jets help break up debris which is then brought into the filter bag.
Suction side cleaners connect to the skimmer of your filtration system—which is not to be confused with the pool skimmer you use to clean leaves off your pool’s surface. The filtration system pulls water in, which propels the suction cleaner.
Each of these choices of automatic pool maintenance system has its strengths and weaknesses. It is important that you do research to see what will work best for your pool’s materials and size. But they are not the only automatic pool cleaners on the market.
There are also robotic cleaners. These devices, while electric, have been calibrated to be safe to use in the water. They have their own brushes and vacuums and are able to get into your pool’s nooks and crannies to take care of your cleaning needs all by themselves.
If you choose any of these automatic cleaners, be aware that they vary in price and power. You may still have to supplement their cleaning with some manual work and you will need to keep pool equipment maintenance in mind.
Because if you let these cleaners fall into disrepair, you’re back to doing everything by hand—and because some of these options utilize your filtration system, you will need to be vigilant for wear and tear on those parts as well.
The last type of pool maintenance system is the self-cleaning pool. As the name implies, these pools are built to clean themselves. As a pool owner, no other pool maintenance strategy requires less work from you.
The way these systems work is that special jets blast freshly filtered water into your pool, pushing algae and debris into a filtering canister. All of these items, when not in use, sink flush into the bottom of the pool.
One of the great benefits of this kind of system is that the water is filtered from the bottom of the pool instead of from the surface. Some automated systems don’t always get to the water at the bottom of a pool. By filtering from the bottom up, this is not an issue.
This is not to say that self cleaning pool systems are without any drawbacks. For example, they are often exclusive to pool manufacturers—meaning that if you do not purchase a specific pool from a specific company, you cannot get access to their self-cleaning pool system.
There is also the issue of trying to install a self-cleaning system into an existing swimming pool. You can’t do it. The cleaning jets, the filtration cylinder, and the mechanisms that raise and lower them need to be installed with the pool.
With all that being said, there is no pool maintenance system option that is more effective and requires less labor from the pool owner than a self-cleaning system. They run surprisingly quietly, so they can be set to clean your pool at any time of night or day—whenever you aren’t swimming, basically.
The more complete circulation provided by a built-in, self-cleaning system brings the added benefit of spreading out your pool chemicals more evenly. That means you have a more consistent safe pH level while using your chemicals more sparingly.
So while a pool caretaker system that utilizes self-cleaning technology is initially the most expensive of all the options we have looked at, it saves you time and money in the long run—particularly in the form of making your budget for pool chemicals stretch farther than ever without sacrificing the efficacy of those chemicals.
Speaking of pool chemicals, it is not unheard of for people to rely on the chemistry of their pool to maintain a healthy swimming environment in between cleanings. Choosing which chemicals and how they are distributed in your pool is a valuable component of your pool maintenance system.
Most chemical treatments will require at least some chlorine, but the goal for many of these systems is to keep your pool sanitary without damaging anyone’s eyes, hair, or bathing suits with excessive chlorine.
Salt chlorine generator systems and chlorine feeders aim to maintain a consistent chlorine level in your pool. As the name implies, a salt chlorine generator uses salt to generate chlorine which maintains pH levels in a pool 24 hours a day. Chlorine feeders use tablets to release a steady flow of chlorine into a pool.
There are also swimming pool cleaning systems that use ozone to kill organisms in your pool water. These systems generate ozone gas and apply it to your pool water after it goes through your filter and heater. Ozone does not kill all bacteria, though, so if you embrace this system, you will still need to add some chlorine to your pool.
Some pool owners opt to replace chlorine entirely in favor of chemicals that don’t have that distinct, chemical smell that comes with chlorine. The most common alternatives are bromine and biguanide.
Bromine can last longer than chlorine treatments, but is more expensive and degrades in direct sunlight. Biguanide is great for killing bacteria, but requires supplements of algaecide and hydrogen peroxide to handle more complex invasive organisms.
One very interesting pool maintenance system that has been gaining popularity outside of the US is the so-called Bio Pool. In order to replace the need for chlorine, the pool water is pumped through a secondary “pond.” This pond is filled with rocks and plant life which filters and oxygenates the water. The water then overflows from your pond back into your pool.
There are lots of strategies that you can implement to keep your swimming pool safe to use and beautiful to look at. Some require more time than others, some cost more than others, some can only be implemented in a newly constructed pool, some can be adopted at any time.
The key is to adopt the pool maintenance system that you can keep to consistently. If you are someone who loves the routine and physical activity of manual cleaning, that is the right choice for you. If you want a less physically demanding system, an automatic cleaning strategy is right for you.
And if you are looking to build a new pool, incorporating a self-cleaning system may be the right choice, since it requires the least work from you.If you have questions about pool installation and maintenance, talk to us at Tracer Pool & Landscape. Our team can answer your questions and point you in the right direction to ensure you get everything you want out of your swimming pool.
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