Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting again

[East_Akl_Neil]

I prep for taking over out new house/pool, I've been doing some reading on TFP, as you do

Looking at some of the threads here about bleaching the pool back to health made me think. With people spending $70 at a time on bleach, (and maybe doing it 2-3 times), why not just dump the water and start again?

Not knowing what the cost of water is where you are I can only go on numbers where I live. I will have an approx 38000L pool (or somewhere around there). With water costing $1.30 per 1000L will cost approx $50 to refill.

I know it will take time to empy and refill, but then so does bleaching. Or are people fill rates such that it takes less time to bleach it back to health? (I have no idea how long it will take to fill my pool till I take over and do some flow tests from the hose.)

Is it because each time the pool is emptied it is at risk? If so from what?
Some places water is not as easy to come by/expensive.
Some people want the chalenge.
People have not done the numbers?
People are a conservationists, and want to save water?
Why else would people not just drain and start again?

 

[TheGoose]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

I've done it several times. It normally takes about 2 days to drain using either the pool pump or various types of sump pumps to drain and then at least 1.5-2 days to refill.

People with vinyl lined pools really can't do this as it might damage their liner. This is something I didn't know either. I would have drained and refilled this year but I just didn't have the time and plus our groundwater levels were high due to lots of rain.

 

[Isaac-1]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

I think a large part of it is the ever increasing price of water in many areas, add to this the potential for problems with vaious types of pools when emptied, this can be pop out for pools in areas with high water tables, cave ins for just about any type, liner wrinkles for vinyl liners, etc. Also your example of 34000 liters is a relatively small pool, that is only about 9,000 gallons.

In my area which has relativley plentiful water, the municple water sources charge between $3-$5 per thousand gallons for residential use depending on where you live, and another $2 - $3 per gallon for sewage treatment on that water unless you have a seperate meter, and pay base meter fees (some people have a seperate meter for lawn sprinklers to avoid the sewage fee), minimum meter charge is $36 per month which includes up to 2,000 gallons. Once you add on the various other fees and taxes the actual water cost comes out close to $10 per thousand gallons, and this is in part of the US with some of the highest annual rainfall totals.

Ike

p.s. rates were based on 2011 rates published on a web page by a nearby water district about 20 miles from me, the local water district here is not that high tech yet, and does not even have a web site.

 

[Leebo]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

There's also the issue of the quality of water. At my in-laws who have well water they have a VERY high iron amount. Many also have huge CH issues or TA issues after refilling from a well. You also have to take into account the cost of re-adding CYA or salt to the pool, as a freshly filled pool has slim to none. Just adding CYA to the 25,000 gallon pool I take care of will add another $40 to the refill cost.

 

[duraleigh]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

Dumping your water does not cure what's wrong with your pool.

An algae laden pool that is drained will quickly regrow the algae once you refill it. Until you understand how to successfully manage the pool with chlorine, the problem will not go away. Dumping your water over and over means you continue to make the same mistakes or have a problem that you have not yet fixed.

 

[Joshmeyer99]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

Every Year we fill our AG pool up from our well water, its brown and takes two days to fill. After reading info from this site, I imagine that algae has already began to grow by the time I start filtering which is why my water has been cloudy every year until now after finding this site.

 

[mrodgers]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

Every Year we fill our AG pool up from our well water, its brown and takes two days to fill. After reading info from this site, I imagine that algae has already began to grow by the time I start filtering which is why my water has been cloudy every year until now after finding this site.

We always drained and refilled every year because it was only a 12' Intex. Did the same with filling the well. We took about 4-5 days with the well before reaching filtering level (Wifey paranoid over running the well dry as she grew up with a bad well) thus I'm sure the water was bad. It was always cloudy, we had no idea what "shock" was (thought of as a noun as a certain chemical) and unreliable chlorine and pH testing, so we never had nice water.

Next week with the 22' Intex coming, I am certainly not going to try to fill with the well, I think it would take a month, and from joining here and reading the past few days, I already know more than I need to know about pool chemicals and balancing than I ever knew.

 

[brainchasm]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

I think a large part of it is the ever increasing price of water in many areas, add to this the potential for problems with vaious types of pools when emptied, this can be pop out for pools in areas with high water tables, cave ins for just about any type, liner wrinkles for vinyl liners, etc. Also your example of 34000 liters is a relatively small pool, that is only about 9,000 gallons.

For reference, my pool is 6000gal. The little pump from Home Depot cleared my pool in less than three hours, and I filled it with the built-in spout and a garden hose in less than four (and then overflowed it a bit by accident and called it "watering the yard").

I drained everything for a few reasons:

My CYA was too high, and the only way to reduce it is a partial or full drain.
I wanted to get in there and do some good cleaning (and had pounds of grit and sandstone detritus to scoop out).
I was at very low risk of floating my pool out (Las Vegas...our water table is "high", but only relative to the rest of the desert!).

It worked, and I'm now BBB-ing like a champ!

 

[East_Akl_Neil]

Re: Cost of treating a swamp vs dumping water and starting a

There's also the issue of the quality of water. At my in-laws who have well water they have a VERY high iron amount. Many also have huge CH issues or TA issues after refilling from a well. You also have to take into account the cost of re-adding CYA or salt to the pool, as a freshly filled pool has slim to none. Just adding CYA to the 25,000 gallon pool I take care of will add another $40 to the refill cost.

That is one thing that I didn't take into account, the costs of what is needed to bring the pool back up into a balanced state.

I guess the best cost saving is 'Don't let your pool turn into a swamp in the first place.'