All,
Over the past five years, we've winterized our pool here in Connecticut by draining the water level down and putting some form of cover over it. Last year, it was a semi-porous mesh. The years prior, it was your basic tarp which ended up being mostly porous after a few years. But in all cases, the water level in the pool rose right back to where we started as the winter progressed, sometimes even before the first hard freeze. We never had any damage to the glued-on tile on the sides of the one-piece fiberglass pool, and the skimmer is protected with antifreeze and one of those whatchamacallits or whatever it's really called, so we didn't have damage there, either.
And every year, as I looked out as this big puddle of water in the back yard, I thought to myself, "Gee. That's pretty unsafe. If not for humans, then certainly for an animal which might go tromping through the snow and discover the pool the hard way."
So I got to wondering: Since we have a superb Aquamatic Hydramatic safety pool cover, and they say it's OK to use with snow (just so long as the water beneath the surface is at its usual level, to keep the cover from pulling out of the tracks), why don't I just leave the water at its usual level, plug the skimmer and winterize as usual otherwise, and let winter come?
Based on past experience, this should be fine. But... am I missing some big, fat hairy law of physics/Mother Nature which will eat our pool alive?
I thought about adding some air pillows under the cover, perhaps one in each quadrant of the pool, but I can't find any reason to do or not to do this.
Thoughts?
Thanks in advance for spending brain cells on this problem with me,
Bill
Over the past five years, we've winterized our pool here in Connecticut by draining the water level down and putting some form of cover over it. Last year, it was a semi-porous mesh. The years prior, it was your basic tarp which ended up being mostly porous after a few years. But in all cases, the water level in the pool rose right back to where we started as the winter progressed, sometimes even before the first hard freeze. We never had any damage to the glued-on tile on the sides of the one-piece fiberglass pool, and the skimmer is protected with antifreeze and one of those whatchamacallits or whatever it's really called, so we didn't have damage there, either.
And every year, as I looked out as this big puddle of water in the back yard, I thought to myself, "Gee. That's pretty unsafe. If not for humans, then certainly for an animal which might go tromping through the snow and discover the pool the hard way."
So I got to wondering: Since we have a superb Aquamatic Hydramatic safety pool cover, and they say it's OK to use with snow (just so long as the water beneath the surface is at its usual level, to keep the cover from pulling out of the tracks), why don't I just leave the water at its usual level, plug the skimmer and winterize as usual otherwise, and let winter come?
Based on past experience, this should be fine. But... am I missing some big, fat hairy law of physics/Mother Nature which will eat our pool alive?
I thought about adding some air pillows under the cover, perhaps one in each quadrant of the pool, but I can't find any reason to do or not to do this.
Thoughts?
Thanks in advance for spending brain cells on this problem with me,
Bill