Let’s see your water after removing winter cover!! **RESURRECTED FOR 2025!**

[thefloatqueen]

Last week I pulled the DE filter out of the pool shack, deep cleaned her body and fingers. Bought a snazzy little Rubbermaid type thing with wheels to store DE powder in the shed.

Sunday took the cover off to open the pool and realized I was not comfortable about the amount of rust on the skimmer screws & faceplate. Is the pool wall rusting the screws, or are the Hayward "stainless steel" screws actually ? Who knows. So decided to do some very minor rust mitigation. My parents wish I was as scared of them as a child as I am of rust on the pool walls.

Fixing the rust means a few days of not being able to fill the water to get everything up and running. No worries, I'll just run the cordless vac until Ithen. Actually, nope robot is dead. This is picture is daily add of a dash of chlorine since Sunday (water level is at the middle of the return). It's windy here today so there are ripples on the water, but the water is clear enough to count how many needles are on the pieces of my neighbors tree that fell into the pool and are slowly decaying. They were there when we took the cover off. I don't remember them being there when we put the winter cover on, but they must of been. Tomorrow I'll go to the store, get 4 more gallons of chlorine to do a what hopefully will be a short opening SLAM process, get the skimmer all put back together, fill the water and fully open Cornelius up.

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Keep us updated! Especially with pics, hehe. I love that liner, btw!

 

[ttroglio]

Do you basically turn off the heat pump and then do your closing procedures? The water would still be pretty warm. I turn off my heater in October. I wait until the water temperature hits 60F before closing. Usually that is around mid to late November. I cover my pool to keep leaves out until I'm ready to close. I also raise the FC level to almost SLAM. I open in the spring when the water temperature hits 60F. I've never opened to a green pool. I've never done the SLAM process.

Checking my Pool Math logs shows I closed the pool on Oct 2 last year. After vacuuming, brushing and flushing the filter, I dumped in 4 gallons of 10% bleach at that time as the FC was 1.5. That would have raised the FC by 32 according to the app. The water temp was 76 deg.

I didn't record when I shut down the heater but I historically do it as soon as the temps overnite drop into the 50s or so. I'm guessing that was a week or so prior to closing. No one is swimming and no point in just wasting electricity.

The water temp when i opened it this year was 67 deg. My pool has no wind breaks and I live at the top of a hill w/ plenty of wind so stuff is always getting under the mesh cover. Some years are better than this year, some are worse. Cleans up in a week or less. If yours looks like that every year upon opening, lot of time and chemicals saved then.

 

[RNDEBBIEROSE]

Opening Day! My pool guy was impressed how my pool looked. He said most of his pools do not look like mine. The only thing I do at closing is clean it well with my Dolphin, get my chlorine up to shock level and try my best to prevent anything organic from getting in prior to them putting the cover. Now to test, clean and get it ready for swimming!!

 

[thefloatqueen]

Opening Day! My pool guy was impressed how my pool looked. He said most of his pools do not look like mine. The only thing I do at closing is clean it well with my Dolphin, get my chlorine up to shock level and try my best to prevent anything organic from getting in prior to them putting the cover. Now to test, clean and get it ready for swimming!!

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That’s my closing routine also! Your pool looks amazing!

 

[Dozenmonkeyz]

Pool opened on 5/7 and only issue was the worm navy that sank itself over the winter. Minimal effort later (mostly by the robot haha) and it's in perfect shape. Water temp hit 85* on Saturday so we've been swimming since then. All our thanks to TFP for another drama free pool opening!

 

[Candurin]

Closed our pool for the first time by myself in October. Opened it absolutely clear water (solid cover) and apparently I lowered the worm population significantly.

No complaints at all! Robot is currently doing it’s job and I’ll manually vacuum sun ledge when it cools down outside.



Yes, the cover is folded and in the shed now.

 

[thefloatqueen]

Closed our pool for the first time by myself in October. Opened it absolutely clear water (solid cover) and apparently I lowered the worm population significantly.

No complaints at all! Robot is currently doing it’s job and I’ll manually vacuum sun ledge when it cools down outside.

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Yes, the cover is folded and in the shed now.

Wow! It’s crystal clear! Did you close at SLAM level or do you do the Polyquat thing? lol I wish I did a poll on this thread asking that question haha

 

[Candurin]

Wow! It’s crystal clear! Did you close at SLAM level or do you do the Polyquat thing? lol I wish I did a poll on this thread asking that question haha

I did add some polyquat and I simply filled a floating chlorine puck holder with 3 chlorine tabs.

I’ll test out the chemistry in the morning to see where I am. I am running out SWG at 60% just overnight (normal set at 30% and we have about 7-8 Chlorine level every day).

 

[Newdude]

It's wild that so many if us witnessed worm armageddon.

It was a very wet winter, I probably should have seen it coming with all the draining I was doing.

 

[Saturn94]

It's wild that so many if us witnessed worm armageddon.

It was a very wet winter, I probably should have seen it coming with all the draining I was doing.

Ha, that’s a normal occurrence here every spring opening.

 

[drafferty]

Did my soft-open on Saturday, didn't realize there was a pic thread going. Threw in the new robot (name-still-in-progress) to grab the couple of leaves, suicidal worms, and fished what I can only guess used to be a frog out of the skimmer well, but other than a little cloudiness which I'm thinking is mostly just dirt/dust off of the mesh cover, it's basically crystal clear. It's a bit brisk tho - 48F is probably optimistic...I think closer to 44 is probably more likely. Pump is now running on super-low, just enough to keep things moving until it starts to warm up here in the next few weeks and I can face turning the heater on !


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Hello, Do you mind me asking what steps you take when you close your pool? I have a mesh cover and when I open it is green with algae goo and takes a weeks time to slam and clear. I'm just curious what you do so that I can do the same come this Fall. Thank you soooo much for the info

 

[Homebrewale]

Hello, Do you mind me asking what steps you take when you close your pool? I have a mesh cover and when I open it is green with algae goo and takes a weeks time to slam and clear. I'm just curious what you do so that I can do the same come this Fall. Thank you soooo much for the info

Water temperature is important. Algae doesn't grow well under 60F. In the fall, don't close until the water gets down to 60F. In the spring, open the pool when the water reaches 60F. You can also bump up FC to slam level when you close. You can also add Polyquat 60 when you close. I have not the last few years and my pool still is algae free in the spring.

 

[SJPoe]

Hello, Do you mind me asking what steps you take when you close your pool? I have a mesh cover and when I open it is green with algae goo and takes a weeks time to slam and clear. I'm just curious what you do so that I can do the same come this Fall. Thank you soooo much for the info

I have the pool guys close the pool, mostly because I'm not 25 anymore...but they only drain and winterize the plumbing, they don't do anything to the water.

Last year, once the weather had got cool enough, I switched off the heater and removed the SWG cell. The pump continued to run just on low, and I manually kept the FC level up via LC until the water was below 60F.
The day before 'closing', I dosed with enough LC to bring the pool up to just under SLAM level. Vacuumed and brushed, backwashed, basically a good cleanout.
On the day of closing, the pool guys drain the pool down, winterize the returns and equipment, put the cover over the pool etc. They do not add any additional chemicals at my request.

I opened early this year as I stated, but my 'Over-winter-chlorine-loss-test' passed pretty well, dropping from about 15ppm to 6ppm in 6 months.

I may 'close' myself this year...we'll see how things go

 

[wireform]

Another new to me TFP pool, 6 days start to finish.

 

[Ticojpunk]

Didn't think to take a picture, but it was totally clear. Just had a few sticks, leaves and little mini branches that busted through my cover over the winter during a storm.

 

[Newdude]

Didn't think to take a picture, but it was totally clear

Let this free pass be a lesson to ya. There will be no free passes next year.

Her Majesty had an amazing idea with this thread and it's a thing now.

 

[Ticojpunk]

Let this free pass be a lesson to ya. There will be no free passes next year.

Her Majesty had an amazing idea with this thread and it's a thing now.

I'll have the camera ready in May 2025!

 

[thefloatqueen]

I’m baaaaaaasck, ladies and gents!!!! It’s almost that time of year (or it is that time of year for some of y’all), and I don’t want to start a new thread, but if this one is too old to resurrect, admin please let me know and I will start a new one.

Anyways, let’s do this again! 2025 edition!! I’m “opening” officially next weekend, but will be removing the cover today after it ripped yesterday (plus we are going to have wind gusts over 40 mph tomorrow and Sunday! ). I’ll post a pic as soon as the cover is removed this afternoon and before I run the robot or brush anything.

You know the drill!! NO CHEATING!!!!!

 

[Newdude]

I don’t want to start a new thread, but if this one is too old to resurrect, admin please let me know

Any relevant new information by the OP in their own thread is not hijacking or resurrecting, it's 'updating'.

 

[Homebrewale]

I guess I'll be cheating. I'll be starting up my equipment in the next week or two. I'll adjust my chemicals based on tests. I may even pull back a corner of the cover and run the robot. But I probably won't be removing my cover until early May.