How to winterise pool with new motorised pool enclosure

[lumpypossum]

Hi,
I am new to this forum and would like some advise on how best to winterise the pool.
The pool is situated in the south of France in a village roughly level with Toulouse. The winters do not usually have more than a couple of days of light snow.
This is the fist winter after six years that my pool is going to be covered with an enclosure when we return to the UK for seven months during the winter. I usually put in the winterising fluid, drain to 6 inches below skimmers, drain skimmer pipework, pump and filter, put some bungs in the skimmers and a winter cover over the pool. This process has worked for the last six years albeit with a fair amount of cleaning and green water/pool surfaces when reopened in May.
Now that the enclosure is in place the pool temp is still up around 26 degrees C and the winterising fluid says wait until below 15. It is not feasible or desirable to leave the filtering system on for 7 months as the pool will be left unattended.
Some of the questions I have are:
Should I still lower the pool level and drain as the skimmers are now under the enclosure?
Will it be a waste of time putting in the winterising fluid as the pool temperature is so high?

 

[JVTrain]

What type of enclosure is it? Is it clear? Is it opaque? Does it rest on the pool water when closed or is it suspended and supported at the level of the coping?

 

[lumpypossum]

Hi Joel,
It is a semi circular cover which is about 115 cm above the coping stones at its apex. It is opaque and made out of Lexan Thermoclear 2 UV polycarbonate sheet.
Bob

 

[JVTrain]

Because it is opaque, you can still close and have a chance at not having an algae filled mess when you open again. The most important part about closing a pool is to only close when the water temperature is below 15 degrees Celsius (~60 degrees Fahrenheit). Algae grows very slowly below this temperature. If you close above that temperature, it's very difficult (somewhat impossible) to open with a clear pool on opening. By the same logic, you must open the pool before the water is above 15 degrees. As this is a seasonal home and pool that you cannot monitor when closed, this makes it difficult.

If you are not able to monitor the pool until it gets to 15 degrees, then close and also unable to monitor it when it gets above 15 degrees, I would suggest having a pool service do the opening and closing for you. This would also mean having them maintain sanitation before closing and after opening until you are there to take over.

If you're unwilling to do that, I'm afraid you're typically going to be opening to a mess to clean up each spring. You can certainly close the same way you have in the past, with likely the same results. You could also go the route of never closing the pool and having it maintained by a pool service throughout the winter. Temperatures in Toulouse it seems rarely drop below 0 C so not much chance of freezing plumbing.

Also, since I forgot in my last post... Welcome to TFP!

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Also, how are you sanitizing the pool? A salt water chlorine generator would make things easier to maintain for much of the season, until water temps are below 15 C...