Closing questions (when, pump time)

[dunnma]

I have read that the recommendation is less than 60 degrees? Right now I think we are in the mid to upper 70's...but we will not be swimming again this year.

Should I close it now? If I don't how often should I run the pump? Right now it is run like 14 of 24 hours (haven't asked about that yet).

We will be getting a lot of leaves here in the pool soon and would like to avoid having to fish them out...

 

[Catanzaro]

Should I close it now? If I don't how often should I run the pump? Right now it is run like 14 of 24 hours (haven't asked about that yet).

Entirely up to you. But 14 hours is a lot right now if temperatures have dropped. I run my pump around 4 hours per day. This allows the leaves to enter the pool and stay on the surface of the water. They are easily removed. By the end of September, my pool will be closed. The key is to open up early.

If you decide to close now because of the leaves, please make sure you follow closing procedures for an IG Pool. Definitely recommend the PolyQuat 60 as you are closing early. And remember to open up about one moth before the holiday. You can even place inexpensive tarps over your safety mesh cover for the next month to help from the sun. If you have a solid tarp cover, then no need as the key again will be to open up early.

One last item is possibly a leaf net. I have seen these. You can search the forum or on line to determine if you want to go this route.

 

[dunnma]

I run my pump around 4 hours per day.

When do you run your pump? I have a 24 hour programmable timer where I can set the on and off's. Should I be running it during the night?

 

[Catanzaro]

You do not want to run your pump at night, that is unless you are clearing up a pool and in the SLAM Mode or have a 2 speed pump. All depends on comfort. I have decided to run the pump shorter times to save on electricity after the heat pump was installed. My pump is on from 2-7. It is actually 5 hours per day as I just checked. As the sun sets in earlier, I turn on earlier and shut down earlier and fool the timer. Leaving a pool dormant during the day is usually not a wise choice. With cooler weathers, no need to waste all that electricity, use pump and everything else.

A lot has to do with circulation in a pool as well. If you have limited returns, skimmers, main drain, you may need to run longer or at least brush the pool often. I use the circulators and now that the pump run time is shorter, I added 2 more. There is a total of 6 returns in the pool, plus 2 in the steps. All 6 spin 360* to move water. There are no dead spots in the pool and I do not brush because of this reason.

 

[dunnma]

We just have 2 returns. However, we also have a dolphin robot that gets all the way out of the water to the coping. I will look into possibly redoing the timer the rest of this year and especially in the spring.