Intex 21 ft Pool

[ladyblue53]

New to the forum:
We just bought the house and owner left the pool. I am in need of help closing it down. It is a 21 ft above ground not sure of the model. It is grey on the outside with grey railing.
It is running the Krystal Clear salt water system. I have cleaned pool and back washed the pump. I am now ready to drain. It has the over the rail skimmer with hose attached to outlet to plunger valve. I am thinking I need to drain below the outlet so plunger valve does not freeze? Any and all help would be very much appreciated.
1. How far do I drain it down? I have no plugs to plug the outlet or the inlets off.
2. How much salt should I put in to last over the winter?
3. What type winter cover do you all recommend?
4. Any other info I need to know. I did go to website and look at manual but I didn't think it was much help.
TIA
Brenda

 

[zea3]

Hi, welcome to TFP! Don't worry about putting salt in the pool now. You won't be running the saltwater chlorine generator (SWG) over the winter, and you will have to add salt when you refill the pool in the spring.

I have a couple of questions for you. What part of the country do you live in? Do you get long, hard freezes every winter?

 

[ladyblue53]

I'm in Central Missouri and yes we do get freezing winters. For the most part we get 30 degree days and a few below that. It can be 50 one day and down to 20 the next! Gotta love the Missouri weather! LOL We do get snow and again some years more then others. The guy that had the pool left it up last year and it was a very cold and snowy winter. He had told me to dump in 3-4 bags of salt as it would keep the water from freezing.
I'm wanting to leave it up as once it's down it more then likely won't go back up! :-( We are a small town and no pool people around to help with setting back up.
Thanks for any help you can give me.

 

[zea3]

I haven't heard of people using a lot of salt to prevent the water from freezing, I guess in theory that could work but I don't know how much you would need. You may be able to order replacement plugs, then you would not have to drain the water. Is this a soft sided pool with steel supports or a ridged wall pool?

 

[ladyblue53]

It's like a canvas pool with steel railing and support legs.
Brenda

 

[jblizzle]

Adding salt is not really going to help. Freshwater freezes at 32 degrees F. The ocean (35,000 ppm salt) freezes at around 28.4 degrees F.

But, a typical pool is only at around 3,500 ppm of salt, so while the freezing point may be lower with a little bit of salt, it is going to be between 31-32 degrees F.

The lowest you can get the freezing point is around -6 degrees F, with a salt concentration of around 290,000 ppm salt ... which is around what the the dead sea has (around 330,000 ppm salt)

 

[ladyblue53]

Thanks for your help. Guess i'll put the winter cover on and hope for the best next spring! Can you give me any good sites for ordering tubes or such for putting under the cover for drain off?

 

[Safetybob]

Brenda, anything you can find to plug that one inlet with the nozzle thing would be good....or shall I say, anything you can find to plug that up would be good, any kind of stopper you can find. Other than that, take the skimmer out, unhook all that stuff, make sure to drain the water out of the pump, hoses and assuming you have a sand filter, there should be a drain knob somewhere along the bottom of that to drain the water out of that. I would suggest you then put as much of that equipment into your garage as possible. Keeping it away from freezing would be good. Hopefully they left you the Intex cover that goes on that pool to keep all the leaves and Crud from finding their way into your pool.....

Now, BEFORE you touch the thing in the spring, you need to read and understand the Pool School section on this forum. You can keep using the salt water system if you want to, or you can use good old Clorox for your chlorine source. Either way, you need to get a "real" test kit (get a Taylor Speed Stir too), know how to use it correctly, and using the knowledge learned in Pool School apply the proper amount of chemicals into your pool. It's not as hard as it may seem, it just takes awhile for it all to sink in......it only takes me a couple of minutes for me to test chlorine levels and add the proper amount of Chorox to the pool.

Keep looking at this sub forum and there is another getting started forum that should be helpful too. Learn for others mistakes. I did besides my own mistakes and I was quickly able to "get it together" enough to have a nice pool without alot of expense or headaches. You don't need to go to the pool store and get "taken"......the only thing I order is Stabilizer (also know as CYA) over the internet. If I go to the pool store it's for stupid toys or floating lights to throw into the pool for the kids, that's it.

Don't worry about asking stupid questions, we all have asked them, because if you have never had a pool, you don't know what to ask in the first place.....pool school and the sub forums here have the answers.

Oh, you have the 21' Intex Ultra Frame pool. Those are the grey pools with the grey frame. So while you are at WalMart or Target and see Intex pools that are blue.....those are the "metal frame" pools. You may also see the other blue pools with the "ring" also.

Oh, if you decide to keep the saltwater system, you will need to add to your shopping list the Taylor Saltwater Test kit. That will allow you to accurately test your pool water for the proper amount of salt. DO NOT ADD SALT TO YOUR POOL for the winter.....that's not the point of it. Your not making a saltwater solution in your pool to prevent or lower the freezing point of your water......read pool school and you will see that the amount of salt you need in your pool is very low compared to...well, anything. Time for you to read up!!

Good luck, welcome to the forum!! Take the winter to learn about your pool and you will have the best pool in the neighborhood with the least amount of work!

Bob E.

 

[ladyblue53]

Thanks for the info Bob. We had a Doughboy above ground pool back 30 yrs ago! Been way to long and forgot everything! It wasn't salt pool either! I'm really thinking about going back to a chlorine pool. I remember I only used a few bags of shock it after a rain and never had any problems. Tested the water once a week, sweep and I was ready to swim! This salt **** is confusing me! LOL We are both retired and the old brain seems to have problem holding any more info! Our small rural town has nothing to offer other then Walmart.
I am in need of a new winter cover. Any good sites you know of for ordering pool stuff?
TIA
Brenda

 

[jblizzle]

What is confusing about the salt? A pool with a SWG is a chlorine pool. The only difference is the SWG "makes" the chlorine for you from the salt. So either you need to manually add a certain amount of chlorine every day OR the SWG does it for you.

Spend a good bit of time reading and learning over the winter. I am sure that the methods of maintenance we teach are different than what you did 30 years ago.

For example, we NEVER have to add a few bags of powder (we do not like the term "shock") after some rain. We maintain the FC in the proper range which is a function of stabilizer (CYA) level ... ideally using bleach ... and then there is never a need for bags of powder on a schedule. If a problem develops, then we use the SLAM Process to get rid of the issue.

Lucky for you, you can find EVERYTHING you need to maintain the pool at Wal-mart (well besides a good test kit ... see link in my signature). And salt is probably cheaper at Home Depot or Lowes.