Why is my pool still cold?!

[JenniferJuniper2]

My husband rigged up hundreds of feet of black hose to make big solar coils and put them on the roof. Also, we have been using a thick, blue solar blanket for about 2 months (the coils have been working for a few weeks). My pool is only 74 degrees this morning! Temps have only been in the low 70s lately but other people with this set up seem to all say they have 80 degree pools so I am wondering if I am just cursed to freeze all summer...help!

 

[JohnT]

Your pool will tend to move to the average daily temperature. The blanket will reduce the overnight loss, but it can't do much to combat temperatures near 50 at night. Overnight heat loss is greater when the difference between the air temperature and water temperature is larger.

The coils won't add nearly as much heat as panels would. They can't handle the volume of water needed to really warm the pool, and they have limited surface area compared to panels.

 

[JenniferJuniper2]

Thanks for the info. What would be a good panel system to buy?

 

[JohnT]

Thanks for the info. What would be a good panel system to buy?

Depends on what kind of roof area you have available. I have these and would buy them again.

 

[jblizzle]

I had 2500' feet of 1" black poly tubes on my roof that the previous owner rigged up ... did not do as much as I wanted and now I have 550sqft of solar panels.

The DIY route is no longer the most economical.

Likely a single solar mat would have more sqft of exposure than the hoses you have now.

 

[pooldv]

Cold water is NO fun! I'm pretty happy with my Vortex panels from Solar Direct. More info in my signature and build thread.

 

[Pool Tool]

not to hijack, but DV how many hours of sun do you panels get with the trees?

 

[pooldv]

That is the question! Sun touches the pool about 8 hours a day and about an hour of that is full sun on the whole pool. Sun touches the solar panels (face south) off and on through the morning, from noonish to 7pm they get pretty much full sun.

I have tried to do a better job of tracking my water temp this spring. Kind of frustrating because of so much rain. I was 77-78 in march. And at 80 today. It has been a roller coaster. On a sunny day I regularly gain 4 degrees over 24 hours, like 6p to 6p. No solar cover. I can gain 4* per day several days in a row, went 73 to 81 in 2 days this week. Had a few 6* gains. Then it rains and I drop 4, 5, 6 degrees, even 9 one day.

 

[crabboy]

Also, we have been using a thick, blue solar blanket for about 2 months

Are you removing the blanket during the day?

 

[JenniferJuniper2]

@crabboy we remove it when the weather is warmer than the pool water. Lately we have been keeping it on because the pool will be at, like, 74 to 77 degrees while the high air temp is only 72 and windy. Our coils are going whenever our pump is on (which is for like 5 hours during the warmest parts of the day; coils are in the sun all day). Our pool is only in sun from about 10am to 4pm. We were taking the blanket off during the day at first, then got lazy and left it on for a few days..we noticed we were gaining more heat with it on. Probably because the weather has not been very warm (unusual for our area).