Time to put the pool away for the winter. After drawing the water down in prep for the hurricane, then getting 7 inches of rain from it plus lots of evergreen needle debris blown into the pool it is time to take it down for the winter since the water temps just aren't coming back up sufficiently.
This is my first year with an ultra frame and wanted to garner any advice or experiences you have had in disassembling and storing same over the winter. Have started to empty, all but a few inches left what remains below the hose outlet. I am basically doing this by myself so trying to lift and maneuver the liner to get the last few inches of water to discharge at the hose outlet doesn't appear to be practical. Also have a bunch of small evergreen needles in the bottom that the crappy intex hose vacuum thing could never suck up from day one so I need to get all of that out too. If I remove sections of the frame to maneuver the liner to get the water over to the hose outlet then in theory the liner may not dry unless I put the frame back up. Thinking the best solution may be a small sump pump to get the majority of the remaining water out them maybe shop vac the rest out. Am I thinking this through correctly or am I missing an easy way to do this?
Was also thinking that before it gets packed away I should give the liner a quick wipedown with bleach solution, to make sure it is super clean before putting it away. Any other advice?
Almost makes me want to dish out the center grade next year and install some sort of main center drain with a plug which would make all of this a non issue. Has anyone ever done/tried installing a center drain in an ultra? I could easily gravity drain the pool since when i built the pad I leveled the low end up with a retaining wall instead of digging down the high side. The wall only goes around the pool maybe 2/3-rds of the way so the high side of the pad is basically at grade. I know, building up a pad is not recommended... but for where I wanted to put the pool I didn't want to install a fence around the pool. The grade 3-feet around the pool had to be down 48" or more from the top rail to forgo the fence and had to be clear of ANY objects that could be used to step on and get into the pool. So, raising the low side made the most sense since the wall could be placed inside of that 3-foot clear zone since the grade droped off further from the wall. If I had dug the pool in, the retaining wall would have had to be at least 3 feet from the outside of the pool then we would have had to build more steps down (which would have had to be outside of the clear zone) to the pad and theoretically push the whole thing even further away from the deck and done alot more excavation. Plus when the pool is down I can use the partial raised patio for other things and don't have to try and mow around a fence. Pool has been rock solid, no settling at all.
Here's a picture from when it was almost complete, pool was not filled yet and i still had to cut off the geogrid sticking out of the wall.
Also, how do you all store your liners? I saved the box so I can put it in there or maybe a large rubbermaid container one for the legs/rails and a second one for the liner? I did remove the thru the wall inlet/outlet and definately want to upgrade to standard parts before next season. That will be the subject of another topic.
Thanks in advance for any advice.
Love TFP!! Have learned tons so far and have lots of learning still to do and dumb questions to ask. You guys/gals rock!
This is my first year with an ultra frame and wanted to garner any advice or experiences you have had in disassembling and storing same over the winter. Have started to empty, all but a few inches left what remains below the hose outlet. I am basically doing this by myself so trying to lift and maneuver the liner to get the last few inches of water to discharge at the hose outlet doesn't appear to be practical. Also have a bunch of small evergreen needles in the bottom that the crappy intex hose vacuum thing could never suck up from day one so I need to get all of that out too. If I remove sections of the frame to maneuver the liner to get the water over to the hose outlet then in theory the liner may not dry unless I put the frame back up. Thinking the best solution may be a small sump pump to get the majority of the remaining water out them maybe shop vac the rest out. Am I thinking this through correctly or am I missing an easy way to do this?
Was also thinking that before it gets packed away I should give the liner a quick wipedown with bleach solution, to make sure it is super clean before putting it away. Any other advice?
Almost makes me want to dish out the center grade next year and install some sort of main center drain with a plug which would make all of this a non issue. Has anyone ever done/tried installing a center drain in an ultra? I could easily gravity drain the pool since when i built the pad I leveled the low end up with a retaining wall instead of digging down the high side. The wall only goes around the pool maybe 2/3-rds of the way so the high side of the pad is basically at grade. I know, building up a pad is not recommended... but for where I wanted to put the pool I didn't want to install a fence around the pool. The grade 3-feet around the pool had to be down 48" or more from the top rail to forgo the fence and had to be clear of ANY objects that could be used to step on and get into the pool. So, raising the low side made the most sense since the wall could be placed inside of that 3-foot clear zone since the grade droped off further from the wall. If I had dug the pool in, the retaining wall would have had to be at least 3 feet from the outside of the pool then we would have had to build more steps down (which would have had to be outside of the clear zone) to the pad and theoretically push the whole thing even further away from the deck and done alot more excavation. Plus when the pool is down I can use the partial raised patio for other things and don't have to try and mow around a fence. Pool has been rock solid, no settling at all.
Here's a picture from when it was almost complete, pool was not filled yet and i still had to cut off the geogrid sticking out of the wall. Also, how do you all store your liners? I saved the box so I can put it in there or maybe a large rubbermaid container one for the legs/rails and a second one for the liner? I did remove the thru the wall inlet/outlet and definately want to upgrade to standard parts before next season. That will be the subject of another topic.
Thanks in advance for any advice.
Love TFP!! Have learned tons so far and have lots of learning still to do and dumb questions to ask. You guys/gals rock!
