How to Care for and Maintain Your Pool – An Ounce of Prevention
Having a pool is a fun and affordable luxury that can make a hot summer a lot more bearable. But even affordable luxuries come with the responsibility of care and maintenance. When you get a swimming pool, it's an investment, and you have to take care of that investment if you want it to last and give you and your family your money's worth for years to come. If you really want to protect that investment the best you can, you're going to have to research how to care for and maintain your pool. Every pool is different, so you'll have your work cut out for you.
When researching how to care for and maintain your pool, you will first have to determine what kind of pool you have. Actually since taking care of a pool can be expensive, it might be a good idea to start your research by talking to a swimming pool contractor even before you purchase the pool so that you can choose a design that you can afford to maintain. The expense of maintaining your pool might include everything from pool cleaning equipment or simply hiring a service to come in and clean it for you. It really depends on your preferences and the resources available to you.
The most obvious consideration you'll need to make when learning how to care for and maintain your pool is keeping debris out of the water. If you have trees in your yard, or if your neighbors have trees, then you'll probably have leaves floating in there from time to time. Bugs can also be attracted to water, and some insects even look for standing water so that they can lay their eggs in it. If you want to prevent your pool from becoming a breeding ground for mosquitoes, then you need to be sure to keep it clean.
The easiest way to keep visible debris out of your pool water is to buy a long-handled pool skimmer that will allow you to scoop out any debris that can see floating in the water. This includes bugs, leaves, and anything else that might be floating on the surface of your pool water. These skimmers are the best way to keep the surface of your water clean and clear, and to keep things from floating down to the bottom later on. The longer something floats on the surface of your pool, the more water it will absorb, which will eventually weigh it down so much that the debris sinks to the bottom of your pool, where it's harder to clean out. It's one of the easiest and most effective ways how to care for and maintain your pool.
No matter how well and how often you skim your pool, however, you're bound to come up against underwater debris sometime. For this situation, you're going to need to invest in a good pool filter. Getting a pool filter is an important step in how to care for and maintain your pool. There are many different types of pool filters, and some people even choose to purchase two different types of filters: one for large debris and another to filter out smaller debris.
A sand filter is one of the most common types of filters, and is a great way to care for and maintain your pool. The pool water is forced through the sand filter and the sand traps any debris while the water is able to move through more easily. Sand filters are great at filtering out fine debris that is contaminating your pool water, such as dirt, insect eggs, smaller insects and the like. But some pool owners feel that it can get a little sluggish when it also has to filter out large pieces of debris, and that debris can clog up the filter instead of allowing it to clean out smaller debris.
Some swimming pool owners buy cartridge filters in order to supplement the fine cleaning power of a sand filter. Cartridge filters use replaceable paper filters to catch the bigger pieces of debris before your pool water reaches the sand filter. This allows your sand filter to work more efficiently, and also serves to prolong the life of your sand filter. Using two cartridges in this way is not only a great way how to care for and maintain your pool, but is also a great way to get the most mileage out of your filtering equipment.
In order to make sure that the water gets to your filters in the first place, however, you first need to invest in a pool pump. Pool pumps come in all different shapes and sizes, and the only really important thing is to get a pool pump that can efficiently and effectively pump all of your pool water through the pool filter so that it will keep your pool water clean. You can also invest in a pool pump that heats the water as it passes through so that you can even use your pool in colder weather. When you buy equipment for your pool, it's sometimes nice to know that it's not all about how to care for and maintain your pool, but that you can also spend some time on just making your pool more useful.
Chemical Balance
Another important aspect of how to care for and maintain your pool is maintaining a good chemical balance in your pool water. Most people know that pool water is chlorinated, but they're not really sure why, and they don't know that it can be a lot more complicated than just dumping chlorine into the pool water. There are specific forms of chlorine that you need to use in order to keep your pool water pure without making it too harsh on your skin.
Getting the right kind of chlorine is an essential part of how to care for and maintain your pool. Pure chlorine is a gas, and most people can't afford the complicated contraptions that can infuse pool water with gaseous chlorine. Most people use solid chlorine for ease of use and because it's more affordable. It's mixed with other chemicals in order to make it solid. There are two main types of solid chlorine: stabilized and unstabilized.
Stabilized chlorine tablets are the best way how to care for and maintain your pool purity on a regular basis. It lasts longer and is more affordable. It is effective at making sure that any daily contaminants that enter your pool are neutralized so that they pose no health threat to you, your family, or anyone else using your pool. It also helps to kill bacteria, algae, and insect eggs and prevents your pool from becoming a hotbed of microbial activity.
Unstabilized chlorine is also an important part of how to care for and maintain your pool. Unstabilized chlorine is best used to shock your pool (usually on a weekly basis), and to clean out anything that your daily stabilized chlorine is missing. Unstabilized chlorine is typically stronger than the stabilized version of the chemical, so you may want to keep out of the pool for twenty-four hours after you've shocked your pool with unstabilized chlorine. But you'll be back in the water before you know it, and it'll be cleaner than ever.
Some pool owners, in learning how to care for and maintain your pool, are tempted to skimp on these weekly "shocks" in order to save money, but this is a mistake. If you are a few days late or even if you miss a week, it's not that big a deal, but if you try to hold out until your water looks cloudy, then you've waited too long, and even a shock of unstabilized chlorine may not be enough to get your pool water clean again. Regular maintenance of your pool water's chemistry is important, and will save you money in the long run.
Before swimming in your pool, you should always check the water chemistry. Water chemistry kits are relatively cheap and some are reusable. Chlorine is a harsh chemical, and the last thing you want is to have any chemical damage done to your skin, hair, or even your eyes because you were exposed to too much chlorine. A simple check is an easy way to make sure that you stay safe and healthy, and to keep your pool chemistry balanced. That's also a major part of how to care for and maintain your pool.
Other Considerations
Aside from the pool water, there are also other considerations to make when considering how to care for and maintain your pool. When you have a pool, you not only have to make sure that the water is clean, but also that the pool itself is both clean and stable. If something happens and there's a crack in your pool, then you may get a lot of contaminants in your water, and your pool water could also leak into the ground soil, which can create an even bigger problem than just keeping your pool clean. You want to always be on the lookout for potential cracking so that you can get it fixed as quickly as possible.
In your quest to learn how to care for and maintain your pool, you'll also need to learn how to care for and clean the area surrounding your pool, such as pool tiles and even your pool deck. Despite your best efforts, multiple filters, a good pump, and a perfect chlorine level, you still might get some algae in your pool, and you'll want to clean that out as soon as possible. There are algaecides that are specifically formulated to kill pool algae without disrupting the chemical balance of your pool water.
Sometimes, you can also get stains in your pool for various reasons. Pools are made up of a variety of different parts, and there are also lots of chemicals in pool water, so these materials and chemicals are bound to interact. You can get unsightly stains from rust, cobalt, copper, and iron in your pool. Over time, this could cause your pool to look dingy, even though the water's actually clean. Finding the right treatment for these stains can be a hassle, since you need to ascertain what's causing the staining before you can effectively remove it. That's one of the more difficult quandaries of how to care for and maintain your pool.
If you want your regimen for how to care for and maintain your pool to include keeping it looking sparkling as well as making sure that the water itself is clean, then you should purchase a stain identification kit. These kits contain chemical tests that will show you the makeup of your stains so that you can purchase the right stain remover for the job. Then, you can purchase the right stain remover and your pool will look as good as new.
You should try to form a weekly cleaning regimen for your pool in order to keep it cleaner. If you learn how to care for and maintain your pool properly, you will see that consistent maintenance is much easier to keep up, and can also save you a lot of money by preventing problems rather than allowing them to occur and then having to fix them. It has been said that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure, and that's certainly true when it comes to swimming pool maintenance.
Your weekly pool cleaning regimen should include skimming the surface of your pool water for debris, scrubbing the scale around the rim of your pool so that you don't get a hard-to-remove "ring around the pool" from mineral deposits, emptying your pool's skimmer and pump baskets, vacuuming your pool, brushing down the sides and bottom, cleaning your pool cleaning tools (the chlorine water can damage your tools; rinsing them off when you're done can make them last longer), and cleaning your pool filters. By learning how to care for and maintain your pool, you'll extend its life and your enjoyment.
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