Opening by the calendar versus opening by water temp

Started by Tom Brennan · · 5 replies
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#1
Twenty five seasons and I've always opened Memorial Day weekend, no earlier, it's in the binder with every date going back to the start. But I was talking to a neighbor who swears by waiting for the water to hit a certain temp before he uncovers, says the calendar is arbitrary and he's going by what the pool actually tells him. Mine's vinyl inground, gas heater, and I've never once had an algae problem opening on schedule, so I'm skeptical. But I'll admit I've never tracked water temp at closing to see if there's a pattern. Anyone switched from one approach to the other and noticed a real difference, or is this just two ways of getting to the same result.

5 Replies

#2
honestly i dont even have a frame of reference since this is only my second season owning the place, first one was just fighting the swamp back to life whenever i could get to it. phoenix doesnt really give me a closing/opening window like you guys have anyway, pool basically never fully shuts down here it just gets neglected less in summer. but 25 seasons of the same memorial day date with zero algae problems is a pretty strong data set, i wouldnt mess with that just cause a neighbor has a theory. if anything i'd be curious what your water temp actually is on that date over a few years before deciding the calendar is "arbitrary", might just turn out memorial day lines up with his magic number anyway and its the same result with extra steps.
#3
We're in Texas so our "season" barely closes, but our first year we opened early because the kids were antsy, water was still cold enough that the salt cell basically wasnt doing anything and we got a light green tint within a week because I wasnt running the pump enough either. After that I started just watching the actual water, not the calendar, and honestly once it holds steady above the mid 60s the system keeps up fine without me babysitting it.

So I think swamp_tyler is onto something, Tom, 25 years of the same date probably does line up with your water hitting whatever temp matters in your area, you just never needed to know the number because the calendar already matched it. I wouldnt switch what you're doing since zero algae problems for that long is nothing to mess with, but it might be worth logging the temp this one time just so you actually know if Memorial Day is the cause or just a coincidence that happens to work. Anyway, doesnt sound broken to me.
#4
yeah that light green tint thing from under-running the pump on cold water makes sense, dana, but did it actually take a full extra shock to fix once you caught it or did bumping up run time alone pull it back before it got worse? curious how close you were to a real problem versus just a scare.
#5
I'm above ground so my "opening" is just dragging the cover off and hoping the Gorilla Pad under my liner did its job over winter, no heater involved so temp was never a factor for me either way, it's whatever Nashville decides to do that week. But one year I uncovered early because the kids wouldnt stop asking and the water was still cold enough that nothing was really circulating right even with the pump running full time, and I got that same light green tint dana's talking about, not full algae just enough to notice. Didnt need a shock to fix it, just ran the filter longer and brushed it a couple days and it cleared before it became an actual problem. So for me it wasnt the calendar date that mattered it was just whether the water was warm enough to actually move and do its job, Tom, twenty five years of zero algae on the same date sounds like you've already found your number even if you never wrote it down.
#6
No full shock, just brushed it and bumped the pump run time to almost all day for a few days and the salt cell caught up once the water actually warmed past that mid 60s mark, cleared up before it got to be a real fight. Honestly scarier in my head than it was in the pool, more of a wake up call than an actual crisis.