How do I prepare my pool for winter? [6 Easy Steps]
What should you do with your outdoor pool now that winter is coming? What do you need for it and how long can you preparing your pool for winter delay it?
Read the blog and find out how to swimming pool ready for winter creators. Happy reading!
What are we going to talk about?
- Why is your pool winterizing?
- When to prepare your pool for winter?
- General tips for preparing for winter
- How do you prepare your (standard) pool for winter? (duration, accessories, costs)
- How do you winterize a Swim Intelligent Pool? (duration, accessories, costs)
Why is your pool winterizing?
If you cannot or do not want to use your outdoor pool in the cold months, you should prepare it for winter to prevent:
- Frost damage to your pool
- Damage to your pool due to contamination entering the pipes
- High energy costs
Not preparing a swimming pool for winter in time is at the cost of its lifespan and/or requires considerable additional costs for repair. A waste of money because preparing your pool for winter is really not an art.
Secretly, all you really want to do is have fun in your pool. You would prefer to swim round all year round. Spoiler: In the 2nd part of this blog, we'll tell you about an opportunity to make that wish come true...
When to prepare your pool for winter?
We recommend that you prepare your pool for winter as soon as the water temperature drops below 14°C. Or when the heating uses too much energy to bring the water to a pleasant level above 14°C.
Of course, you can also prepare your pool for winter earlier if you find the temperature of your pool too low to swim in. Then you just forget to take advantage of the many benefits of swim in cold water!
Steps to winterize your pool
How to prepare your pool for winter:
- Clean your pool
- Maintain a good water balance
- Prevent damage to the basin
- Winterize your installations
- Make sure you have a good pool cover
- Restart your pool.
Below, we explain the steps to you in more detail and give you a time indication per step.
Step 1. Clean your pool (2 hours)
Remove anything from the pool that you can safely remove, e.g. water toys, separate stairs, metal stairs or rails that are not made of stainless steel (--> risk of rust). Use a landing net to remove anything that floats on or in the water: leaves, trimmings, plastic, etc.
Clean the skimmer and circulation pump filter. See how to empty your skimmer in the video below:
Next, do a backwash to clean your sand filter.
Grab your pool vacuum cleaner and clean the bottom of your pool. The less contamination on the soil, the lower the risk of finding algae in your pool in spring, so be extra thorough.
Step 2. Ensure a good water balance (5 min. - 2 hours)
Check the water values. In the case of a swimming pool, these are the carbonate hardness, the chlorine value and the pH value.. If you fill your swimming pool with spring or salt water, you may need to check other values.
In large amounts of water, such as the water in your pool, changes are constantly happening — water evaporates, temperature changes, dust gets into it, etc. This affects the
pH value and other properties of the water, changes that would affect the polar systems
may damage.
Deviations in pH and chlorine values also offer algae an opportunity to grow. Because you won't be controlling the water for a few months now, the water must be in optimal condition before “hibernation” — pollution-free and chemically in optimal condition.
Check the manual for your pool systems to see which values the manufacturer recommends for winterizing. Test strips are in garden centers or online available; you can see how to use them gentleman. If your pool has a fully automatic water preparation system, this device may provide some values automatically.
Winter fluid
So-called winter liquid contains substances that help the water in your swimming pool get through the winter, in particular extra anti-algae agents. This can be a good tool. First, check whether all your installations are able to withstand this drug.
If you add winter liquid, chlorine or other agents to your water in this step, let the circulation pump run for a few more hours afterwards. The resources need time and flow to develop
easy to spread.
Step 3: Prevent damage to the basin (20 min.)
During the cold months, you should protect your pool against frost damage. If you don't want to heat the water in your swimming pool to a constant 12°C or more, you'll need to take other measures. First, lower the water level to around 10 cm below the skimmer.
Tip: During a backwash, a swimming pool “loses” a certain amount of water. See if the water level has dropped sufficiently after the last backwash (tip 1).
Do not let the water out of the pool completely because then the surface could push in and thus damage the bottom and/or walls of your pool.
The weight of the water prevents this.
Ice pressure could damage the pool. You can prevent this with winter floats (also: wintering floats). These icebreakers are placed on the water. They are available in garden centers and, of course, online.
Step 4. Winterize your installations (15 min.)
Leave the skimmer and all water pipes off the pool deflate.
This prevents frost damage to the parts.
Also prepare the heat pump, circulation pump and filters for winter. Unplug them or put them on winter mode. Refer to the instructions for recommended winter care.
Seal the injectors in the pool with rubber winter stoppers. This prevents rain, snow or dirt from entering the installations through these openings. The skimmer gets a special winter stopper that lets (rain) water out of the skimmer: this type of winter stopper is called gizzmo.
Just make sure that all parts are free of water to prevent mold. If you interrupt other connections, you could also use winter stoppers for that.
Step 5. Make sure you have a good pool cover (5 min.)
A pool cover is suitable as a winter cover if it insulates well, (almost) seals the swimming water to prevent contamination and does not let light through. The more light hits the water, the faster algae grows in it.
*Step 6. Reboot (3+ hours)
You only do it after the cold months, but with a standard pool, you shouldn't forget that you have to restart your systems in the spring.
In the spring, you basically do steps 1 & 2. Even if you use winter fluid, keep in mind that you will have to clean your pool again and also remove algae.
So, adding up autumn and spring, you have at least two afternoons required to prepare your pool for winter and get it out of “hibernation” again.
General tips for preparing your pool for winter
Tip 1. Use a winter cover
Every pool, and certainly an outdoor swimming pool, benefits from a decent cover all year round. A pool cover reduces evaporation, helps keep swimming water clean and saves you energy costs.
Click on the following link and decide which pool cover suits you best.
In the cold months, an outdoor pool also has to deal with leaves, branches and turbulent weather.
In addition, more water evaporates when there is a strong wind.
When water doesn't keep moving, algae grows in it, even in winter. Sunlight promotes algae growth. In addition, the water in the pool and in the pipes must not freeze due to damage to the installation
to prevent.
The more your winter cover protects your pool in these aspects, the better.
Tip 2: Go for a small pool
A small (and therefore (sustainable) swimming pool Winterizing is a lot easier than preparing a large pool for winter. Hence our second tip: go for a small pool.
Winterizing one of our Swim Intelligent Pools is very different (and faster) than with a “standard” pool.
Next, we will first review the standard winterization program and then the winter care for a Swimm Intelligent Pool.
The standard pools assume a water surface of 6 m x 3 m and a water depth of 1.5 m, which is actually very small for a standard pool.
What do you need to get your pool ready for the winter?
In order to properly implement this step-by-step plan, you have some pool accessories needed. Your minimum equipment includes:
- Landing net (manual removal of dirt)
- Polar dredger
- Test strips (minimum: carbonate hardness, chlorine, pH)
- Chlorine tablets and/or chlorine granules (manual chlorine regulation)
- Rubber stoppers for injectors and skimmers (and other connections)
- Overwintering floats (also called: winter floats, icebreakers)
- Winter cover
- If desired: winter liquid
The good news is that you already have about half of this stuff at home for the regular upkeep of your pool.
What does it cost to winterize your (standard) pool?
The costs of preparing for winter depend on a number of factors. First, you can do it yourself or outsource the job.
If you prepare your pool for winter yourself, then, as just seen, you already have most of the stuff for that at home. The cost of the accessories you need specifically for the winter depends mainly on the size of the pool. The more water there is in your pool, the more winter fluid you need.
Materials to get your pool ready for the colder months
Below are a few products to help you prepare your pool for the winter.
1. Winter stopper
A winter stopper costs an average of around 5€. How many stoppers you need depends on how many injectors you have and how many other pipes you need to protect.
2. Winter Floater
A winter float costs around €7. Winter floats are usually placed diagonally in your pool and are usually +/- 50 cm long. So for a 6 m x 3 m swimming pool, you need at least 12 pieces.
3. Winter cover
The dimensions of the swimming surface determine the choice of your pool cover (s). The smaller this surface, the more choice you usually have. A winter cover (we call it) Swim cover) for one of our Health or Advanced models (swimming area 4 m x 2.25 m), for example, costs 2,200€ incl. BTW. You can see what this cover looks like in the picture above
If you let someone else winterize your pool, they charge for several hours of working time, travel costs and equipment. Just count with a few hundred euros.
How do you winterize a Swim Intelligent Pool?
With a swimming area of 4 m x 2.25 m and a water depth of 1.25 m or 1.35 m, Swimm Intelligent Pools are really very compact compared to the average standard pool
— which is certainly not at the expense of the fun, sports & wellness factor.
An Intelligent Pool is extremely energy efficient and requires very little time and energy to maintain compared to “normal” pools. Since the relatively low energy costs, a pool of Swimm gives you 2 options when it comes to the theme of this blog:
1. You can swim all year round!
That's the nice and special thing about our Intelligent Pools. Heat wave or frost, swimming and training every day of the year without having to carry out any special activities.
If you also swim in the winter, you circulate and heat the water like in summer. Standard maintenance will continue as usual. The water and pipes do not freeze. Want to know how to get your pool ready for summer? Read it in our blog: How do you restart your pool after the winter?
You can also set a lower temperature (above 0°C) on the heat pump and swim in a wetsuit, for example.
Additional tools: none (except a wetsuit then)
Time required: none
2. You definitely want NOT swimming in the winter?
Then you can adjust the heat pump temperature (somewhere > 0°C).
When it's not freezing, run the circulation pump for four hours a day.
In this case, there are two positive side effects, namely:
a) that the water does not freeze and
b) that the water remains clear, so that you can go swimming again in the spring without (much) maintenance.
If it freezes, you need to switch on the circulation pump permanently. If the heat pump is not on in case of frost, blow the water out of the heat pump pipes using a compressor and close these pipes.
Additional tools: compressor & winter stoppers for the heat pump (if desired)
Time required: minimal (keep a close eye on the weather & act on time)
At most, option 2 comes close to preparing a regular swimming pool for winter. Even if you count on one extra hour of maintenance/cleaning in the spring, you clearly have to invest less time than with the “standard program”.
Practice shows that the costs of running the heat pump and circulation pump in option 2 are still lower than the costs of having someone else winterize your standard pool.
With option 1, depending on the desired water temperature, you will probably end up slightly more expensive.
But at the same time, you can also enjoy your pool for an extra long time and a lot.
Want to know more about Swim's swimming pools?
You buy your own pool to swim in it as often as possible, preferably every day.
Sports, wellness and fun every day — great!
Of course, you also want a pool that lasts and lasts a long time looks super nice. This will not work even with a high-quality swimming pool without regular maintenance. The less time, energy and costs involved, the better!
Swim Intelligent Polish
The Swim Intelligent Polish really meet all these expectations (and much more).
With a swimming area measuring 4 m x 2.25 m, these pools fit into almost any garden and you have a full choice of accessories.
With the Intelligent Pools, you also don't have to invest hours to get your pool ready for winter. Or you can simply swim in an energy-efficient countercurrent pool all year round. Or you can put a winter cover on your Intelligent Pool and run the circulation and heat pump according to the schedule mentioned above. So easy!
Whether you swim recreationally or go for Olympic gold — in a Swimm, you swim just like in open water and find the support (or challenge) that suits your wishes and needs.
