Winter pool covers can be a big expense; taking care of your pool cover will extend the life of the cover.
How To Protect Your Swimming Pool Cover From Winter:
Elite Lawn Sprinklers, Pools & Spas refers to these as the ” top five winter pool cover care tips”. These five tips will help you protect the swimming pool cover from the elements as we described above.
These tips will be for above ground pools as well as in ground pools.
How To Remove Ice and Water From A Pool Cover:
The best way to remove ice and water from the swimming pool cover is to use a pump. You will have to wait for a warm day when the ice melts and then pump off the cover. It is never a good idea to try to remove ice from the pool cover because it has sharp edges and if you drop the ice, it will cut a whole or gash though the cover.
The best way to prevent large build ups of ice is to keep the water level on top of the pool cover to a minimum. You will want to keep an inch of water on top of the pool cover to keep it from blowing during heavy winds.
How To Protect Your Pool Cover From Wind Damage:
Heavy winds and rain can blow the pool cover around and even completely off of the swimming pool. When this happens the cover could tear, rip or possibly even be shredded into pieces if it is windy enough. You can protect this from happening by taking a few easy steps.
We will first explain how to secure an Above ground swimming pool.
You will want to do three things to totally protect your above ground swimming pool cover from the wind.The first thing you will want to do is make sure the cable and the winch are totally tight and secure.
The second thing you will want to do is to use either pool clips that clip onto the railing of the pool or use bleach bottles full of sand and hand them from several places on the pool cover, some may say this is not professional but it actually works much better than pool clips.
Third, you should protect the cover from wind by adding a few hundred gallons of water on top of the cover. That may sound like a lot of water but its only about 10 minutes or less of running the garden hose,. You also have to remember that the pool cover is large and this water will spread out. A hundred gallons actually won’t seem like much after you add it, but it will be enough to hold the cover in place.
Protecting your in-ground pool cover from wind:
If you have an in-ground pool cover you can follow most of the steps that we had mentioned on the above ground how to. You will not need a cable or winch .
You will also just want to keep a small amount of water on top of the in-ground pool cover as well to make sure that the pool cover stays on place and does not lift off on windy days.
How To Protect Your Pool Cover From Leaves & Tree Branches:
Every year when the pool guys go to take off the pool cover, the cover has holes in it because of some type of tree branch or leaves that have destroyed the cover. There are two things you can do to protect your pool from being damaged by the winter and the trees.
First, hire a professional tree specialist to remove any overhanging tree limbs that may land in your pool of they were to somehow break off the tree. Dead tree limbs are a #1 cause of holes in swimming pool covers during the course of the winter, closely followed by seam rips.
Second, buy a swimming pool leaf net that installs on top of your pool cover. This leaf net is made from mesh so the water drains right through but the leaves are stopped. Once the leaves have all fallen you can remove the net.
How To Make Sure Your Pool Cover Doesn’t Blow Off The Pool:
The number one thing that happens to all new swimming pool owners during their first winter season is that the pool cover blows off of the pool. Now, this also happens to a lot of seasoned pool owners as well as professional swimming pool companies. This can all be avoided by simply just making sure to tuck of of your straight edge corners under the cover making all the edges round in a sense. After you do that you will want to make sure that the corners are all weighed down worth water bags or objects heavy enough.
How To Pump The Water Off With A Pump:
If you have a swimming pool cover pump you will want to drain the pool cover as we mentioned in the steps above, but it’s not that easy to drain the pool cover off if you have leaves and other debris on the cover. What usually happens is that the pump impeller or the pump filter will get clogged and the pump will stop pumping. This can happen over and over again until the pool owner gets frustrated enough and just gives up.
The best way to avoid frustration and keep that pump pumping with out getting clogged is to take the pump and place it inside of a 5 gallon bucket that has a few holes drilled into it. You will then take this bucket with the pump in it and place it on the pool cover. This will stop the big leaves and other debris from clogging your pump.
Bonus Protection Tips For Safety Swimming Pool Cover Owners:
If you have a safety pool cover you will want to know about these three top tips to protect the cover from damage which could result in an expensive repair bill. Here is what you want to do to protect your swimming pool safety cover during the winter.
First, make sure that are the safety cover springs are tight and the cover is not sagging. If the cover springs are loose that could cause them to pop off and then one by one the cover will have less support and that will eventually lead to tears or rips in the seams of the cover. Please remember that in the event of above average snow and or ice accumulation the cover may begin to sag.
Second, protect your safety pool cover is to make sure that you don’t lower the water too much when you are closing your pool. A low water level will cause your pool cover to stretch if ice or snow weight down the cover during the winter. Just lower the water a few inches below the skimmer and keep an eye on it.
Third, make sure that the water level in your swimming pool stays at a safe height. As mentioned above, if you remove to much water from your swimming pool cover you could damage your cover.
To prepare in advance for heavy rain, set a pump on the step of the pool before closing it . If the water level becomes too high you can turn on the pump on to remove some excess.
By properly protecting your in-ground swimming pool cover from the winter elements, you can and will save hundreds or even thousands of dollars on costly swimming pool covers and safety swimming pool cover repair.
