02/02/2022
Upcoming freeze
Here are a few tips keep your pool from freeze damage. Make sure your swimming pool is filled to the proper levels low water can cause your pool equipment to lose prime. Also after it gets cold many times garden hoses are frozen, if you are unable to add water you can melt ice in your garden hose in your bathtub, or drain your garden hose after using it and keep it in a warm area.
Make sure that your skimmer baskets are clean, net any surface debris. Heavy debris in skimmers can slow down circulation and again your pump and equipment can be susceptible to damage. Make sure swimming pool circulation pump is running the entire time temperatures are below 36°. Many pools have automatic freeze guards although they can be checked the only sure fire way to make sure that they are working properly is to make sure water is moving in your swimming pool. If for whatever reason you lose prime and your pool is not circulating only then shut off your pump it makes no sense to run your equipment if water is not circulating through it. Then we tell people cover your equipment with a tarp and put some type of heat source under the tarp a heat lamp works well but a regular lightbulb is better than nothing, make sure heat source is not touching any flammable materials and do not attempt to run your heater if you are going to cover your equipment. In fact we don’t recommend running a heater unless you are there to monitor it warm water will cause massive amounts of evaporation in the pool causing a problem if the water gets too low.
In case is a power outages where equipment shuts off there are drain plugs in all of the pumps also on filters and heaters that can be removed although many times the pumps and pipes are already frozen. In some cases you can at least save your pool pump by using hot water from the bathtub to thaw out the pump so at least you can drain it.
