Category: Pool Maintenance

There’s something special about owning an in-ground spa and having it available in the winter. That hot water is therapeutic and being able to enjoy it all winter is something that changes the entire approach to the season.

Making sure your in-ground spa or spool is ready for winter enjoyment is an important part of ownership. A few minutes and a few easy steps can ensure your spa is in top condition for years to come. Winter is the time of year when frigid temperatures and freezing pipes can do real damage for owners who are not prepared.

Have a Plan

Waiting for the power to go out in -10 degree weather is not the time to test whether or not you can keep your spa running in an emergency. Make sure you write down the plan, have an emergency contact, and know where all the resources are before you go away. We came up with a few of our top things to look for when making a good plan to maintain your spa all winter.

Check Your Backup Generator

If you have a whole house generator, which we always recommend, make sure it is ready for the season. If your spa was installed after the generator, or if you have specific circuits that receive emergency power, be sure that your electrician has set up the spa as part of the necessary running items.

Above 65 Degrees

If you are using your spa in the winter, most people keep temperatures over 90 degrees. However, if you plan to lower the spa temperature for a period of time, do not go below 65 degrees. In the case of a real emergency, having the temperature warm enough to be able to react is as important as having an emergency plan.

24 Hour Pump Schedule

Your spa pump should be running continuously for 24 hours, especially when the temperature drops below freezing. We schedule a pump reset and system shutdown only one minute per day. This is where most people get in trouble as they adjust the schedule on days where the temperature is moderate, but forget to reset it back before the freeze. Keep that same schedule all winter.

Check Your Cover

The main direction for heat loss in an in-ground spa is UP. Keep that cover installed when not in use. Be sure to inspect the cover every Spring to make sure it’s ready for the next season. That will give you time to repair or replace anything necessary before the cold season arrives again.

Maintain Water Level

Automatic water fillers are typically turned off in the winter, because they will freeze when not in use. Check to make sure your water level is above the filter line, and that you can fill it up easily when needed.

Watching the downpour from a summer rainstorm teem across the surface of your pool is a great sight, but it’s important to remember that heavy rain can affect your pool’s water quality. A heavy storm with lots of rainfall can change the chemical balance in the pool water, overflow your pool, and introduce contaminates from the air, rain, and runoff.

Rainwater is acidic (the level of acidity depends on where you live) and naturally has a lower pH level than pool water. If enough rain fills a pool, it can lower the pH levels. This directly affects swimmers’ comfort — when people complain of burning eyes from pool water, it’s not because of too much chlorine, but because of low pH.

Besides acidity, a heavy storm can bring foreign contaminants into your pool that also could have a negative impact. Without proper drainage around your pool, water runoff can introduce elements that can change the calcium, hardness and alkalinity in your water, as well as bring in dirt and debris that can damage surfaces and equipment. Heavy rains can also deposit airborne debris and algae spores into water, which can, along with the chemical imbalance, lead to quicker algae growth — and nobody wants a green pool.

What does this mean for you as a pool owner? It means that it is important to have your pool water checked weekly to ensure the best chemical balances to prevent recreational water illness and protect the lifespan of the equipment and swimmers’ comfort. You’ve created the pool you’ve always wanted, and, just like your car, your boat, or your body, you need to keep it finely tuned.

We at Precision Pool and Spa offer weekly water testing for chlorine, pH and overall alkalinity, to help keep your pool in top shape. By performing weekly tests, we can keep the water at the optimal balance for the health of your pool avoiding excessive chemical corrections. For more information, check out our service programs where we test you pool and keep it in balance.

CHECK YOUR TEST KIT

A proper test kit is your security blanket in knowing you have the right levels for your pool. The most reliable and accurate kits are still the most essential.

Rochester Climate

spool

A Spool, or a Small Pool, is a smaller pool design created as a solution to having a swimming pool fit for a small backyard or limited space. While it was originally designed as the solution to fit into small yard, Spools are quickly becoming the hottest trend for any size yard and small families.

While they can be customized to any size, they would typically be 10-16 feet long and 6 to 8 feet wide. They are much smaller than in-ground swimming pool, but nearly twice the length of an average spa.

What options are there?

Spa Spool – The natural build out of this space is to make sure it isn’t just a pool but also a spa. Ideal for homes in the Northeastern part of the country, a combination build can be enjoyed year round.  Cool and refreshing during the hot months while a heater turns it into a large in-ground hot tub that can fit 15 people or more.

Lap Spool – Take a small pool and add powerful pump designed for making current and you have yourself the perfect lap pool. Swim against the current for the perfect fitness solution.

Bar Spool – Space is limited in the backyard, this makes the ultimate addition to a custom outdoor kitchen. Custom seating solutions and countertop edging will give you the best place to relax and enjoy a few cocktails.

Check out This Spool Portfolio

Shotcrete is not new. It has been around since the mid-60’s and outside of the pool industry is not really differentiated in how pneumatically applied concrete is referred to. Call a sprayed concrete pool a gunite pool or call it a shotcrete pool and you will not be wrong. The difference is in the process, the equipment, and the material.

Here is a quick comparison of the two, but really the only difference is that Gunite uses a dry mix where water is added at the nozzle, and Shotcrete uses a wet mix of concrete.

We usually see more shotcrete out west or down south where the temperatures allow them to work with wet material, not needing to worry about freezing. Here in upstate NY, we plan to work throughout the winter, so most companies use gunite.

FAQS

Does this affect the cost of my pool?

No. The processes are interchangeable and we will use the best solution to match the job and the environment that day. The material and labor costs remain the same.

Where does the waste go?

For us waste is excess material from the spray. We scrape it off so we can get to the shaping layers of the gunite. For large projects we can distribute the waste to over-dug areas of the project area or ultimately haul it away in buckets to get recycled.

Download this Infographic

It’s an Olympic time of year.  The Winter Olympics are in Pyeongchang South Korea and the patriot pride is running high.  While all the water events this year involve frozen water, the summer Olympics are in Tokyo in 2020 when swimming returns, it’s a perfect time to talk about training and swimming in actual Olympic Pools. 

So what exactly goes into the design of an Olympic pool and how are they different from the pools the rest of us swim in on a regular basis?

Competitions can’t be held in just any large pool. There are specific requirements to graner the label “Olympic.” These regulations are determined and enforced by the Federation Internationale de Natation (FINA).

Although each pool has its own style design to match the venue, there are some guidelines they all have to follow when designing the layout and size.

Highlights of Olympic Pool Design

• Depth: Minimum 2 meters deep. No restriction on max.
• Length: 50 meters long. (+.030m tolerance to accomodate touch panels.)
• 10 lanes: 8 for swimmers, two for buffering waves
• Lane width of 2.5 meters with a buoyed rope
• Lines marking the lanes on the bottom of the pool
• 6 ½ feet before the end, the bottom lane line stops to notify swimmers
• A false start rope placed 15 meters from the start line
• A flagged backstroke turn line placed almost 4 feet above the surface

Changes and Trends

2009 – FINA Congress rules were approved for 10-lane courses for competition, as an alternative to the more traditional 8-lane course. In RIO the outside lanes were used to buffer the waves for the outside swimmers.

What Makes a Pool Faster?

Depth. “A fast pool typically has at least three meters of depth to it,” says Teri McKeever, head coach of the University of California’s women’s swimming team, and who served as the U.S. head coach at London 2012. “The deeper the pool is the better, because the splash or the turbulence and everything takes longer to get down to the bottom and then it doesn’t ricochet back up into the swimmers.”

Notable Olympic Pools in History

While the very first olympic swimming events weren’t held in pools, much has changed since they changed from “Nautical Games” in rivers, lakes, and oceans to our modern swimming events. Controlling the environment and making sure it is equal level for everybody involved is a crucial component when you are running an International competition watched by the world. Here are some of the more notable moments and pools in the history of the Olympics, each one playing a major role in it’s growth as a sport.

1924: Paris’ Olympic Swimming Pool

The very first Olympic swimming pool made its debut in the 1924 Olympics. Piscene Georges Vallerey pool still exists today. It has some major upgrades and will be hosting the 2018 Gay Games within its walls.

It’s original features include:

• A considerably shallow depth of less than 10 feet
• A width of approximately 82 feet
• Spectator seating up close and personal to the poolside
• Narrow pool decks

1996: Atlanta’s Olympic Swimming Pool

The pool at Atlanta’s Summer Olympics was specifically designed. It boasted unique architecture with an outdoor and indoor feel. The pool’s sides were open to the elements, but it had a roof covering the entire area.

More adaptable than the first Olympic pool 72 years prior, this pool’s design included:

• 108 foot length and 72 foot width
• Spacious pool decks
• Outdoor opening which offered cool breezes to combat the humidity
• An adjustable floor that could be set to a specific depth: 8 feet for the competition

2008: Beijing’s Olympic Swimming Pool

As records fell in the 2008 Beijing swim events, physics reigned supreme. The design of China’s pool enhanced the ability of swimmers to maximize their potential. How? The design took wave dissipation, optimal conditions for vision, and lane placement into consideration.

Here are the changes that resulted in the fastest pool to be utilized at the time:

• 10 lanes instead of 8
• Perforated gutters to suck the waves out of the way
• 10 feet deep instead of 7
• Expansive stadium to give athletes space to focus

2016: Rio’s Olympic Swimming Pool

Although Rio De Janeiro’s Olympic Pool did not house as many falling records as China’s fast pool, it crushed the records set in London during the 2012 Olympics. It is heralded as another fast pool, just not the fastest.

Rio’s pool had the technology but was missing some of the components of the pool in Beijing. Here’s what Rio had to offer:

• Deeper pool to dissipate waves instead of bouncing them back to athletes at 10 feet
• Gutters and bumpers between lanes designed to stabilize the water
• 10 lanes to provide space for waves to be absorbed
• Flat walls that allowed for slightly higher circulation of waves

Lap Pools vs Lane Pools

Outside of an actual olympic pool, there are two good options to keep your training alive. Lap Pools are for swimming endurance, but not necessarily to simulate the experience of the event pool.  Equipped with a high speed jet, “which you cannot swim faster than” they are a great option to get some pace timing in. Lane Pools we create to mimic the the swim  of any sized pool you want, including olympic pools. Any ideal lane pool will include enough width to prevent wash back off the walls, and be exactly 50 meters. If counting reps is the important factor and space is limited, we would consider a 25 meter pool, breaking your distance in half, but adding more reps to the rotation.

Autumn in Rochester

Summer’s long nights are being replaced by autumn’s cool breezes. Upstate New Yorkers are trading in their marshmallowey s’mores and bathing suits for pumpkin spice and muck boots. Open windows are being pulled shut and preparations for winter are emerging everywhere. Pools are being closed, shorts are getting packed away and the birds are migrating. But winter isn’t here just yet and that is great news for all of the warm weather lovers out there!

If you’re a warm weather fan, there are a few things you can do to hang on to the sunshine season without traveling south with the geese.

Optimizing Gunite Pool Heat

You don’t need to be a polar plunger to enjoy the pool beyond August. All you need is a higher temperature for the water. This doesn’t mean you have to turn your swimming pool into a sauna, it just means you can raise it up a notch to take the bite out of the autumn air. Here are some concepts as to how and why your pool can hold onto that heat and you can keep swimming.

• Geothermal heat retention. Imagine your favorite travel mug for a moment. Have you ever watched a barista heat up your coffee mug before pouring coffee into the mug? By having a material already heated around the liquid, you are conditioning that mug, which will keep your coffee warmer, longer. Your gunite pool is a huge heat sink that has the heat retained from the ground around it. This time of year, that keeps your water temperature from dropping faster than the other the air temperature outside does.
• Put a lid on it. With your pool surrounded by a warm cozy layer of gunite, the number one cause of heat loss is out the top. An insulated solar cover this time of year doesn’t bring heat in with the solar rays, but helps insulate and retain that heat, especially at night when the air temperature drops.
• Temperature Homeostasis. Homeo-what-sis? Let’s stick with the home analogy to describe this one. During the cold season it is normal to have the temperature on the thermostat change based on whether the family is home or out and about. When doing this, it’s important to make sure the change is minimal because more energy (and likewise more money) is used to raise the temperature more than 5 degrees at a time. Many families use this strategy to heat their homes. The same is true for pools. When extending your swim season by raising the heat of your pool, put it on a timer or change it in small increments at a time. In the end leaving your pool at a higher temperature is more cost effective and efficient than fluctuating the temp drastically when you aren’t using it.

What if you don’t have a pool?

Autumn is for Pool Planning

It seems a little backwards to buy a pool after swim season is over, but the truth is: now is the time to plan.

We are installing pools through December, and our schedule books deep into next year, so it is important to get your name on the calendar as soon as possible. More importantly, right now is when the little nuances of your yard and habits are fresh in your mind. If you wait a few months you might not remember where the sun shines best, where the leaves tend to gather, or which part of your deck and backyard is most convenient for lounging. All of these details factor into what size, shape and location is best for your pool. Thinking about a future pool could bring some warm thoughts to sustain you through the cool nights too!

What to know what to consider through all four seasons when planning your pool? Give us a call or stop into our new indoor/outdoor learning patio. We totally built a fully stocked patio inside and outside our office, so we can ignore the seasons completely.