Swimming Pool Tips and Reviews

The ColorQ Pro 7 Digital Photometer Pool Water Test Kit is a very accurate and easy to use test kit for your pool water chemistry. One of the best features is that it takes the guess work out of water testing. It uses a digital photometer to give you a precise readout of the test results. A photometer is an instrument for measuring the intensity of light, so the ColorQ will scan the reagent sample and that is how it gets the digital results. This video details how the ColorQ Pro7 works  and I also touch on some of the nice features of this particular test kit: The ColorQ Pro 7 is a very versatile tester as it will check your pool or spa for all of the main test factors. So if you are a homeowner or a pool service professional it is the only test you will need. It comes with enough reagents for 144 test and 100 tablets for CYA testing.  .  The price range is higher than most testers mainly because of the ColorQ unit itself. Since it is a di...

I get asked this question often on my website and YouTube channel and my answer depends on many factors which I will go over a little in this article.  My answer will vary from person to person but  there are some general rules in choosing a cleaner.  The most pressing questions are how much will a  good cleaner cost and will it clean my pool  effectively?  The price between the different cleaner types vary  widely so it is better to focus on the price point in  each category of cleaner. The most expensive  cleaner types are the Robotic cleaners followed by  the Pressure Side cleaners and the most affordable  cleaners are the suction side cleaners. Robotic Cleaners: A good Robotic cleaner with all the bells and whistles will run you over $1,500 in most cases. Quite an investment but you do get a good return for your money. Today's robotic cleaners are much improved over the 1st generation which came out a few years ago....

What is ORP? ORP stands for oxidation-reduction potential and it basically measures the effectiveness of the sanitizer (usually Chlorine) in your swimming pool. ORP can also be used for Bromine and Ozone as well as other Oxidizing sanitizers. ORP is widely used in Eurpoe as the standard for safety in swimming pools. The US is slow to adopt this standard and still use PPM of Free Chlorine as the standard. ORP is a proven method of safety in water and has a long track record dating back over 40 years. So do you need to test for it? It depends. If you are a pool service professional you should test for ORP at your commercial accounts and some heavily used residential accounts. If you are a homeowner and want to be 100% certain your pool is safe to swim in, then getting an ORP tester is not a bad idea. You can basically keep your sanitizer effective by keeping a Free Chlorine level of 2-3 ppm, keeping the pH at 7.2-7.6 and having your Cyanuric Acid (Conditioner) at  30 ppm to 1...

If I say "Appomattox Court House," would you know what I was referring to? Some might know that this is where General Lee surrendered the Southern Army to General Grant. This is a common mistake pool manufacturers make when they try to market their products. If I told 100 pool guys starting out in the business to define the "Power Vac PV2100 Portable Professional Swimming Pool Vacuum Cleaner," chances are those that could answer this would be about the same percentage who would know what happened at the "Appmattox Court House." So I will unpack the Power Vac model PV2100 for you in this article so you will know exactly what it is and why I would highly recommend it to you. In the video below I liken the Power Vac PV2100 to a Robotic Pool Cleaner, a portable pool pump, a manual vacuum and a Leafbagger. So let me explain this in some detail. The Power Vac is similar to a Robotic cleaner in that it operates with a powerful motor and propeller - 35 lb. of ...

The Hayward AquaVac 500 is a very solid and well made robotic pool cleaner that seems to be overlooked in the market. It s priced in the mid-range as far as robotic cleaners go and delivers a lot of features. I like the easy access filter area and I like the design of the filter itself. It has a large area for leaves and the two filter inserts trap the dirt and small debris. This cleaner has no problem climbing up walls and moving around the pool. It just zips around the pool on a mission to clean it in the allotted 3 hour time frame. In my testing the pools I put it in come out spotless. While it is climbing the walls it also cleans the pool tile area which is a nice touch. I like the cord swivel as it prevents one of the major plagues of robotic cleaners - the cord getting tangled up in the pool. 60 ft of cord is plenty for most pools. Many consumers worry about this compact design I think as early cleaners that used this flat design would "Turtle" in the pool - t...

There is nothing worse than going out to your pool and finding a dead animal on the bottom. Well, maybe finding one in the skimmer is equally unpleasant. This is probably the most unpleasant part of my job. But animals fall into a pool and I am left to take care of it. So my list includes rats, mice, lizards, birds, a skunk, gofers and this Possum in the video above. All in a days work as they say. These are the steps I follow whenever I find a dead animal in the pool. I super chlorinate the pool, run it for one cycle and close it for 24-48 hours or until the chlorine drops down to 5 ppm or less. Liquid chlorine or Clorox bleach are the best - Sodium Hypochlorite is proven to kill bacteria and virus. If the pool already was at 2. ppm technically you are fine. But I always like to bring the chlorine up to 10 -20 ppm just to be on the safe side.  It just feels better to have the chlorine blazing high so everything is killed without a doubt. I run the pool for one complet...

In this video I cover a broad range of things that I think will help you maintain your above ground pool and allow you to enjoy it rather then cursing the decision to purchase it. Here are some things from the video and some added information. KEEP YOUR POOL BALANCED: The key is to keep the water balanced not just for enjoyment and everyday use but because when an above ground pool turns - starts to get algae it is harder to reverse it. Mainly because the equipment is undersized for the amount of water. Manufacturers can't package full size equipment for practical reasons like set-up and assembly. So you are working with equipment that is designed to keep a balanced pool blue and looking good. The equipment is not designed for a green pool clean-up. Some newer above ground pools don't have a skimmer or vacuum port so once it gets out of hand things can get frustrating. One solution is to upgrade to better equipment but the less expensive alternative is to not let the...

There is no hiding the fact that the AquaNaut and Phoenix are just the Poolvergnuegen in an updated body and color scheme. All of the internal parts are the same as the PoolCleaner "The Next Generation." Hayward purchased that company last year and owns the patents so it is incorporating the design into their own brand and there is nothing wrong with that. Here is an explanation in a nutshell for you. Hayward Purchased Poolvergnuegen back in January of 2014 or so and in that purchase came all of the patents. Since the PoolCleaner was not a Hayward product it couldn't be offered in the Hayward rebate programs. So they spent a lot of money to design a new body and color schemes for the AquaNaut and Phoenix and made them Hayward products. So essentially all three are the same cleaner, PoolCleaner "Next Generation," AqauNaut and Phoenix. So why purchase the AquaNaut/Phoenix vs the Poolvergnuegen? The answer is Rebates. The PoolCleaner still carries the Po...

Bio-Active Cyanuric Acid Reducer - BiOWiSH Technologies is the first of it's kind. For years everyone has been trying to come up with a chemical that would destroy high CYA levels. Turns out it isn't a chemical that will do it but a microorganism. With a huge drought in the Southwest and particularly California, draining your pool partially is not an option. So this product couldn't have hit the market at a better time. This video above is a basic overview of the product. To learn more you can go to their website: www.bioactivenow.com I talked to their sales rep extensively and here are some finer points of the Bio-Active. If the parameters are in line you will get good results - the minimum results ares 40-60 ppm in a pool of 25,000 gallons with a CYA level of 150 ppm. He states that if it is in the 200-250 ppm range the Bio-Active will work better and reduce the levels more. Contrary to that if the levels are 80 ppm you will only see a slight reduction. ...

I saw the SweepEase being demonstrated at a pool show and was intrigued by the design. The Patented shape uses water to push it to the wall and floor creating more pressure without you physically exerting the force. 5-10 lbs more according to the manufacturer. The manufacturer plays up the one handed brushing of the pool which is nice but I really like the fact that when you use two hands the force created by this brush is increased dramatically. You almost get pulled into the pool - so be careful. You can also use one hand and brush the pool effectively. The brush is well made and finished well. I like the overall shape as it makes brushing in the corners easy. Both brushes use Polypropylene which is superior to Nylon in many ways. Polypropylene is chemical and UV resistant, has more flexibility and is more durable than nylon. They make two models, one for plaster and Pebble Tec pool surfaces with wire bristles inserted among the Poly bristles: SweepEase 100% POLY BRIST...

It is a bit of circular logic but if you keep your pool balanced you won't develop algae and it won't be a problem for you. But we all get busy and forget to check on the pool or the gardeners decide to blow everything from the deck into the pool. Maybe your pump basket gets clogged and you don't notice for a few days. Or you leave your pool in spa mode and the pool sits not circulating for a week. In an ideal world simply keeping your pool balanced would solve a lot of issues, but stuff happens. So here are some common causes of algae blooming in your pool, ways to treat it and a preventative algae treatment you can use all season long. There are of course other ways to prevent algae growth if you would like to try them. Here are some low cost preventative things you can do: Adding Borates to your pool to achieve 30 ppm- 50 ppm helps to inhibit algae growth. Keeping your pH at 7.2-7.4 is also effective as the chlorine will be more effective but be used up quic...

Basically a green pool clean-up is a process as I detail in all three videos. If you don't follow the process and just dump chlorine and algaecide in it probably won't work. From my experience the initial chemical reading is not a factor - unless the pool is really low on Conditioner - below 30 ppm. It doesn't matter what  the initial pH or Alkalinity reading the first day - you are looking at a swamp with mosquito larvae growing in it - it is not a pool in any sense except for the equipment. So the first step is to make sure the pump is working - this pool had the pump down for  6 months  - finally got a used pump installed. Circulation is critical so the filter needs to be cleaned. A Cartridge filter like this one needs to be taken apart and cleaned - so does a DE filter. Sand filters are a pain as they can only be backwashed so the process will be longer with that filter type. Then we bomb out the pool. I like 30 ppm of chlorine -Shock and Awe. Liquid Chlorin...