Swimming Pool Tips and Reviews

There are two upgrades to your pool equipment that I highly recommend. If you have the money to invest I would put in a Variable Speed Pump (VS Pump) and a Salt Water Generator also known as a Salt Water System. The Variable Speed pump will save you a tone of money on your energy cost and a Salt Water Generator will generate and add chlorine to your pool for you which will save you time on your pool maintenance. I am going to focus here on the money savings that a Variable Speed Pump (VS) can help you with and you will be amazed I think of the amount of money you can save each year on your pool care budget. The pool pump can be the highest energy hog in your house, passing your Air Conditioner and Refrigerator just by the sheer amount of hours it runs each day. If you have a 1 ½ or 2 HP pump installed and you run it 8 hours per day, not to get into complicated conversions of kWh (Kilowatt Hours) and how you are charged each month by your Electric Company, just imagine it as ...

To see the Polaris Quattro Sport in action is truly a sight to see. I can sit by the pool all day watching the cleaner move around. It does such a great job picking up debris on the floors and it will climb the walls up to the water line and clean that also. The scrubbing brush on front loosens up debris as it moves along, and you can see the pool being cleaned right before your eyes! This was a very dirty Pebble Tec pool that just got hit by a Santa Ana wind event. So it was full of oak leaves, dirt, and fine particle debris. With the large debris opening the Polaris Quattro Sport had no problem with the large oak leaves and the dual layer canister easily trapped the smaller particle debris. It also did great climbing the walls and you see it also cleaning the step area of the pool. There is a lot to like about the new Quattro Sport including the sleek design of the cleaner. With the internal debris canister, the cleaner looks very clean as it works its way around the pool....

In this Podcast I talk to Joe DiAnna the owner of Primate Pool Tools which is the company that makes the Primate Pool Pole. I have been using this pole now for 3 months and it is truly a great product. There are so many great features as you will see below. This is the most unique 3-piece pool service pole (Tri-Pole) on the market today.  The Primate 3X Pole is also the most compact and lightweight pole that I have used. It collapses down to 6 ft and extends to 15.6 ft and weighs only 2 lbs. 4 oz.  Oh, and it is made from Carbon Fiber making it 3 times stronger than a standard aluminum pole. I will admit that it took a few days to get used to the unique way that you extend the Primate 3X Pole. The last section just has two holes and you need fully extend that one each time you pull it out. So, the 2 nd piece acts as the main height adjuster if you use the full 15.6 ft of pole. Tricky since my regular Tri-Pole uses the 3 rd Section as the height adjustment. But...

The ‘Lil Rebel suction-side cleaner for aboveground pools was created specifically for aboveground pools, this automatic, suction-side, two-wheeled cleaner is the ideal size for the smaller pumping capabilities and is designed for these smaller pools. It will also work great in a small to medium size in-ground pool (I would say 5,000 to 15,000 gallons). There are some notable features of the ‘Lil Rebel that I really like and that are pretty unique to this cleaner. The price point is also excellent, most stores carry it for under $200. This is a retail pool store only cleaner so you can purchase it at your local pool store or get it from your local pool service provider. It comes with 12 hoses but instead of the standard 3 feet hose (1 meter) length, the hoses are just 2 ½ feet long. These smaller hoses are a smart idea. If you use all of them, you get 32 feet of total hose which is plenty for most small to medium size pools. The shorter hoses allow for more precise insta...

Like anything else, a pool is pretty complex with many ins and outs and dos and don’ts and I will go over some things you probably should not touch around your pool until you gain more knowledge. Recently my home furnace went out, so I went up into the attic to see if anything obvious was amiss. I thought maybe I would be able to figure it out.  I stood there for about five minutes and then decided that this was out of my league and I simply called my AC guy. I figured I would do more harm than good if I tried to “fix” anything myself. The same goes for your pool in many respects. If you don’t know how to do something, stop and don’t touch anything! I will start with something that seems very basic, your pool’s timer. Generally, it is an Intermatic Timer with a yellow dial and two trippers that control when the pool comes on and goes off. This mechanism uses a very simple principle, the “on” tripper has a notch that will cause the pool pump to turn on when the tripper is...

The Pool Lab 1.0 is a new product for the USA and comes to us from Germany. It is a very well-constructed and simple to use Photometer pool and spa water tester. It is completely waterproof so you would simply dip it into the pool to retrieve the water sample and then use the tablet reagent to run the test. After the test is done the digital display will let you know the exact level of the test factor you were checking. It also can send the test results to your phone or device via Bluetooth through the Lab connect app and you can store the readings in the app or online in the cloud. So, this is great for both the pool service tech and the homeowner who wishes to easily keep a record of the tests results. Here is more on the PoolLab ®  1.0 Photometer from the manufacturer: “The new PoolLab ®  1.0 is a triple wavelength photometer for professional water analysis of private pools and spas. An in-built but changeable cuvette allows quick water sampling by jus...

Pool Route Software is a growing area in the service industry and if you are just starting out in the business this is the perfect time to start looking at your options. Mitigating an existing route takes some time but if you are just beginning it would be simple to use a program to track your route. One such program is called Skimmer. The software developer behind Skimmer wanted to give it a streamlined look, but also make it highly functional. He has succeeded on both counts as the app looks much like something Apple would develop for the iPhone. It is extremely smooth and user-friendly. New features will be added including integrated invoicing with Quick books.  Below are some of the key features from their website. https://getskimmer.com/ Skimmer Features: Customers Track all your customers, each with the ability to have multiple locations and bodies of water. Always have up-to-date contact information, wherever you go. Routes Everything you need to customize an...

The Polaris Quattro Sport is the first real update of the Polaris Pressure Side Cleaner in over 40 years. Over the years Polaris has tweaked the design of the Polaris by changing the drive from a drive shaft to a belt and then to a chain, but the basic 3-wheel design stayed the same. The Polaris Quattro Sport is a huge leap forward in Pressure Side Cleaners. There is a lot to like about the new Quattro Sport including the sleek design of the cleaner. With the internal debris canister, the cleaner looks very clean as it works its way around the pool. No more unsightly debris bag full of dirt and leaves on top. The four-wheel compact design also allows the cleaner to clean the entire pool including the floor walls and the waterline. This is the only Pressure Cleaner that can do this. Here are some of the great new features of the Quattro Sport: Active Brushing Equipped with rotating brushes that actively scrub and scour floors, walls and the waterline —Quattro Sport pene...