Nothing But Love :: golf blogger

Swimming Pool Maintenance Tips

Our two regular readers know that we have an in-ground swimming pool. Stacey had the idea when the kids were small that we would get many, many years of enjoyment from a pool as opposed to vacation trips. And she has been right about that.

From time to time, I provide our readers advice and guidance about pool care and safety, based on my many years of experience in the cleaning, care, and maintenance of our pool. For instance, when opening the pool in the spring-time, the impeller of the pump could be "frozen." This condition can be recognized by the buzz of the electric motor, which indicates that the shaft is not rotating and the impeller is most likely "frozen." Allowing this condition to persist could result in damage to the electric motor, leading to early replacement of the unit. I am pleased to say that my years of experience alerted me to this condition, and I remedied the condition by simply freeing the impeller so that it could spin freely.

This is a simple operation, since the water is not yet circulating. The lid and filter basket have already been removed from the small filter, the removable filter basket of which serves the purpose of removing large contaminants from the water supply before the pool water travels to the diatomaceous earth or sand filter. It is at this point of attachment near the bottom of the filter housing that the impeller is located. You can free the impeller by simply spraying a small amount of WD-40 on the impeller and moving the blade with your finger. This is a blind operation as the impeller is located at the end of the motor shaft in the channel between the incoming water supply line from the pool and the pipe carrying the water to the large filter. Freeing the impeller should cause the motor to operate smoothly, turning the motor shaft, and causing the impeller to spin at high speed, thereby creating the suction to draw the pool water through the small filter and into the large filter.

CAUTION: It is extremely important that you unplug the electric motor prior to, that is, before performing this operation because success in freeing the impeller while the motor is supplied with power will result in the motor shaft beginning to spin at high speed, and the concomitant resumption of the high speed spin of the impeller may cause severe injury to fingers not removed fast enough from the impeller location. At a minimum, the living shit will be scared out of you.

Once the pool is filled to the appropriate level, the water is circulating, the chemical balance of the water is restored, and the water is crystal clear, it is recommended that you backwash the diatomaceous earth or sand filter. There is a lever on the top of the large filter housing for this purpose. It is important to follow the manufacturer's instructions in operating this mechanism. This operation is simple and can be done by any moron. Of course, if the moron gets caught up in playing with the dogs and then goes in the house because it's 95 fucking degrees, he may forget that he is backwashing the filter. Rather than explain the intricacies of this operation to you, the plain fact is that the water from the pool goes through the filter, washing the crap out of the filtering material and into the sewer system. So the water from the pool carries the crap removed by the filter into the sewer, thereby cleaning the filter. Basically. And if the moron performing the backwashing operation forgets what he is doing, it takes only about a half hour or so for half the water in the pool to be backwashed into the city sewer system.

CAUTION: Never leave your station at the pump mechanism when performing the backwashing operation. Serious head injury will result when the major fuck-up is discovered.

That concludes this session of swimming pool tips. I hope that it has helped. In the future, I will provide tips on building decks and the safe operation of nail guns. Thank you for your time and attention.

Posted by Bill at June 28, 2005 10:16 PM