Anyone heat an in-ground pool with solar heat?

[schuh]

We moved into our house last year. We have a very nice in-ground pool. It isn't heated and even though we have a good solar cover, it just doesn't get/stay as warm as I'd like. It's in full sun from mid-morning through early evening (our house faces east).

We've heard good things about solar heat, and I think we've got a good situation for it. Full sun on a black roof. The problem is that we can't find any pool store in the area that installs solar heat.

So my question is -- if you have solar heat for your pool, do you like it? And did you install it yourself or have someone else install it for you? Can you think of a reason the pool stores wouldn't install solar heat on a roof? Is there any risk to the roof?

I'd appreciate any help you can give me!

Tracy

[Beth]

I think it is used out in CA more than here. DH has talked about converting our gas heater to solar at some point (after the exterior of the house and the kitchen are done), so I'm interested to hear what is said. We don't need heat April or May through October or November unless it is for the spa, but if we had solar, we might actually heat it in the winter!

[jmarie]

Tracy, We didn't use the panels, although I am trying to talk my husband into doing this. We used a long,lone black hose that was laid on the roof of the poolhouse...it was laid in a circle like you would store a water hose and it was attaced to the filtering system..

Anything that we have done to our pool, DH has done it. This may be something that your DH can do.

Also while we are on the subject of pools...
Look at the Salt ionizers. Using that instead of all of the chemicals that will be suggested for you to use, will do two things for you.
1. SAVE MONEY IN THE LONG RUN! (It will pay for itself after just two years, as you only use salt.)
2. SAVE YOU VALUABLE CLEAN-UP TIME. We rarely have to clean our pool since installing this.

Also. Check the distance where the shallow end goes to the deep end. As you know, there is an incline there and you want to make sure that all of your guests know where this is. This is important for those diving into the deep end and important for anyone who cannot swim to know, so they won't get too close to that edge drop off.

HAVE FUN WITH YOUR POOL!
Joyce

[schuh]

Thanks Joyce. I'm not at all familiar with the ionizers so I'll have to look into them.

I'd love to enjoy our pool, if our weather would finally heat up! It's been hovering around the 60s for weeks, which is fairly pleasant but definitely not pool weather! We plan to open it Memorial Day weekend and hope for the best.

Tracy

[jmarie]

Do you have a SOLAR COVER
http://www.poolproducts.com/images/choose_solarB.jpg

This will gradually help with the building of the temperature. We keep this on our pool when the pool is not in use. When you put it on at night, after pool use, it helps prevent heat loss from cool nights. You can probably get this from your pool supply dealer.

http://www.poolproducts.com/cgi-bin/sgdynamo.exe?HTNAME=static_site/solarBlankets.htm&UID=7032052211002225

They run from 70 to 80 dollars, I think...at least that is what we pay...

[Grace]

My Dad has a solar heater on his in-ground pool, although he lives in Florida. It works very well - I'm not sure if there is more than one type of solar heater though - his works like this - there are panel on the roof, the water from the pool is slowly pumped out of the pool, up along side of the house, through the solar panels where the water gets really hot, and then the water is pumped back into the pool on the other side. It's not solar powered - it requires an electric pump to pump the water out and up to the panels. So I'm not sure if you mean you are wanting a regular heater that is solar powered (or if there even is such a thing). Dad's works well, but only if it's sunny out. If it's cloudy or raining, the sun can't heat the water up. That's the only thing I don't like about it. Gas heaters can heat up the pool no matter what it's like outside.

Don't know if that helps you in any way or not.....

[schuh]

Grace, That's exactly what I'm talking about. Solar panels are on the roof, and an electric pump pumps water through them. I see what you mean about the disadvantages, but purchasing and running regular heaters is darned expensive. And it appears that we can get the whole solar panel kit for about $500. From what my Floridian mom told me, these are very popular there. I can't figure out why nobody will install them here!

Joyce, We do have a good thick solar cover that we keep on a roll. We cover the pool religiously every night. I'm sure it helps keep the warmth in, but I need something that will heat the water a little better!

And given that we have a short pool season, I'd like to extend the season for the pool if at all possible.

I'm looking at the forecast for the next 5 days -- the highest temp we will reach is 63 degrees! Grrr... definitely not pool weather, heater or no heater.

[Beth]

I'd gladly send you 15 or 20 degrees. Weather.com says it's 89 outside, and we are usually a couple of degrees cooler, if anything, up ghere among the tall trees. But I have 93 in the shade and 99 when I stepped out in the sun for about 30 seconds. It seems to feel even hotter, because until Thirsday or Friday, we'd had a relatively cool spring. Guess that's over. :rolleyes:

[schuh]

Beth,

I despise weather in the 90s. It makes me feel limp and void of energy. My current house has A/C but in my previous house the lack of A/C made those days a nightmare, especially when trying to go to sleep.

I was in Houston for a trade show several years ago and I thought it was the hottest hot I ever felt (although, as you said, it probably felt hotter as I experienced all of a sudden).

That said, I'd gladly take a good 15-20 of those degrees right now!

Tracy

[cas]

We live in the cold northeast PA and looked into the solar panels for our pool this year too. We changed our mind after we learned that we would have needed 4 2x20 panels which was around $1400 not installed. My husband thought the panels would have been the size of a billboard- not too attractive on our roof even though they are flat. Plus we were concerned about the water heating up on those not too sunny days. So to make a long story short we just got a propane heater. Hopefully the weather will warm up around here- 70's would be nice! Good luck!

[schuh]

Thanks cas.

[jmarie]

Cas how big is your pool?
I have been thinking alone the solar panel line and would like to compare.

Schuh, consider the black tubing if any of this proves too expensive for you right now. I think it was fairly inexpensive and although it is not going to help you achieve the desired effect for this weekend...(we have the same problem here, in Virginia, is is good for our cool summer nights when the pool seems to lose heat. It does help to warm the pool faster. If you want more information about this, I will ask my DH, as he installed it on our pool.
Joyce

[cas]

Our pool size is 18 x 36. We found a lot of info on the web and also through some local pool contractors.

[Gracie]

We've been having cloudy/rainy weather that hasn't gotten out of the mid-50's this entire spring and this entire coming week is scheduled not to get out of the mid-40's with what they're calling "gale-swept" rain.

So with Memorial Day approaching and our non-heated inground pool at a current temp of 53 I don't think we'll get our annual initiate-the-pool dip this weekend.

So my response when I saw the title of this thread was - we don't even have any solar to use if we had that installed!!! :D

I know this wasn't helpful but we are all getting pretty sick of our "spring" weather around here!

Loren

[schuh]

Gracie, I'm with you. The weather has been sickening. But I am hopeful it will actually heat up. The trouble last year was that the temperature was so variable ... we had days in the 80s interspersed with days in the 70s and lots of cool evenings. The days in the 80s just didn't heat up the pool well enough, although we wanted to swim. I just felt like the pool temperature could use a "boost."