Guide · spring
Opening your pool this spring
The order that saves a second trip to the store: the cover and the equipment first, then the water level, the salt, the pH and the chlorine last. Each dose is sized to your own pool.
Check what you have
Before you open the cover, look at the chlorine, shock, algaecide and balancers you kept from last season, and throw out any product past its date.
Source: Hayward: Opening Your Pool
Take the cover off
Pump off the standing water and clear the leaves first, so they do not fall in. Fold the cover back slowly, then clean and dry it before you store it.
Source: Hayward: Opening Your Pool
Put the equipment back
Remove the winterizing plugs, put the skimmer baskets and return fittings back, and reconnect the pump and the filter. Bring the water up to the level the skimmer needs.
Source: Hayward: Opening Your Pool
Know your gallons
Every dose below depends on how much water the pool holds. Work it out once from the length, the width and the depth at each end, and keep the number.
Start the pump and look for leaks
Turn the circulation on, check the pump, the filter and the fittings for drips, and clean or backwash the filter if its pressure is high.
Source: Hayward: Opening Your Pool
Test the water
Test free chlorine and pH with a DPD test kit. For a home pool, CDC recommends free chlorine of at least 1 ppm, at least 2 ppm if you use cyanuric acid or a stabilized chlorine such as dichlor or trichlor, and pH 7.0 to 7.8. Hayward’s opening guide aims for 1 to 3 ppm and a pH of 7.2 to 7.8.
Source: CDC: Home Pool and Hot Tub Water Treatment and Testing, Hayward: Opening Your Pool
Bring the salt up, if you have a salt cell
Salt does not evaporate, but rain and the fresh water you add to top the pool up dilute it. Test it, then add the pounds to reach the level your cell asks for, three quarters first and the rest after a day of circulation.
Shock, then raise the chlorine
Shock the pool once the water is balanced, as the sun goes down so the sunlight does not burn the chlorine off, and bring free chlorine to your target with the product you have.
Source: Hayward: Opening Your Pool
Vacuum the next day
Leave the pump running overnight, then vacuum what settled on the bottom and test again. Top the water up if the cleaning lowered it.
Source: Hayward: Opening Your Pool
Keep testing
CDC advises testing chlorine and pH at least twice a day while the pool is in use, and more often when many people swim.
Source: CDC: Home Pool and Hot Tub Water Treatment and Testing
Read the label of each product before you add it, and follow it where it differs from this guide.