How To Keep Your Pool Clean

Do you dream of having a nice, crystal clear swimming pool? Well you can easily have one, but you need to follow four simple steps and use the proper swimming pool chemicals.

The four things you need to do are:

* Keep the pool chemistry balanced!
* Keep algae out at all costs! Keep your pool sanitized!
* Keep your pH and total alkalinity (TA) properly adjusted!
* Keep calcium constant!

1.) Keep the Pool Chemistry Balanced!

Well balanced pool water is essential for swimming enjoyment, prolonging the life of your pool equipment and much more

Balancing the water is simply maintaining the proper amount of chemicals in your swimming pool. This can be as simple as doing the following:

a.) Keeping chlorine tablets or sticks, in your chlorine reservoir.
b.) Shock the pool regularly.
c.) Add any balancing chemicals as needed. If ever in doubt, simply have your water tested. The results will dictate what needs to be added.

2.) Prevent algae at all costs!

Why should you prevent algae at all costs? Algae is a group of microscopic organisms which start out in your pool virtually invisible to the naked eye. If left alone, algae will multiply and grow and pretty soon you will have a murky, cloudy water.

Algae can be very difficult to get rid of and cause innumberable problems with your pool equipment.

3.) Keep Your pH and Total Alkalinity (TA)

Properly adjusted pH is probably the most important thing to keep properly maintained.

The pH of the water is is very important. It can become unsafe to have pH too low or too high. Both high or low pH effects your pool and equipment.

4.) Keep Calcium Constant

Calcium is important both for the liner. Calcium keeps the liner flexible, if it gets too low, the liner can begin to get brittle so keeping your water balanced will help your liner last longer.

If you keep these four things in check, you should enjoy a clear, beautiful pool. The use of swimming pool chemicals is not difficult - if you understand the basics.

For more details, please visit:
http:www.KeepYourPoolClean.com

The one thing I regret about my inground swimming pool decisions is buying a heater.

I live in SC so the summers are fairly long and warm, but not quite like those in Florida, for instance.

Since my family loves to swim, we went with the swimming pool heater installation so the swimming season could be extended. (this was a number of years ago)

Unfortunately, we only used the heater once because of its expense to warm the water. Here are the facts of why this swimming pool heater was a bad decision.

The initial cost was $2000, many years ago. Now it is probably $2500 or more.

Heating the water cost about $10 (or more) an hour for every hour you run the heater. (and this $10 was years ago long before the price of oil started sky rocketing.) The pool water temperature will only rise a few degrees an hour. A guesstimate then would be to raise the pool temperature 10 deg would cost you about $75 to $85 dollars. (Now in the year 2008, this cost is probably close to $100 or more, even)

At most you would use the heater maybe once or twice in the Spring and then again maybe the same amount of time in the Fall. This simply isn't worth the expense. (However, if money is no concern, you can use the heater to warm your swimming pool all year round.)

On top of all this, the gas company will be requiring that you 'rent' their gas meter since they will probably put a separate one on your pool. This will be a recurring monthly rental fee of at least $7.50 for the life of your pool - even if you never run the heater.

I think you can see that unless you are really an avid swimmer, who has money to burn (literally) that the purchase of a swimming pool heater is not the best choice you can make.