Any Swimming Pool Experts In The House?

We have an 18,000 gallon pool with a sand filtration system. I was told initially that it had to run pretty much constantly or the sand would harden and become useless. Since we live in Texas we leave the water in year round and pumping costs become noticeable.

So I’m asking if I can let the pump be idle during the winter and restart it in the summer.

What is the cost to replace the sand? I would think pretty cheap, unless labor is intensive. Forgive me if I am missing something here, but if the energy is a lot more expensive than the sand, then I would turn off the pumps.

You do make a good point but it is somewhat labor intensive. Have to dismantle the pump and scoop 200 lbs of wet sand out of a 6” diameter hole.

Thanks I may see how much new sand would be.

It’s going to be 80 again in three days. Just keep enjoying it.

Nah. Just turn it over on top of a milk crate and blast it with a hose.

Probably but we need to get it covered due to our trees shedding their leaves soon.

1 Like

I’ve worked for a pool company for 5+ years, albeit in Canada, but the same principles should apply. You DO NOT need to keep the pump running. We obviously close down pools and then start them once winter is over. Sand filter should be fine. DO NOT remove the sand from inside. There are specific plastic mechanisms that must align with other fittings in the filter or else you’ll start to spew a lot of sand into the pool. You’ll be ok for the winter.

Awesome! Thank you for the specific answer I was looking for

I must say I don’t know too much about this, but if it did clump, could you break it up with a rod or something? Maybe that causes damage to something else?

I would listen to the guy who has experience. I just like to think differently about problems than most people.

I have a pool and am curious what you mean by this. I have a DE filter pool and was told that I should continue to run the pump in the winter, although for shorter periods of time than in the summer.

I also live in Texas so I there are very few instances where I would have to worry about freezing.

If we didn’t close down the pools the water would freeze in the pipes and burst (it’d be way too expensive to keep the pool running all year because the heater would have to be on to avoid freezing) - so we reduce the water beneath the scimmer so no water can enter the pipes/pump/filter. But this is because our winter is…well, winter. You’re probably okay with running it every so often to the water does sit and freeze where we would have an issue.

We blow the lines (reverse vacuum) so all of the water is out and then plug them, this means the filter and pump are also empty. Come summer, we fill the pools/all the lines again. We would then throw a tarp over the pool to prevent water, leaves, etc from going into the pool.

Would likely cause damage - it’s also a pain in the arse because its such a small hole at the top of the filter. To get all the sand out, you need to cut the whole filter…its just weighs too much with the sand that has soaked up all the water.

1 Like

Fair point, thanks for the clarification.

Thank you all for the replies!

I second this I have put that type of system to bed for the winter in the past.

I don’t know what part of TX you live in (I’m in Houston), but I can’t get away with not running my pump all winter. We get enough spurts of hot weather during the “winter” that algae will definitely bloom. My main pump shit the bed last December and it took two weeks to get it fixed. When it was finally fixed we had a significant amount of algae in the pool.

Just food for thought.

Run it every other day. That’s 182 days a year. See what that gets you?

South Austin area. We have a ton of oak trees and last year didn’t get it covered. Huge algae problem even with the filter