Solar Blankets....really worth the trouble ????

[steig]

The 30' round cover is impossible to take off with 1 person. Very hard with 2 people, and a pain in the Butt with 4 people. I would like a reel, but I have a pool fence around the pool. Even storing is a major problem.

[medvampire]

I guess I will have to eat the words I spewed in the beginning of this thread. Two weeks ago I installed solar heating panels. After a few days I dumped my cumbersome solar cover back on the pool. I have quickly learned that the solar cover in conjunction with the heating panels is putting my temps up in the 90s. The best I could get before the solar cover with the panels was the low to mid 80s. I was hitting the high 70s with nothing heating the pool. I have a 7 to 8 drop with out the cover.
I did find a way to make getting the solar cover on and off less painful. I took a 10 ft section of 3 inch of pvc pipe glued 3 to 2 inch reducers on each end and added about 3 foot of 2 inch pvc on each end of the 3 inch. Capped the 2 inch pipe and rolled the cover up. If I get in the pool I can roll the cover up set it across the back if the pool in just a 3 or 4 minutes. The whole pipe assembly is about 16 foot long and floats very well. I can put the cover on and off from the out side but it takes 2 people then.
So solar covers do work but you need a external heat source to make the most of them.
Steve

[Spensar]

If your heating, definately worth it. Good link in this post I put up.

http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/showthread.php?t=5336

[matt4x4]

Steig - I have a 30 foot round pool with a 30 foot cover, now when i first received the cover, it was probably 32 feet big and curved up the walls once on the pool, I went and cut it so it's within an inch of the wall all around and floats perfectly flat on the water.
Ours was a cynch to remove, get in the pool, start rolling it up, once you get half way, stop moving forwards when rolling, rahter pull it towards you and roll so it gets rolled in the center of the pool.
Once all rolled up, I would start at one side and just lift it over the wall working my way along it's length until the whole thing was thrown over the wall and sat on large hooks that I bolted to the uprights.
To get it back on, I would reach over the wall from inside the pool, starting from one end and pull it back over and in, get it to the center and reverse the process.
Since then I have installed a reel at the far end of the pool, about 4-6" higher than the wall, and about 1 foot beyond the wall - now i can roll and unroll it by myself from outside the pool which is really nice since my kid likes to go swimming ALL THE TIME and I no longer have to drop what I'm doing to go and get changed etc etc... to open the pool