Achieving Easy Pool Maintenance Through Proper Water Circulation

When I imagine having my own swimming pool, I envision a backyard oasis—a place of relaxation, fun, and resort-style living at home. What doesn't come to mind immediately are the regular tasks involved in keeping the pool water clean, healthy, and safe for swimming.

Ensuring proper water circulation and filtration throughout the day is a crucial aspect of maintaining a clean and healthy pool. Unfortunately, maximizing circulation is often overlooked during the initial planning and setup stages of pool ownership, both by salespeople and customers.

To put it simply, a well-designed circulation system can make a significant difference in how much you enjoy owning a pool and whether it becomes just another chore to manage. If you think about it, regularly moving water tends to be healthier. Just like a stream becomes stagnant when it loses its flow, pool water follows the same principle. For the ultimate circulation in a pool you want it to mix water right throughout from top to bottom.

Experts and pool standards in Australia and New Zealand recommend that the entire volume of water in your pool should be pumped out, filtered, sanitized, and returned at least once every day. While traditional circulation systems can move this amount of water, they tend to circulate only a small portion repeatedly.

Traditional pools typically rely on an eyeball and skimmer system, where surface water is removed through a skimmer box using a pump. The water is then filtered and returned to the pool through jets or "eyeballs" located in the top 1-2 feet of water.

It's easy to see that while the top part of the water circulates regularly, the deeper sections remain stagnant, creating an ideal environment for algae and bacteria growth.

For the healthiest pool water possible, it's essential to ensure bottom-to-top circulation. Increased water movement makes it more challenging for algae and bacteria to thrive.

This understanding has influenced how we build pools at Compass. We offer two revolutionary circulation systems as additional options for our customers. The most popular choice, Vantage, is renowned as the "self-cleaning pool" option, but its greatest benefit lies in significantly improving water circulation. Vantage utilizes a special main drain to remove water from the pool floor and returns it through a series of automated jets strategically positioned on the pool floor. This ensures extensive movement in the depths of the pool while the eyeball and skimmer system circulates the top water.

Vantage has been proven to reduce chemical usage, enhance heat pump efficiency, optimize distribution of sanitizing pool chemicals, and keep your pool clean—all while reducing operating costs and eliminating the need for expensive cleaning equipment.

Another excellent alternative to traditional circulation is our Compass Logic™ system. Logic focuses on creating circulation in the deeper parts of the pool, an area that often lacks proper water movement in most pools. By strategically placing two drains two-thirds down the pool wall, we remove water from the deep end and return it using specialized swing jets designed to push freshly-filtered water toward the bottom. These swing jets change direction with each activation, maximizing chemical distribution, evenly spreading warm water heated by the sun, and promoting movement throughout the pool.

The Logic system can be further optimized to achieve a significant reduction in power consumption. Many pool owners use energy-efficient pumps that run at high speed for short periods and shift to low speeds for most of the filtration cycle. However, when coupled with a traditional pool setup, running the pump at low speeds reduces water mixing and movement.

To address this issue, we employ a supercharged skimmer unit that requires minimal suction from the pool pump. We then redirect the pump suction mainly to the wall drains. This allows us to incorporate an energy-efficient pump without sacrificing water movement. By utilizing an energy-efficient pump in this manner, you can achieve substantial power savings (up to $600 per year) without worrying about your pool turning green.

When it comes to owning a pool, a significant amount of effort is required to keep the water balanced, clean, and safe for swimming. The question is, how does that align with your dream of being a pool owner? With the right setup from the start, you can make your life much easier and more enjoyable as a pool owner.

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