Chapter 6: SPA MAINTENANCE. How to Build Your Own Home Swimming Pool or Spa

Chapter 6: SPA MAINTENANCE. How to Build Your Own Home Swimming Pool or Spa

Maintaining a spa is almost exactly the same as maintaining a pool.  The same filtration systems, chlorination issues, and other issues apply.  The major differences between a spa and a pool are the frequency with which you'll need to brush the walls and issues related to the heater.

Since a spa is invariably more enclosed than a pool, there are more tiny cracks into which dirt and debris can creep.  You'll need to brush down the interior of a spa more frequently in order to release that dirt and debris.  This is a common sense issue if you know about how pools work, but many people tend to forget it and wonder why their spa gets so much dirtier than their pool.  If you give the spa a quick brushdown every day you'll avoid having to do more elaborate and tiresome cleanups once a week, and you'll keep your spa looking nicer for longer.

Since spas are almost always kept separate from the main body of the pool, there are issues related to the cleanness of the water's surface that you'll have to deal with.  There aren't usually skimmer baskets in a spa, for example.  Many people solve this problem by putting the water return for the filtration system in the spa and setting up a "spillway" leading from the spa to the pool.  This lets the surface debris from the spa float into the pool where the pool vacuum, skimmer baskets, and better drainage systems can take care of it.  If your spa is kept entirely separate from your pool, you'll need to skim the water with a net yourself at least once a day in order to keep the surface clear of obvious debris that could affect the filtration system.

The biggest issue with spa maintenance is of course the heater.  This plugs into the pool's filtration system.  When the spa is active, the heater is turned on and water that passes through the filter is directed into the heater.  The heated water then passes into the spa, heating it up.

It's usually possible to a heat a swimming pool as well, since the heater is part of the basic filtration system and it essentially doesn't matter where the returned water goes to.  In practice, it's usually less common to find a heated pool than a heated spa, simply because it takes much more energy to heat a water volume that's anywhere from five to twenty times as great as the spa's.  The cost of heating a pool makes it a nice option for an occasional fall pool party and a terrible option for everyday use.

Maintaining the heater is fairly simple, considering that it's essentially a massive outdoor heating coil.  The big choice you have to make is whether to go with natural gas or electricity for your energy source.  If natural gas is available, it should be the immediate choice since it's substantially cheaper and more efficient at heating water.  Electricity will take longer to heat the water and will likely cost you additional money in utilities.  (There are also options for wood heating or solar panel heating, but they usually involve substantial installation requirements that are somewhat beyond the scope of this book.  The basic logic of connecting everything to the spa itself is the same.)

If you do go with an electrical heater, use common sense: keep the heater a safe distance away from the rest of the pool.  Usually a pool shed with other filtration pipes is a safe place, as long as everything else works as it should.  Most spa heaters are designed to shield sensitive electric components from the water, but better to be safe than sorry.