We just ordered a solid safety cover. My Father-in-Law uses the standard cover with the waterbags and his pool is an absolute disaster every Spring. We are also in NJ. What PB do you use?

We just ordered a solid safety cover too. They are pretty pricey but safety is worth it. One pb stated that the mesh covers are almost as bad as not having a cover at all. We are in NJ too.

I just ordered a commercial strength mesh cover from intheswim.com. It is between a standard mesh and a promesh type. Difference is two things. It has a superior weight capacity strength over reg and promesh. The reason I chose this is since we have a tendency to get snow the cover can handle the excess weight without causing sagging or over stretching. The other reason is it comes with a 25 year warranty. The highest I could find was 17 years on others. I also know the solid cover weigh more and you must pump off the water from the top of the cover. Seems people have diffent likes and dislikes though..not an easy choice. It costs under $1200 and I am installing myself. We have a child and pets so safety is our #1 issue. There is a past post of cover that I asked what types people liked and the majority chose if they could the promesh (sunblock) type. Not sure if this helps any or makes it harder to decide. So hope this helps or sorry!

Ls

I ordered and receieved a solid safety cover that has a mesh strip in the center to drain rain water and melting snow. This cover came recommended by a friend as it gives the best of both cover choices. The solid cover keeps out fine silt, sun rays and such that cause for dirty pool openings in the spring. The mesh strip allows water to drain so you don't have a need for a pump like you would on the solid safety cover.

I orderd from Speciality Pool Products, it's the Aquamaster Sure-drain.
http://www.poolproducts.com/-p-safetyCovers-FNM-92.htm

I have a new pool and my pool installer agreed to install the cover for an additional charge. That entails drilling the brass anchors and installing the cover. I am having my pool closed the last week of September. :-(

Many, many years ago we owned a pool in NJ. We had a solid cover with the water bags. It wasnt a disaster and it wasnt pretty! For the most part, the pool was clear when we opened it. If anything when we took off the cover we would get debris in the pool that was on top of the cover. If we had 4-6 people to remove the cover we could have done it without dropping anything into the pool. Neighbors only showed up on the hot days to swim, not on the opening or closing days. The two of us would do our best to remove the cover without letting any of the silt which had settled on top of the cover get into the pool. It wasnt a big deal if it did, we just started up the pool and vacuumed it out. We had a Sears submerable pump we had to use regularly to pump the water off the cover. We were religious about it, any weekend it was above freezing, my husband would be out there plugging in the pump to remove the excess water on the cover, because eventually it would freeze and then you couldnt remove it. We didnt have kids at the time so I didnt have that "safety" issue. It definately requires a lot of attention and does not have the clean lines of the newer safety covers they sell today. We hated the look so much we would leave the pool open until the end of October and open it in April. Its not an easy project, but it does work. All depends on how much time you want to put into it, but it can be done successfully however, its obviously not as safe as the other covers. We are in Florida now, so thankfully, we dont have that issue to deal with.

A friend(pool guy)is doing a solid cover with a pump for me for 1575.00. this includes the drilling as the pool is new. He's also going to winterize it.

the pool company wanted 1400 for a mesh cover. i was told solid is the only way to go-

nj...

We are in NJ also. Our builder offered us the expensive cover, but we went with the plastic tarpy-looking cover and waterbags...and for less than $300, it has been fantastic. Our pool looks like the day we closed it when we open it up..except for the debris issue that gk5040 reported. We try to take the water/snow off when it accumulates, but if we don't, it's still hasn't been a problem. Our friends with the $$$ mesh cover always complain about how their pool is black for a few days til they clean it up..while mine is looking pretty from the first day!! The cover did get a rip this year, so we are getting another tarp and maybe one day we'll switch to the expensive one, but I'm not ready to hand over the 3K yet.

In NJ... We have a mesh safety cover and when we opened the pool for the 1st time this past May it was SCARY!!! It took the company that opened our pool 3 trips to get the pool clear.

Go with what the budget allows...you can always add the expensive cover at a later time. The cover wont last forever. Our first year we had a problem with several pinholes in the cover. We concluded this mainly happened because of water left on the cover attracted the birds to use it as a bird bath. That was one of the reasons my husband frequently pumped the water off the cover.....no water, no birds, no holes. I am sure todays covers are stronger than they were 15 years ago.

Hi, I'm in Connecticut and we use a green tarp that we bought from Ocean State for less than $100 for our 19 x 37 pool, and double water bags. When we open our pool in April the water is crystal clear with a small amount of debris on the bottom.

This year we're going to put on a leaf net over the cover and remove the leaves in November. We use a cover pump to get the water off the cover and have not had a problem with debris going into the water when we take the cover off. I can safely say it works for us without spending a lot of $$$

We've also trimmed the tarp's edges to look neat, and place the bags in a neat line around the pool which also helps it to look better.

Also, we put the cover pump in a milk crate with some weight in it to make a depression in the cover and the water drains towards it so we get more water off the cover. Sometimes I brush the water towards the depression, too and then the sun dries the cover and the winds we get blows a lot of the debris off.

Best,
Jan

for anyone who has ordered their own? do you have a free form pool and did you measure and install yourself? Was it hard? Thanks

We just had our pool completed about 3 weeks ago and need to decide on what to do about a winter cover. I'm totally ignorant on the subject so when I read this thread about "water pillows", "solid vs. mesh", I'm not 100% sure I follow. What are the basics? What are people talking aboiut then they say it takes 3 days to clean up their pool in the spring, while others say they have a sparkling clean pool. That's the one I want. I really could use some advice. Thanks.

We have just ordered ours and our PB has already come out to measure. They will also be installing it as this requires drilling into our concrete. It is a solid safety cover with built in pump. Would not even consider installing ourselves.

I've opened and closed alot of pools in my time and for me a solid safety cover is the best, but for a large pool they can be extremely heavy. The smart mesh covers are my next pick Light weight and easy to remove and install, yet the sun light will not penetrate and let the water turn green..So it really depends on your pool and it shape and size. But which ever you pick try adding the Spring and Fall to your pool. This is a great product that works...

Here is a link that might be useful: Spring and Fall