anyone used chemical "pool covers"?

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anyone used chemical "pool covers"?

They rarely work as advertised. Any ripple on the water surface is enough to completely disrupt the thin layer on top. So if you have any wind at all, it won't work.
 
I have used CoverFree. While it doesn't compare to a solar cover, it in my case actually does reduce evaporation and heat loss somewhat, but as Joyful points out, is easily disturbed by wind and motion. So if you've watched the video out there showing its lab effect, you will not get that same performance in-pool.

But especially in the shoulder season, you can easily tell when it starts to wear down based on the steam coming off the pool (our pool is kept quite warm.) Hubby, who is completely uninvolved in the pool care, will say to me the day before my weekly dose "I think you need more CoverFree."

In terms of cost/benefit, it costs about $1.50 in natural gas per degree of heat in my pool. So if you reduce heat loss by even two or three degrees a night, its pretty much paid for itself a third of the way through the bottle. It Els to keep the pump off/keep water still at night.

I've come to believe its reasonably worthwhile if you keep your pool hot, have cooler nights, and are a night swimmer who doesn't want to mess with a solar cover in the dark but want the water warm for swimming early morning. That's pretty much my situation in season. But the most sensible approach to heatloss is of course the solar cover.
 
I'm intrigued - it sounds like it could be a great solution to help mitigate moisture issues of an indoor pool. When my pool is warm, I have to keep the cover on whenever I'm not swimming to avoid energy-sucking measures to keep the house dry.

Swampwoman, what does it feel like? One review complained about an oily feeling left on their skin, which doesn't surprise me. My CH is on the high side, so maybe a little oil will be ok?

I wonder what happens if I want to cover the pool while it has CoverFree in it. I expect it would coat the cover pretty well and maybe get messy? I suppose a quick waste cycle from the skimmer would pull much of it from the surface?
 
CoverFree specifically at the dose on the bottle does not leave any oily residue on my skin, IMHO. The liquid is not actually like oil on the water...it creates a 1 molecule layer of lighter-than-water substance and degrades over time.

Your indoor condition might be ideal for a trial...it wears off/breaks down, so if you didn't like it or could discern any feel whatsoever, wait a week and you're good ;)
 
Rollercoastr said:
that's going to be an awkward google search. :)

I noticed one of the adamant reviewers of Coverfree insists that it helps with heat retention, but not so much evaporation. I would think the opposite would be true, but I'll guess I'll see.
Click to expand...

Heat loss in a pool is entirely dominated by evaporative cooling. CoverFree simply slows down the rate of evaporation of water from the pool's surface which, in turn, reduces the cooling effect. It doesn't retain heat, per se, it simply slows down evaporation. The conductive and radiative heat transfer across all the boundaries of the pool (walls, floor, surface) would remain unchanged. It's simply the fact that those heat loss pathways are negligible when one considers the amount of heat energy taken away from water when it evaporates into dry air.
 

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In general, this helped me "get it": ^70% of heat loss on a pool is evaporation; approximately 20% or less is radiation and 10% or less is conduction, eg wall contact with cold ground.

So decreasing evaporation via a molecular "shield" between the water and the air gives a good evaporation reduction in theory...but again, not near what a real cover can.

In essence, with CoverFree, the idea is to obstruct the ease with whch evaporation can occur. Its less likely to cause thermal interruption, eg radiation.

When you see it in action on a cold morning on still water, if you drop a pool noodle in or break the water on entry, you will see a column of steam/fog rise at that location=evaporate. The other "uninterrupted" locations may have small bits of fog hovering, but nothing like where the surface has been disturbed.
 
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As much as I don't like the pool store advise, I actually got a real answer or one that makes sense. When I asked what was actually in the bottle of the liquid cover they said it was mostly alcohol. The alcohol is lighter than water and will float giving you that layer. The alcohol has to evaporate before the water can evaporate. As stated in other post if it's windy that layer will be pushed to one end of the pool making the liquid cover ineffective.
Just my 2 cents for what it's worth. If it works for your application than why not use it...?
 
I've tried it and didn't notice any significant benifit but our pool is exposed and there is always a steady breeze.

I can't say it any better so hears the quote.
chem geek said:
It is biodegradable (not sure why that matters, unless you are referring to backwashing) and should not have any issues with pool equipment since it's just a long-chain alcohol so isn't particularly reactive. The specific alcohol used in different products varies with some using cetyl alcohol, others using stearyl alcohol, and some using mixtures of these or other long-chained alcohols. Note that isopropyl alcohol in these products is just a carrier that evaporates. Some products also contain calcium hydroxide to help with dispersing the product evenly, but then the calcium hydroxide dissolves in the water.
Click to expand...

Taken from Liquid Solar Covers - Do they work?
 
I can't say that I'm impressed with it. I'm not interested in managing the variables enough for a truly fair test, but my impression was: "eh, it might help." I don't regret dropping $14 on it. I'll keep using it, but I doubt I'll buy another bottle when this one is gone.

My biggest disappointment was holding my hand 24" above completely still, 88° pool water and feeling heat rise. That doesn't happen with the plastic cover.
 
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