Solar sun rings

jamesduffield1 · Feb 13, 2017

Hello all, I was wondering if anyone has had experience with these solar sun rings. I live north of Charlotte NC and my pool on a clear day gets around 8 hours of direct sunlight. The previous owner had the heater removed at one point so I have no other heating source.
Can anyone recommend a particular brand or style or even if these things work?

http://www.poolsupplyworld.com/Solar-Sun-Rings-SSR-ANCHOR-Palm-Pattern--Anchors/SSR-ANCHOR.htm

Thank you in advance

Donldson · Feb 13, 2017

They are a pain to work with, getting blown around in even a moderate wind. The way they are designed they will get water on top which will be a breeding ground for algae. We used them for a single season after our solar cover gave out and haven't used them since. Just wasn't worth the effort.

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Ozzy7750 · Feb 13, 2017

They make no sense to me at all. With all of the gaps between the individual rings there will be a lot of heat loss through evaporation.

Why don't you just get a normal solar cover?

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pooldv · Feb 13, 2017

An 8mil solar cover will work a lot better. A solar cover will significantly reduce heat loss through evaporation overnight. Our pool runs at least 5-7 degrees warmer with a cover than without. The lightest, cheapest 8mil cover is all you need. Thicker ones cost more, are a lot heavier and don't work much better or last much longer. I cut ours in half to make it much easier to handle. Now, I need to make one of these to make it even easier to handle, DIY Solar Cover Roller

JoyfulNoise · Feb 13, 2017

If your pool is a rectangular shape (lazy-L, Grecian, etc, etc), then a bubble cover will work a lot better than rings.

If your pool is a freeform pool like mine, then there's really no good solution. Unfortunately, I've never gotten a bubble cover to last more than 1 year for me before the bubbles get brittle and leave little bits of cover debris in the pool. Cutting a cover for a freeform pool is a PITA and the Solar Cover Roller did not help much (too heavy). So there's really no good options for a freeform pool.

What I've always wanted to try is to do what they do in some smaller reservoirs - deploy evaporation control spheres! Free floating spheres (about 2"-3" in diameter) would occlude about 95% of the surface area of the pool and, depending on their transparency or opaqueness, could be left in the water. It would be like swimming in one of the old McDonald ball-crawl pits. Now that would be FUN :swim:

JoyfulNoise · Feb 13, 2017

Shade Balls- Floating Hollow Ball Covers for Ponds, Tanks, Reservoirs, Lagoons.

bmoreswim · Feb 14, 2017

Nice. $500 to hold your place in line for your own shade balls once they become a thing again. Or as Matt refers to them in his highbrow way, free floating spheres. And you thought taking that bubble cover off was a pain.

BTW - I'm now looking for a thread where I can make an actually useful post.

Veccster · Feb 15, 2017

JoyfulNoise said:
If your pool is a rectangular shape (lazy-L, Grecian, etc, etc), then a bubble cover will work a lot better than rings.

If your pool is a freeform pool like mine, then there's really no good solution. Unfortunately, I've never gotten a bubble cover to last more than 1 year for me before the bubbles get brittle and leave little bits of cover debris in the pool. Cutting a cover for a freeform pool is a PITA and the Solar Cover Roller did not help much (too heavy). So there's really no good options for a freeform pool.

What I've always wanted to try is to do what they do in some smaller reservoirs - deploy evaporation control spheres! Free floating spheres (about 2"-3" in diameter) would occlude about 95% of the surface area of the pool and, depending on their transparency or opaqueness, could be left in the water. It would be like swimming in one of the old McDonald ball-crawl pits. Now that would be FUN

Our previous pool was an above ground and, even with that, dealing with the solar cover was a PITA. We ended up cutting in two halves as it was easier to work with.

Fast forward to 6months ago, we were deciding on the shape of our in-ground. We ended up doing a rectangle for the reason of being able to use a solar cover with a reel. In Pennsylvania, it's necessary as we get some cold summer nights. I didn't care for it visually but a PB told us how a free form decking around a rectangle pool can offset the straight lines and looks much nicer. Now that it's in the ground, I agree and can't wait to have the ease of a solar cover reel.

Sorry this was off-topic. Those rings don't look effective to me. Lots of gimmicky things out there trying to mimic a solar cover but nothing is as good as an actual solar cover.