Solar Pool Heater
Last year I installed a solar pool heater that I made myself. I just T’d the 2inch pipe coming out from the pump and the T side was 1 inch. Thus, the T slips off some of the circulating water and runs it through a set of 1/2 inch black tubing. There are two headers at each end and then the water comes out onto the slide and back into the pool. The pool temp on this day started out at 68 degrees in the morning. Granted it was a nice sunny day and the outside temp was about 74. The pool water was up to 73 degrees during the shooting of this video and the water coming out of the solar heater was almost 79 degress. It had been 80 degress coming out most of the day even though the air temperature was 74 for most of the day. This was a relatively cheap way to achieve solar heating for your pool. Now each pool is different so I am not sure of your set up but this was a pretty easy way to set up the solar heater. I might add additional tubing and another header at each end this year in order to increase the pool temp even more. NOTHING LIKE FREE ENERGY FROM THE SUN TO HEAT THE POOL!!! The pump still runs off of the grid and isn’t solar. Maybe someday I will upgrade the pump to solar.
Nice, you can even thread clear soda/coke bottles on the pipe if you have space and thats a cheap way to create more heat and it saves the land fill.? Subbed mate.?
@Aqlor Work hard and maybe one day you can move to a house with a pool. I don’t really use it much but my kids love it. This set up really does increase the pool temp and it does keep the pool much warmer than when I didn’t have it on there. I had the solar cover first and that helped so I figured this would help more and between the two I am very pleased with this system. It has two on/off points so if the outside air temp goes down, you can turn it off and still let the filter run.
@RocketMaker10000 I wish I had one ^^ I live in a duplex and it’s impossible for me to have a pool here, I was just searching for curiosity, wanted to see if these things existed and how did they work. Once I noticed I was watching a lot of these videos of people showing they homemade creations which turn out really cool in some cases
@Aqlor Thanks for the complement. Post yours and subscribe to mine and I will subscribe to yours then we can see any improvements on the designs that happen over time….
@RocketMaker10000 oh well … in the end you still ended up with one of the best systems I could find on youtube, with or without drooping tubes
@Aqlor I did use Zip Ties and they still droop. Oh well. When you are in the pool it doesn’t seem to be a bother and I rather have warm water and messy tubes than cold water and neat tubes…. This is worth it and with my solar cover it was very warm most of this past summer and the one before it.
Hm you could use zip ties to make those heating lines straight and look better…its cheap and probably worth it
@malovich You are right. That is why I have an on/off value at each end of the black tubes. Thus if temperature declines, I turn it off and just keep the solar cover on to try and keep the heat in. I had the cover on and the solar tubing running most of the summer and for the most part the pool temps was between 85 and 90 almost all summer. It works like dream and it free….building more around it would be great but I don’t think it is really necessary. Let me know if you build one…..
I would like to point out that the heating lines being exposed to open air are not very effective even though it may work. the problem is that once the temperature difference between the water/pipe and the air gets large enough you will not be able to heat the water any more because all of the heat would convect away. If you really wanted to increase your heating abilities, isolate the tubing such that it is not open to outside air. Build a cleartop box so no heat is convected away.
@RocketMaker10000 sell your pool
@RocketMaker10000 Nice. I’ll check out the other vids now.
@odius94 It has a timer that can be programmed to run day or night. I run it during the day because that is when I have the most people in the pool. Plus my electric company doesn’t give any discounts whether I run it at night or during the day. They used to offer better deals at night. Since they don’t do that anymore why bother running it at night. I recently put in a new liner. See my other videos and the water that was delivered was 58 degrees. Got it up to 80 in 6 days with it.
Is your filter programmed to run at certain times during the day? I ask because if the filter runs at night and the valves to the solar system are left on it will act like a radiator and release the heat into the atmosphere. Just a thought.
@MrCoryjohnson1 I don’t think the pool will look as nice with a black bottom. It looks really nice as is so I don’t really want to have the pool black. I have a solar cover and the solar heater here and I can usually raise the pool temp pretty fast provided the outside air at night doesn’t pull it way down.
if you put somthing black on the bottom of your pool it will help to absorb heat and warm your pool.
@MrEcunningham I don’t feel like having a bunch of other pipes in and out of the pool so I will use what is already available. The pump runs fine with this Solar heater but right now I am measuring it for a new liner.
what if you coil up regular garden hoses and place them on your roof and buy a regular utility pump nothing big theyre bout 99 dollars USD then you dont need to use the pool’s pump at all
@MrEcunningham
Good point but it would block the view out to the yard. The liner ripped over the winter so the pool is actually empty now and I am measuring for a new liner and I am going to make some video of the project to post on Youtube. Stay tuned.
If you put the hoses tighter together they will in turn keep each other heated so instead of having a huge gap in between each hose keep them closer together and they will heat the pool even more efficiently
Too expensive. Tight budget right now. Roof is very slanted and not fun to get up on to do installs. Not a bad idea for anybody else though. If the economy turns around I will consider it again.
Why dont you buy the panels and put them on your roof?
@RocketMaker10000
Now how do you feel after 8 feet of snow this year?:) N Az has sunny skies, a few winter flurries and not the killer heat of Phoenix. BTW when I said earlier about a solar cover I meant some heat retaining material like clear plastic or plexiglass covering the black poly pipe that you have on the fence then back this with an larger heat absorbing material like black aluminum you know – typical solar design.
Nortern NJ. Friend of mine is moving down to SC just north of Charleston. Why move to AZ?
Are you in the U.S. and which part? I’m in SC and hoping to transfer to AZ whew!
Hey IronHorsez88,
This system works well and a solar cover would help as well. I have had two solar covers over the years and they tend to wear out fast and then I have little pieces fo round plastic punchouts in the bottom of the pool to vacuum out. The combination of both will raise up the temp and help prevent heat loss at night.