Martha Stewart Radio Interview April 2010 Transcribed: Part 3

In April of 2010, I was invited to come on Martha Stewart Morning Living Radio with Kim Fernandez to talk about opening a swimming pool for the summer. I decided to transcribed the interview so you can pull written tips from what I had to say. If you want to hear the audio from that morning, click here.

Kim: Now what happens if you open up your pool and it is cloudy?

Matt: Cloudy pools are an easy enough problem to deal with. All  you have to do is filter. Let that pool run 24/7. Let your filter clear that pool up. And you can also buy an aid.  You can buy clarifier and there are things that can go into your filter to help filter out finer particles. If you have a DE or cartridge filter, they filter pretty good. So as long as you run that filter and keep it going you can clear that pool pretty quick.

Kim: You know what makes me crazy, when you get a pool and the pool’s older and you go to order parts for the filter and they don’t make it anymore. Then what do you do?

Matt: Then you just buy a new filter. A lot of pool companies will sell parts for older filter models.

Kim: Let’s say you need to clear up your swimming pool overnight. What would you use then and is it gonna take my skin off the next morning?

Matt: There is a chemical that’s not harmful at all and it’s called Floc, or it’s longer name Flocculant. What that does is you pour it into your pool, let it run for a couple of hours and it drops all the debris to the bottom of the pool. So now your pool is clear except for a layer of green or cloudy water at the bottom of your pool.

…and then you vacuum it?

Matt: yes, but you have to vacuum it to “waste,” you can’t vacuum it and let it go through your filter and come back into the pool cause then you’ll see all that nasty water come back into the pool because it’s such a heavy concentrated cloud of debris. So you want to vacuum it directly out of your pool as if you were backwashing.

Kim: Actually that seems pretty simple

Matt: Yes, it’s simple but it takes a lot of elbow grease and it can take a while, but for the most part you can do it overnight. Lets say you had a party the next day and you needed to get your pool cyrstal clear really fast, you can just use floc. It’s drops everything to the bottom so you can vacuum it all out.

Kim: Do they have early deals, like can you get a bunch of products early like they do with sales for other things. Like Memorial Day sales, that kinda thing.

Matt: Pool companies this year are struggling and they want people in as early as possible to get the season started. So a lot of companies are gonna offer early buy deals on pool chemicals, pool openings, pool maintenance equipment. So you want to get in now and start buying those chemicals. You can even stock up and have enough chemicals for the rest of the season. As the summer goes along they are gonna bring the prices back up to normal and you won’t be able to save any money. It’s important now and that’s another reason you should open your pool early.

Kim: What are the chemicals, in your opinion, that are the best to use that won’t be too harmful to anyone in your family?

Matt: The best sanitizer there is on the market is chlorine. It’s an old fashioned technique.

Kim: Do you like the tablets or do you like to pour it in straight?

Matt: You definitely wanna use tablets. You can put them in your skimmer basket or you can buy a chlorinator, which is what I recommend.

Kim: How often should you be checking your skimmer basket, because I can’t do it. Every now and then you find a little hitch-hiker in there. You know what I’m saying?

Matt: You should check it very frequently, like once a day.

Kim: Do you have some energy saving tips for us, because it costs a fortune to run the filter all the time. I have mine on a timer.

Matt: Get a solar blanket! After people get done swimming, put it on at night, which is best. During the day the sun gonna heat your pool naturally. All that heat is gonna build up and then at night it gets cooler out. When it gets cooler out, all that heat starts to evaporate into the air, so you’re losing all that heat. When you put the solar cover on at night, it stops all that.

Kim: Do they make a roller, cause it’s a pain getting those solar covers on and off your pool.

Matt: You can get a solar reel, or some people just cut them into sections so it’s easier to remove.

Kim: Thank you so much for being here and giving us some great tips for opening our pools. I think I can handle it now. Don’t put your chlorine tablets directly into the pool.  That’s what I’ve learned from this and I learned what Floc was today. That’s excellent!

More From The Martha Stewart Radio Series

Martha Stewart Radio Interview April 2010 Transcribed: Part 1
Martha Stewart Radio Interview April 2010 Transcribed: Part 2