Maintaining

Swimming
Pools, Spas,
Whirlpool Tubs
and Saunas
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Maintaining Swimming Pools, Spas,
Whirlpool Tubs and Saunas
By Wm R. Griffin, President
Cleaning Consultant Services, Inc.
Copyright ã2001 Wm R. Griffin, Seattle, WA
98111

In today's customer driven market place,

swimming pools, spas and whirlpools baths
are becoming common amenities in hotels,
motels, apartment buildings, condominiums,
private clubs, schools, and health care
facilities. The National Swimming Pool
Foundation (NSPF) estimates that there are
over 9 million commercial facilities in the
U.S. that have pools of one type or another.
Along with more wide spread use of pools
and spas, comes the need to operate and clean
and maintain these facilities in order to meet
health code regulations, customer
expectations and to limit an organizations
legal liability. With chemical automation,
robotics, and a growing variety of design and
build options for pools and spas, it's getting
easier to maintain water balance and
cleanliness in less time and with less technical
knowledge.

What's Involved
You basically have three options when it
comes to maintaining bathing facilities, you
can hire, train and supervise your own staff,
you can contract out for these services or you
can use a combination of the above two
options. Every situation is a little different
and there are many things to consider when
making a decision as to which approach is
best in your specific situation.
Being that pools require daily testing,
monitoring and cleaning, most facilities opt to
hire their own pool maintenance staff and
then as need, supplement in house skills with
support from a local pool service vendor.
Normally if you make arrangements to
purchase your pool chemicals from a local
supplier, along with that will come some
degree of technical support, training and
oversight.
Depending on the size of your facility, and
your specific needs, it's best to hire or have
your pool staff attend a Certified Pool
Operator (CPO) course. More than 400 CPO
seminars are offered through out the U.S.
each year by local vendors in cooperation
with the National Swimming Pool Foundation
(NSPI) which has certified over 50,000 pool
operators.
From a management point of view, it's best to
have at least two people on your staff trained
to handle water balance, monitoring,
maintenance and pool cleaning issues. At the
same time, you don't want too many people
involved with a pool, as a high level of
responsibility, consistency, and quality
control is needed to keep things from getting
out of control.
In most facilities, maintaining a pool and spa
area is a shared responsibility between the
housekeeping and engineering departments.
Housekeeping normally takes care of the
floors, walls, glass, trash and furniture, with
engineering monitoring water balance, pump,
equipment, back pressure, filters, vacuuming,
scrubbing and maintaining daily records and
adding chemicals as needed. An outside
contractor with specific expertise often
handles repairs, equipment and system
upgrades, and resurfacing of the pool or
surrounding deck areas.

How it's done at the Warwick Hotel in Seattle,

WA
Tim Chiles, Chief Engineer at the Warwick
Hotel, was good enough to take time out of
his day to show me around the operation and
explain how his employees keep their 11,000
gallon pool and 800 gallon spa safe, sanitary
and inviting for guests. Chiles said "The key
is to set up a program and then monitor it.
Once you do that, it's pretty simple. In our
case, pool maintenance takes about an hour a
day. The number one thing is chemical
balance. We have to keep the chlorine and pH
levels within acceptable ranges that are set by
the King County Health Department, which
comes in about once a month to monitor our
inspect our pools, and check our records.
"To prevent problems and to raise our level of
customer satisfaction, we test our water twice
a day, even though the County only requires
once a day testing, other tests are done once a
week. Our pool attendant, John Slaughter, is
part of the Engineering Department and has
attended the Certified Pool Operator (CPO)
course in the past. He uses a Taylor Water
Test kit that enables him to complete five
tests: chlorine, pH, total alkalinity, calcium
hardness and cyanuric acid."
According to Chiles. "If you don't keep the
water in balance or do the required cleaning,
your pool can get cloudy or contaminated
with black or mustard algae. Algae can be
tough to get rid of once it gets inside of the
system hoses and equipment. We vacuum our
pool each morning before they open. And
every other day we scrub the edges and
bottom with a stainless steel wire scrub brush
before we vacuum. The spa we inspect and
vacuum and or scrub when we can visually
see it's soiled. Usually two or three times a
week is adequate.
"We use chlorine in our pool as a sanitizer. In
the spa we use bromine as the sanitizer as it
tends to be more stable at higher
temperatures. Our system is automated to test
the water for pH and chemicals and to then
automatically feed in chemicals to maintain
the desired balance, although we can override
the system if we need to make manual
adjustments.
"Outdoor pools are more difficult," said
Chiles. "They are impacted by rain,
temperature, sun, and tend to quickly become
contaminated with dust, soil, leaves and other
debris."
Chiles went on to explain that filtration is
another important element of maintaining
pools. "We monitor the back pressure in our
filters and run a back flush cycle to clean
them out when the pressure builds up to 30
PSI. Our desired pressure is 22 to 26 PSI after
back flushing. Every four to six weeks, back
flushing no longer gets the desired results so
we have to change out our filters. The
frequency for the spa filters is different, as the
bather load is lower than the pool.
"Being filters are quite expensive, we soak,
clean and reuse them. It's important to back
flush and change out your filters when they
need it," said Chiles. "If you don't maintain
the filters, they won't do their job and your
chemicals end up going to waste. On average
we spend about $300.00 to $350.00 a month
on pool chemicals."
The elements that make up a balanced system
include:
1. Chemicals
2. Chemical checks
3. Filtration
4. Water Flow and quality
5. Cleaning and maintenance
6. Bather or usage level
Chiles said, "According to the county health
code, we have to pump down or completely
drain the spa every 30 days and refill it with
fresh water. There is no set pump down
requirement for the pool, so with proper
maintenance and flow, we may not have to
drain it for two or three years. When it's
empty, we normally do a muratic acid wash of
the sides, bottom and pool deck to brighten
thing up. That is a periodic cleaning task that
takes quite a bit of work and requires boots,
gloves and a face shield for each worker, as
the chemical is pretty harsh. When it comes to
repairs or upgrading our system, we put it out
to bid with an independent contractor or use
our chemical supplier.
"The County code requires us to keep the spa
temperature below 104 degrees. There is no
temperature requirement on the pool, so we
try to keep it right around 78 degrees, which
seems to keep most people happy.
"The housekeeping department dumps the
trash, and cleans the glass and poolside
furniture. We mop the floor, each morning
before the area opens using pool water, which
eliminates the possibility of the disinfectant
chemical getting tracked into the pool and
contaminating it. We keep a separate mop and
mop pail near the pool for that purpose. Once
a year we do an acid scrub of the pool deck to
remove discoloration and clean up the grout.
"As you can see," said Chiles, "we are real
proud of our pool area and our employees
people do a great job of maintaining it for our
guests."

Basic Cleaning Procedures Pool and Spa

Areas:

Daily
1. Sweep or pick up debris, spot mop with a
disinfectant or
bleach solution if visibly soiled.
2. Clean and polish water fountains to a shine.
3. Spot clean glass.
4. Dump trash and clean can exterior.
5. Wipe clean scum line if visible at water
level; use pool water or a
neutral cleaner on a rag or a white scrubbing
pad.

Weekly
1. Hose clean or damp mop with bleach or a
disinfectant solution all floor areas in
and around the pool deck.

Monthly
2. Drain the spa, spray with foam cleaner and
use a soft brush to clean the tub
interior. (frequency will depend on health
code regulations and bather level, a busy pool
may need to be drained and cleaned weekly)

Quarterly
1. Scrub, acid wash or high pressure wash the
pool or tub deck.
2. High dust all vents, fans, speakers, and
pipes, etc.
3. Completely clean all glass inside and out,
use a white scrubbing pad and white
vinegar to remove water stains.

Note: Cleaning of the pool/tub and water

treatment requires specialized training and
certification. This is normally done by the
maintenance or engineering department or an
outside pool service contractor.

Whirlpool Tub
Frequency: After each patient or guest use.
1. Fill tub with water two inches above water
jet level
2. Add disinfectant at dilution ratio (ounces
per gallon) for quantity of water in tub
3. Run whirlpool for 3 minutes
4. Rotate each air induction knob thorough all
bubble sizes or range of operations
5. Use a soft brush to clean around jets, knobs
and drain.
6. Polish metal surfaces to a shine
7. Drain tub
8. Rinse with fresh water
9. Wipe surfaces with a clean rag moist with
fresh disinfectant solution. Allow to air dry.
10. Inspect your work, redo if visibly soiled
or proceed to next assignment area.

Note:
1. If the tub is used for medical purposes or
treatment, before patient use, refill tub with
clean water to two inches above jet level, run
whirlpool for 3 minutes, drain tub, and then
refill with clean water for patient use.
2. Warning: Operating the whirlpool system
with insufficient water in the tub will
cause permanent damage to the water pump.
Do not operate the whirlpool unless the water
level is at least two inches above the highest
jet in the tub.

Sauna
Daily
1. Spot clean door handle and glass
2. Wipe clean the seats, walls and door with a
towel damp with disinfectant solution to
remove visible soil. Allow to air dry.
3. Mop the floor with a disinfectant solution.
Allow to air dry.
4. Wipe clean exterior of heater (when cold)
5. Inspect and test timer and thermostat
6. Inspect benches for slivers and remove
with sandpaper

Monthly
1. Wipe clean door jamb, hinges, ceiling vents
and lights
2. Vacuum under seats
3. Clean floor drain
4. Spray floor and mats (both sides) with a
disinfectant solution,
scrub mats with a stiff brush, rinse well with a
hose or pressure washer and reapply
disinfectant solution. Allow to air dry before
use.

Twice yearly
1. Wash all wood surfaces with a disinfectant
solution. Allow to air dry
2. Treat with teak or sauna oil to keep the
wood from drying out
3. Allow to soak in and dry for 24 hours
before use

Annually
1. Pressure wash all surfaces (using light
pressure won't damage the wood).

Safety, health and ergonomics

This type of work must be approached in a
professional and consistent manner, this
requires organization, and documentation,
close supervision and management control, or
it can quickly become a serious problem. This
responsibility should not be taken lightly, as
there are health, safety and liability issues
involved. Customers and guest are very picky
and have high expectations.
Care must be taken to perform cleaning tasks
when areas are closed to customers to avoid
creating unsafe conditions that may result in
slip, trip or fall accidents. Cleaning tasks
should be performed and chemicals applied in
such manner that odors and dust do not
become airborne or spread to other areas.
Workers should be aware of chemical
hazards, blood and body fluid precautions and
ergonomic injury risks associated with
performing their tasks in these areas.
Appropriate personal protective equipment
(PPE) should be worn when needed to prevent
injury and/or exposure. MSDS sheets must be
immediately available for all chemicals used
on the job.

Equipment, Supplies and Chemicals

The equipment used to clean pools, spas and
associated areas is the same used in other
areas, with the possible exception of a high-
pressure washer, foam gum, pool vacuum and
brush.
Chemicals are very important and should be
used only as instructed on the label by the
manufacturer. Use chemicals in a light
dilution, as guests, employees and patients are
sensitive to odors and are often walking
around in their bare feet.
There seems to be a trend away from using
bleach, except around pools and hot tubs, and
for more heavy cleaning of shower and steam
rooms on a less frequent schedule. Most
facilities are finding that using a foam gun for
periodic or even daily cleaning is fast, safe
and effective on tiled surfaces such as those
found in shower and stream rooms. Brand
name products such as Simple Green and
Windex are popular, as employees are
familiar with and comfortable using them.
Pool and spa chemicals are hazardous
products. Care must be exercised at all time,
product must be measured exactly and
manufacturer instructions followed closely.
As with all chemicals, employees must be
properly trained in their use and hazards and
be required to wear the personal protective
equipment (PPE) at all times.

Side Bar 1
Pool Servicing Procedures

DAILY:
Pool and Spa
Check and log Chlorine, pH, Alkalinity.
This is to be done at the start of the AM shift
and PM shift.
Acceptable Chemical Ranges
Pool: Chlorine - 2.0 to 4.0 Spa: Bromine - 4.0
to 8.0
pH - 7.4 to 7.6 pH - 7.4 to 7.6
Alkalinity - 80 to 120 Alkalinity - 80 to 120
Calcium Hardness - 300 to 400 Calcium
Hardness - 300 to 400

Check and Log ALL temperatures and

pressure readings.
Acceptable Pool and Spa Temperatures
Pool: 80 - 82 degrees F. Spa: 102 - 104
degrees F.

Add chemicals as required. Check Chlorinator

and Brominator and fill as required

Scrub and vacuum pool.

Mondays
Add 3 ounces of Algae 60. Add 4 ounces of
Pool Clarifier, (green bottle)
Check and log Calcium Hardness readings.
Add chemicals as required.

Pool Filter Procedures

The pool filter needs to be back flushed when
the pressure reaches 30 PSI.

DO NOT BACK FLUSH BEFORE THE

PRESSURE REACHES 30 PSI.

Back flush the filter till all cloudiness is no

longer visible in the sight glass.
Restart the filter and add 5 lbs. of DE filter
media via the filter skimmer for the pool.
Slowly add media to skimmer to allow it to
properly coat the screen filter grids in the
filter unit.

After back flushing the filter the pressure

reading should be 22 psi. If the pressure is 26
psi after back flushing, change out the filter
screens and install the fresh ones stored in the
mechanical room by the pool equipment.

Do not change the filter screens before the

pressure reaches 26 psi after back flushing.

If you have any questions with this or do not

understand what is expected please let me
know.

Resources
Resources
- Local swimming pool and spa supply and
service companies
Check the yellow pages under swimming pool
supplies and service

Associations
- National Swimming Pool Foundation
(NSPF)
Ph-516-623-3447
www.nspf.com

- National Spa and Pool Institute (NSPI)

Ph-703-549-0493
www.nspi.org

- Independent Pool and Spa Service

Association (IPSSA)
Ph-818-360-9505
www.ipssa.com
Publications
- Aqua Magazine
Ph-608-249-0186
www.aquamagazine.com

- Pool and Spa Marketing Magazine

Ph-600-268-5503

- Swimming Pool and Spa Age

Ph-913-341-1300
www.age.poolspa.com

Books
- The Ultimate Pool Maintenance Manual
By Terry Tamminen, second edition
Published by McGraw-Hill, ISBN: 0-07-
136239-8

- What Color Is Your Swimming Pool

By John O'Keefe, second edition
Published by Storey Books, ISBN: 0-58017-
036-6