Your swimming pool water is being constantly polluted by a gang of environmental elements. Everything from pollen, spores, dust, leaves, bacteria, decaying matter, and waste can make their way into your swimming pool. Aside from environmental pollution, your friends and family are the next biggest polluters of your swimming pool. Swimmers carry many pollutants into your water including sweat, bacteria, viruses, urine, feces, suntan lotions, etc. In order for these pollutants not to effect your water quality, you need adequate circulation pumps and filters on your swimming pool

The filtration process involves your swimming pool pump and filter working together. The pool pump moves the water through the filter system thus removing any unwanted pollutants that are inhabiting your pool. Pool filters come in three major classifications or types: sand filters, diatomaceous earth filters, and cartridge filters. Most residential swimming pools have either a sand filtration system or a cartridge filter system. Commercial swimming pools usually run on the diatomaceous earth filtration system. These filters can filter our finer particles of dirt then their counterparts but are much more difficult and expensive to maintain.

The easiest to maintain swimming pool pump system is a timer based system. Your pump should run for at least 8 hours a day minimum. This ensures circulation of your swimming pool water to remove any suspended particles in your swimming pool water like the ones we mentioned at the beginning of this article. The pump and filtration system will not remove any particles that have adhered themselves to the bottom and sides of your inground swimming pool. For these particles, you will need to brush and vacuum your swimming pool at least once a week.

Brushing and vacuuming of your swimming pool should take place with your circulation pumps turned off. Brush the walls and floor of your swimming pool and wait for the particles to settle on the bottom of your pool. When the particles have settled, use a vacuum to remove the particles. If you are like the average pool owner and do not have time for any of this, there are automatic vacuums, brushes, and cleaners you can get for your pool that will do the work for you. The automatic pool cleaner variety does not replace manual cleaning, but they are very close in cleaning effectiveness.

When you have brushed and vacuumed your swimming pool, you need to clean your filter medium. This is done through a process called back washing. Back washing forces water through the filter the opposite way to flush out any dirt and particles that have accumulated in the filter. First, remove your leaf buckets, clean them, and replace them. There should be a setting on your swimming pool filter called "backwash". With the filter setting set to "backwash", turn on your pump and let the water run until the water is clear. This process usually takes a few minutes depending on the size of your inground pool. Next, turn off the pump and set your filter to "rinse". Run the pump again for a few minutes and turn off. Set the filter to "closed" and open your leaf trap to remove any debris that may be present. Clean and replace the trap. Finally, turn your filter to back to its original settings and set your pump back to timer mode.

Since your swimming pool water level will be lowered by this process, take a moment to top off your swimming pool with a garden hose. It is recommended that the backwash process take place once a week.