Anybody heat a pool with a heat exchanger?

[shroom]

thanks for the link DJ. i replaced my gas heater in a hurry when i moved in last year and have a solar cover but plan to get to solar set up by the time the heater’s life is up.

we’ve had a cold spring and cranked it on last week for the first time this year, i was feeling guilty with temps at 82. last year we hit 96 pool temp when outside temps hit 105 for a over a week. gross.

[Timberridge]

Do you live anywhere near volcanic activity? The ancient Romans used to heat their baths in Baiae with the nearby hot springs.

[Cocximus]

The idea checks out. Question is, is there enough energy wasted to justify the cost of the heat exchanger? Look at your AC wattage and energy used by the pool heater. Do the AC wasted W/h recovered at max 80%(guesstimate) by the heat exchanger do much for heating your pool?

[gregorys]

Covers get you a lot for not much energy use, or hassle.
I'm not a pool owner - but my parents have one.
Now it's in central Washington, which is very sunny and quite hot during the summer - so I'm not sure how much this will apply to your situation.

The cover we always used was like bubble-wrap. Blue in color (not as clear as you'd think.) And , obviously, much heavier duty than bubble-wrap.
But it was also important to run the pump if you really wanted to increase temps. Otherwise the top 12" would get very warm, but the rest would still be cold. Yes, that heat would move lower in the pool, but the capture of the heat was just way more efficient if you kept the pump running and the temp would peak higher.

We also, tried a hose-in-the-sun heating method. It worked quite well, but was prone to breakage and other fussiness. So we only used it a year or three. (This was back in the stone-age, so I'm sure the materials and experience has improved the situation a lot.)

IMO, the simple cover+pump gets you a lot for not much effort or maintenance.

The cover does break down though. I think we got like 5y on ours before it was falling apart.

YMMV

[muted reborn]

Anyone know a decent electric heater for a small 800 gallon pool? Everything I see is for a 5 gallon bucket of water or for 3000 gallons at least. Solar reviews look shitty so I'm hesitant to buy one of those. Right now I'm using a cheap 1500 watt heating stick, it takes days for the pool to be a decent temp, I'd like to get something a bit faster between $100-300. What I'm looking for doesn't seem to exist or my googling sucks.