When considering how best to control your pool’s functions, you are faced with a couple of options. First, you can go full manual. A pump with a switch you turn on and off, lights with manual switching, and a heater you adjust with the built in thermostat. Or you could go fully automated with a pool control panel where all functions are controlled with your phone.
Before you integrate a pool control panel into your backyard pool experience consider if it’s worth it. Much like a deciding on a robotic pool cleaner, you’ll be weighing price versus convenience. You should evaluate what the control panel can do for you, as well as examine the potential drawbacks. All of which you’ll find in this article, written by a pool designer with over 20 years of experience.
Pool Control Panel Benefits
First, the pool control panel can save you from frustration. From annoyances as simple as leaving a light on and needing to go back outside to turn it off, to a guest using your spa and accidentally draining it into the pool. The pool control panel can automate these tasks and make your life much easier. Depending on the manufacturer and the panel selected, you can specify you want to control it from an app on your phone. You can now turn your spa on while you’re headed home for the night.
What Pools Are Best Suited For A Control Panel?
The most important time to use a pool control panel on a project is when the project has a built in spa or hot tub. Generally, spas use the same equipment as the pool. This means they share the pump, filter, heater, and disinfection systems. This is done for many reasons. First, to eliminate costly duplication of equipment. Second, to minimize long term maintenance challenges which occur when you have multiple bodies of water.
However, sharing an equipment set also means some additional work. Whenever you want to use the spa, you need to turn at least two valves in the equipment area. Additionally, you have to adjust the heater, and maybe turn on some air bubblers and jets. Also, since most spa use happens at night, you’ll want to turn on the underwater light, maybe you’ll want the light color to be blue.
Doing all these tasks manually means you’ll generally have one person in the family who knows how to do them. Therefore, when they’re not there, it’s a crapshoot. Not to mention you’re usually doing all this valve turning and switching in low light in a mechanical area.
For most pool and spa owners, a pool controller makes sense. There are some out there with an engineer’s mindset who like to get into the workings of the pool hydraulics system, filtration system, and heating system. However, even engineers have a family and not all of them will have the same idea of fun. Sometimes pressing a button is the best way to control your swimming pool and spa features.
Downside Of A Pool Control Panel
Why else might you consider not using a pool control panel? A big reason you may want to avoid it is if you have a simple swimming pool with a single light. If you have one light, or a couple lights wired to the same switch, there is minimal reason to have a control panel. However, as soon as you add a waterfall, water feature, some deck jets, or other features, a pool control panel will become an attractive add on.
How Do Pool Control Panels Make Spas Easier?
A pool control panel can be the difference between using the spa and not using the spa. What happens when all you need to do is press the spa mode button and the valves automatically move, the heater comes on, jets turn on, and the light turns on? The spa becomes a whole lot more accessible for everyone. The pool control panel may seem like a luxury. However, the true luxury is the pool and spa in your backyard. Whereas the control panel just makes it that much more useable.
Modern variable speed pumps are perfectly capable of managing their own run times and speeds once they’re initially programmed. You don’t need a pool control panel to speed them up, slow them down or turn them off.
However, as soon as you add another flow state to the mix, like opening a valve and speeding up the pump for a water feature, you really need a pool control panel to control the pump and to turn the valve. Alternatively, you need to have a good comfort level with your pumps and valves. Then, you can begin to control these features manually.
How Much Does A Pool Control Panel Cost?
Having access to these functions on your phone will add somewhere in the $1,500 – $5,000 price range on most backyard swimming pool construction budgets. Of course this depends on manufacturers and precise specifications you need for your specific pool. Some of the big players include Pentair and Hayward. Given this price point, it’s not a mystery why many people consider eliminating pool control panels from their pool project.
Pool Control Panel Summary
In conclusion, a pool control panel in the modern age is capable of being controlled through an app in your phone. You can turn the lights on, the heater on, turn on a waterfall and check your water chemistry. It’s important to always remember you can add a control panel down the road without much trouble if you can’t afford one today.
