A homemade pool solar heater can be built for less than $50 in less than a day. Do it yourself solar pool heating is one of the easiest and least expensive ways to use solar energy. On a hot sunny day or even a warm sunny day you may have noticed how hot the water in a hose can get that has been laying out in the sun. When you turn the faucet on the water coming out of the hose can be scalding hot.
This is how easy it can be to heat water with solar energy. Using this same concept you can build a cheap solar pool heating unit that will heat your pool as warm as you want with free solar heat. The best way is to build a solar water heater that can also be used to heat water for your home. You can learn how to build a solar water heater here that will cost you less than $100 in materials.
That link will show you how to build one that is compact, very efficient and low cost. You can mount it on your roof or by your pool or wherever you can find a sunny spot. You will also need a pump to circulate the water. You can get a solar powered water pump or the least expensive way is to just use your pool’s existing filter pump.
Simply hook up your filter pump so that as it is circulating water through the filter all or some of the water will go through the water heater too. Pool filters can move a lot of water so instead of a direct hose from the pump to the solar heater you may just want to have a junction like a T in the line so only part of the water goes through the heater. I suggest also installing valves at the junction so you can control how much goes through the heater and how much goes through the filter.
The even less expensive, ugly and in the way but still effective way to make a homemade pool solar heater is to get as much black PVC pipe as you can afford or have room for. Ideally 100′s of feet of it if possible. Lay it out in your yard in the sun and hook that up to your pool’s pump.
It is simple and it works. It can also be a pain having all that pipe laying around and it can get in the way. You could also mount it to your roof or lay it out neatly somewhere. But for best results with do it yourself solar pool heating I think it is best to learn the real way to build a solar water heater.
