Any pool owner worth half his weight in wisdom knows that keeping a watchful eye on the rate that water leaves the pool is vital. Testing for pool leaks at home is not as daunting as the thought of it is and getting a handle on common causes is ken worth adding to your expertise.

Let’s take a look at the process for leaks in the pools walls or floor and in the underground piping, which will save a lot of time and money even if you still decide to call in the experts.

The following will need to be done with the filtration system turned off.

Wall and floor leakage

If you see or suspect a crack line on the walls or floor, turn the pump off and keeping the water still as best you’re able, squirt some food colouring from a medicine dropper in the area and see if the dye is sucked into the suspected spot. Don the goggles and swim slowly to the pool floor with dye in hand for suspected leaks down below.

If nothing shows, you’ll need to resort to draining the pool. Wherever the level holds, you’ll know it’s along the wall somewhere at that level. Of course, if the leak happens to be on the floor of the pool, all the water will drain away, which is unavoidable, but at least you’ll know where the problem lies.

Leakage in the filtration system or underground piping

Resist the rising panic, nearly all concrete pools develop leaks at the skimmer somewhere along the line and that’s not a nightmare to fix. Use the food colouring/ pool dye test (pump off) to see where the water is being drawn off.

Your worst fears will be that the dreaded leak is in the underground piping and you’re already visualizing your wife’s prize garden being ripped up or your fabulous pool deck cut open for repairs. Underground piping seldom develops leaks but there are factors such a tree roots and even moles, that may compromise the system.

You may cause more problems than you fix trying to repair leaks in the piping. The professionals make quick work of locating leaks with pressure tests and will respect your pool surrounds when carrying out pool leakage investigation.

Warning: if you have a vinyl liner pool and you’re losing water at a rate of knots, forget all the foregoing tests, start adding water and call the experts in – liner pools need to have water in them at all times.

Other than that, congratulate yourself for successfully locating your pool leak, crack open a beer and decide if it’s going be a DIY job or whether the professionals need to be summoned on Monday!