We are continually asked who makes the best pool equipment? When considering what equipment we would use in our own pools and would feel comfortable giving a 5 YEAR WARRANTY to our customers we considered the three main manufacturers of pool equipment: Pentair, Hayward, and Jandy. We considered the warranty, reputation, ease of use (automation), wear and tear, manufacturing, training, and cutting-edge technology.
The Best
Hayward Pool Products has been the leader in pool equipment and innovation for decades and is the clear choice for our customers.
Why Hayward?
Hayward offers complete pool automation systems, so everything on your equipment pad is made by Hayward and Mud Slingers Pool and Patio offers a 5 YEAR WARRANTY on all Hayward equipment. Some pool builders only offer a one or two year warranty, so make sure you ask your builder what they offer.
Heaters
The most important part of a pool heater is the heat exchanger and on average to have replaced is $800-1000. The three types of heat exchangers are: copper, copper-nickel, and titanium. Copper can wear down in 3-5 years with normal water chemistry, copper-nickel is 8 times more resistant to chemical wear than plain copper so life expectancy is >25 years, titanium will never wear down from chemical use. All hayward gas heaters come standard with copper-nickel heat exchangers. Electric heat pumps come with titanium heat exchangers.
Filters
If you want a clear and clean pool, your filter is a critical component. Sand is the most common and has been around since the beginning. They are very easy to use and maintenance time is minimized by simply backwashing when dirty, but it only cleans to a 30 micron particle so the water isn’t the cleanest it can be. Cartridge filters are very good and clean to a 5 micron particle, so water is very clean but cleaning the cartridge filter is very time consuming. A DE filter is like a hybrid of cartridge and sand, it has grids on the inside that with the combination of crushed sea shells coating them is essentially a double filtration that cleans to 1 micron or the equivalent of a red blood cell – so ultra clean water. It also has the same backwash system as a sand filter, so you have the best of both worlds – ultra clean water and minimal maintenance time.
Pumps
Single, dual or variable ? A single speed pump run on high speed 24 hours a day so it consumes a lot of unnecessary power. A dual speed or variable speed pump is going to be the best option as it is not necessary to run your pump on high speed all day. Set your pump on high speed during the day so you have optimal filtration while swimming in your pool. At night you can turn it (or program it) to low speed to keep water filtering and the heater running, but saving energy and money.
Pool Chemistry Automation
Itchy skin? Cloudy water? Red eyes? Water chemistry is the part of pool ownership most people will talk about. Older pools must be monitored daily to ensure proper chemistry and often wind up having ridiculous amounts of chemicals in them. Hayward has been a leader in this cutting edge technology for years. The Hayward Pro Logic and Gold Line controls have made pool water chemistry very inexpensive to operate and virtually automatic. Your time messing with chemicals is reduced to checking an Omni Logic touch screen to get the water chemistry correct. Simple.
The pool industry has come a long way and Hayward has been leading the pack by investing in technology that makes your pool automatic and nearly maintenance free. Gone are the days of lugging harsh chemicals and dipping sticks in the water. Now owning a pool means more time relaxing with your family.
