Hello everyone,

I just found this forum last week as we started our new pool. I think/hope I have most of the major details nailed down. I do hope to figure out the chlorine thing before they start to set equipment (next week).

I’ll run though the process of starting this project and I’ll post some photos and video I have of the construction. If you have suggestions feel free to post them. This is my second pool. The first one came with the house, so there was nothing to pick out and I only owned the house for a couple years.

We purchased the current house as a Repo. The interior was trashed and the exterior was 99% dead. We spent the last 2 years working on the inside and now we are moving to the outside. I didn’t really know where to start and I wanted to make sure everything looked like we had a plan. I didn’t want it to look like the yard was pieced together and I didn’t want to install something, only to later change our mind. To that end we hired a Landscape Architect. It was more difficult than I thought to locate someone in our area.

The Landscape Architect came to our house a couple times and we arrived at this initial design.



There were several things I wanted changed, but we eventually went with a completely different design. If I was going to Owner Build my pool the Architect was going to complete about 5 detailed plans for Pool, Electrical, Plumbing, Landscape (plant types and location), Water, Etc. Total cost for the Full Project would have been about $2,500. We received the plan above for about $550.

When we first started working on the back yard I called two local Pool Builders. My yard has several issues with the proposed pool location: Septic, Property Line and a Slope.

Pool Company #1 was deathly afraid of the slope. He tried to squeeze a 15x30 pool into the yard. I think the bid for the pool and spa was right at $30,000 for the Basic Pool/Spa Package.

Pool Company #2 was not afraid of the slope. But they also never completed a bid.

For a short period of time I considered an Above Ground Pool. Specifically a Splash Superpool. Potential problems with location, permits and a fence killed that idea.

Pool Company #3 was also not afraid of the slope and worked with their engineers to see what could be done with the slope. I won’t name the company until the work is completed and I check with the Project Manager. The PM came to our house at least 4 times. He measured the slope and the rest of the yard. He also generated a 3D image of the pool and the yard. We made several changes and he came back with a new design and a complete breakdown of his proposal. These photos are close to the final design (The BBQ is moved between the Fire Pit and the Swingset):





After checking some of the numbers we decided to have Pool Company #3 handle the entire project: Pool/Spa, Hardscape and Landscape. One stop shopping and one guy to handle any problems as they arise. We signed the Contract in December and planned to start in the middle of January.

Here are the highlights:

Pool - 40x20 Free Form (see signature for more details)
Spa - 8x8 Free Form
Raised Fire Pit
Outdoor BBQ (I will actually build most of this)
Colored Stamped Concrete Decking and Sidewalks
Pavers for the Fire Pit, Patio and Front walk
Pool Code Chain link fence
Alumawood Patio Cover
Landscaping (trees, shrubs, drip, wired for low voltage lights)
RV Pad with 50A service and water

Before

Dig

Rebar



Gunite

I missed the demo, but I've been taking thousands of photos for a time lapse video of the project.

Here are last 3 hours of Rebar work in 1 minute.

The video is in HD, so maximize the screen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEReiGAkByc&hd=1

I just LOVE the views you have out in CA. What a great setting for a pool and the pool looks like it's going to be AWESOME!

You obviously know what you are doing. Very awesome!

Nightmare-Structural looks great and I see the keyway in the spa. Your slope is very gradual, so you should have no worries at all there. I can't see any plumbing, so not real sure how it is plumbed (I like the 2 skimmers though Are you over 800 SF?).

Looking great! You and your family are going to have a great summer (and many more to follow)

Nightmare,

that is a great pool. Perfect weather too for building a pool.
We are currently building in Corona. We shoot our shotcrete tomorrow.

We picked out the Water Line Tile today.

I really don't know how we were supposed to make a decision. They had hundreds of tiles on the wall, hundreds more in the cardboard racks. We looked at a couple dozen photos of pools they completed. We took about a dozen samples outside to see them in the sunlight. Our final choice was something along the lines of:

"Do you like it?"
"I dunno, do you like it?"
"Yea, I guess"
"Ok, we'll take that one"

We went with a 3" tile, because the pool has several elevations. One size is at ground level, the back side is +6" and the Spa and Firepit area are +12". I thought the 6" tile looked a little out of place when they were stacked 2 high. I guess we will see what this looks like on Monday

That will look great, and the 3X3 is a great choice as well. Much easier to make the radius' and you will not have to cut tile in them (the 6X6 always look a little goofy to me when you have to cut them to make a radius).

What color grout did you choose? I would try and find a color (Delorean grey, pewter, dove grey) that matches the tile so that you don't have every joint defined on the tile.

I'll need to ask the PB, he just said 'Grey'.

Monday/Tuesday for the tile install.

I think they will set started on the Coping next week too.

I asked the PB about the 2 motors in the Spa. He planned to use 1 motor for both Pool and all the spa functions. He mentioned some limitation on the PDA 6 remote. The Spa has 2 large pipes in the floor and the 6 jet pipes in the wall. I'll see if the PB can draw a diagram of the equipment.

Any grey will be fine really. I just didn't want to see you go with white and then ask why no one said it would look like that

We picked out the Pavers today too. They look MUCH lighter in person and I'm going to make sure they are not this dark before we start installing them. We saw this same color paver installed at a home today and Angelus had them setup in the materials yard.

Tile guys installed most of the tile today. They installed some pieces of tile that I feel should have been thrown out due to a defect in the color pattern.

I'm also not impressed with the detail work. Am I being too picky?

Is there any problem with breaking out the problem tiles tomorrow and re-installing? I can live with most of the minor flaws if it is going to compromise the life of the tile.

I wouldn't accept it. Looks like his first job

If I were running the job he would be tearing it out and doing it right. And I would not be paying him to do it over ('cuz I only pay you to do it right; the first time!). It doesn't even look like he used surface bull nose on the spa spillway.

Have him cut the tiles so that they fan out, not try and make full sized tiles work ('cuz they won't!). You really should not have to accept work like that.

What Bruce said. Those tiles that arc on the spillway should be cut so the grout lines are the same width all the way down. Bruce is right too when he said they should have used bulllnose tile on the edge. The guy who did this surely doesnt do this for a living? Make them tear it out and bring out a real tile guy. Heck i'm an amature tile layer and I could do a better job. I know this sounds harsh but no way I would accept that.

Ask him if he thinks you would refer him to a friend with that kind of workmanship, or lack there of. The guy is used to doing bathrooms, not pools. He obviously didn't do a layout first.

Scott

I can't find that exact tile on the Master Tile web site to see if they make a bullnose tile.

The edge of the spillway hangs over the face tile to create the waterfall cascade. Will that work the same with a bullnose tile?

I talked to the tile guy before he put the first tile on the pool. I asked him how he planned to start the wall tiles. I also asked about the spillway (we talked about widening it a little bit). I even told him about my disappointment with my bathroom tile guy, because he started on the 'wrong wall' and I ended up with all the 'cut' tiles on the visible wall.

I was gone for a couple hours and when I came back they were just about done (they ran out of tile). The first thing I noticed was several 'bright' spots in the field of tiles. I went over to wipe off the grout and it did not easily come off. I can't tell if it will come off completely or not. See photo.

Is there any problem with setting the tiles and doing the grout on the same day?

I completely agree with the poor tile work. I do a lot of tile work around the house and even grout lines are the rule, not the exception. I'm not sure if it would hurt the tile to grout on the same day, but have NEVER done that before either. Welcome to my world with my PB. Don't pay any draws until you're satisfied. If you do, expect a lot more anxiety from yourself - speaking from experience with my pool build.

No problem to set and grout the same day. It really doesn't affect anything.

Today is DAY NUMBER 66 of the project. I'll post the complete schedule when we are near completion.

Pavers and Patio Cover this week. Palm Trees and Landscape next week. We may have water in the pool by April 1.

OK, lots of work since my last update. I also uploaded a couple more time lapse videos:

Coping: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNzsGflHEq0

Decking: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8l_bOUvhqQU

Pavers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LYp1Uf8Yw4

Here is where we were yesterday:

I guess it is a limit of 3 Photos per post.