New Pool in Broken Arrow OK

This way I will be able to discuss in the same language as everyone here.
(y) The value of being able to do just that will far outweigh whatever value (if any) the PB's kit will provide. Depending on what he delivers, you'll likely be able to make use of it, to supplement the excellent kits you purchased.
 
Because of the level of calcium in my city water, I ended up plumbing my auto filler to my water softener, which keeps my CH in check. Otherwise, I'd be draining/replacing water regularly. So other than the initial fill, I don't use hose bibs to fill my pool. My city water is about CH350, which is what my pool wants. But, like salt, calcium doesn't evaporate, so it collects over time. The softener has allowed me to maintain that initial CH350, without having to replace water periodically. That same water supply is also "whole-house-filtered." I don't know if that actually helps anything, but I like the notion of it. I don't track what using the softener in this way does to my softener salt bill. I just know I don't have to fill the thing very often, so it's a negligible expense.
 
I am also running a filtration/water softener system on the interior water. I may have to consider connecting my autofill to a spare cold tap on my filtered manifold. Autofill connection was not part of the PB scope. I will have to do that myself once everything is finished. Once I get my test kit in, I'll check both hose bib and interior faucet and see what is up.

@kimkats - I played with the poolmath deal to see how temps affected things. According to that, anything below 70F temps (assuming ideal range on the other components) could be corrosive to the plaster. Maybe I didn't fully understand what I was doing?

--Jeff
 
Now what you do is play with the numbers of the pH, TA, and CH. See what that does to the CSI. What you are doing is learning how each item changes your number. Better to learn "playing" than with the real water. MUCH easier this way.

Kim:kim:
 
Gotcha! I didn't fully understand. I thought about messing around with those some, and should have, to be honest. It is not like my normal inquisitive self to just leave things alone like that.

Played around with the numbers a little bit. Looks like PH has the largest effect on the CSI number. I'll play around a little bit more and watch the numbers and see what I can deduce.

Thanks!

--Jeff
 
Gotcha! I didn't fully understand. I thought about messing around with those some, and should have, to be honest. It is not like my normal inquisitive self to just leave things alone like that.

Played around with the numbers a little bit. Looks like PH has the largest effect on the CSI number. I'll play around a little bit more and watch the numbers and see what I can deduce.

Thanks!

--Jeff
I keep all my other numbers within range, throughout the year, then, as water temp drops, I adjust pH to maintain a negative CSI, between -0.3 to 0.0, even if that means a pH slightly out of range. Since I'm not swimming in it anyway, CSI takes precedence over skin sensitivities...
 
Having already lost my plaster (only 6 years old) to bad water chemistry (because it was left to a pool "pro" to maintain), I am now fanatical about CSI, probably the single most important number--under my control--that will determine my new plaster's longevity. Since I got cheated out of about 10 years of lifespan of the first plaster, I now have to try to make this second batch last even longer, to outlast me, so that I won't have to pay for it again! It was $9K this time around. I figure it'll be maybe $20K next time (inflation)! So I keep a good watch on my CSI, because test kit chemicals and some muriatic acid are a whole lot cheaper than re-plastering a pool!

PS. Pool Math (either the calculator here on this site, or the Pool Math app), making understanding and adjusting CSI a breeze!
 

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Having already lost my plaster (only 6 years old) to bad water chemistry (because it was left to a pool "pro" to maintain), I am now fanatical about CSI, probably the single most important number--under my control--that will determine my new plaster's longevity. Since I got cheated out of about 10 years of lifespan of the first plaster, I now have to try to make this second batch last even longer, to outlast me, so that I won't have to pay for it again! It was $9K this time around. I figure it'll be maybe $20K next time (inflation)! So I keep a good watch on my CSI, because test kit chemicals and some muriatic acid are a whole lot cheaper than re-plastering a pool!

PS. Pool Math (either the calculator here on this site, or the Pool Math app), making understanding and adjusting CSI a breeze!

Yeah - I'd be a little more than peeved if in 6 years I'm resurfacing the pool. On top of the impact of the pool math lessons that I learned, the one other thing that I have learned in the last several days is that the plaster is way more delicate than I would have guessed. At least during the initial cure.

Had rain and a little snow flurries Friday/Saturday. They were out this morning to pump out the pool and clean again. And replace more chipped tiles. It doesn't matter how many times I have looked...I always seem to find another with a chip. I know my PB has got to be tired of me messaging him telling him I found another :rolleyes:

--Jeff
 
I need to update... Plaster was completed almost two weeks ago. We had about 3 days in a row of high 50's/low 60's weather and the plaster crew jumped on it. PB was very confident in the crew that he uses and didn't have any concerns, so I deferred to his judgement. Might prove to be a mistake later on, but I hope not.

Once plastered, waited the recommended time from reading articles here, and began the fill.
Water meter begin - 56,884
Water meter end - 71,644
Total gallons - 14,760
During the fill - there was 2 baths, 1 shower, probably 5 sinks of dishwater, and normal getting ready stuff the next morning. So I am estimating somewhere around 250 gallons extra used (80gal tub, 50 gal tub, 10 min shower @ ~ 4 gpm and a 1 gal/hr leak from the hose bib filling the pool for ~24 gal, plus some extra).
Total pool fill - ~14,500 gallons. Spa is ~615 gallons (calculated) and the pool would be about 13,900.

I tried to use the hose flow meters. Those are ok, except they roll over every 999 gallons. So you have to be able to check it every so often, to ensure you catch the rollovers. Not conducive to overnight or while at work.

Here are some pics...

Plaster 1.JPGPlaster 2.JPGPlaster 3.JPGPlaster 5.JPGPlaster 6.JPGPlaster 7.JPGFull pool1.JPGFull Pool2.JPG
 

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PB was out the next day, during the fill, to work on some things. Then a day or two later, the chemical guy came out and started up the equipment and checked the chemicals. At the moment, it is still under their care so I am not doing much. They got all of the equipment up and going and were out Tuesday to get all the valve actuators connected up and begin programming the Intellicenter.

Can't wait until PB is complete with everything and it is turned over. I played with it a bit this past weekend, as much as I could, to get familiar with the Intellicenter. That is going to be fun. I am looking forward to playing with that.

Couldn't keep the kids out of it this past weekend. For some reason air temps of 72 degrees made them think it was time to swim. They were a little shocked at the 48 degree water temps!

Knuckleheads.JPG
 
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Now that the pool itself is complete, I need to get the area around the pool cleaned up. The PB was only responsible for back filling around the patio. It will be a long drawn out process, but that's ok. I'm not in any hurry.

First step was to address the elevation change at the far side of the patio, so that I don't have to move the fence immediately. So off to Lowe's to pick up some retaining wall bricks. 100 bricks later and hardly a workout for the truck, and now the hard part.

Blocks.JPG
Patio edge.JPG

Kinda hard to tell in this picture but there is a 12" elevation change between the top of concrete and the bottom of the fence right here.

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Next up was to connect the autofill. This involved digging a 24" deep trench, about 50' long. Thought I was going to need to core through the footing, because I wasn't certain how deep the footings went. Fortunately I found the bottom of the footing and we ended up just going under. I connected to the plumbing manifold in my garage, which happens to be on the complete opposite end of the house from where I came out. It took about 135' of pex, but I was able to make it in a single run with only a fitting at the valve and 2 fittings in the garage. I installed the pex in a 1-1/4" conduit, so that should I ever need to replace it, I can pull it out and re-feed it. The cap on the end of the conduit is not glued, so that I can remove it, if I ever were to need to replace the line.

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Manifold.JPG

To be continued...

Edit - added manifold picture

--Jeff
 
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Continued...

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Everything is filled in. I worked diligently to compact the soil as I refilled. I managed to get most of the dirt back in the hole! Which never happens. Since this, we have had several inches of rain and I have seen some small amounts of settling where I obviously did not get it compacted as well as I thought, but no ginormous holes either.

Yesterday was a nice day, mid to upper 50's and sunny. Although not as warm as it had been during the week prior, it was nice enough I wanted to be outdoors. So I decided to finally clean up the electrician's mess. I just do not understand not taking pride in your work and turning out something like this. I got it cleaned up, not quite as well as I would have liked, I left the ground wires alone since they were tucked in the back and out of the way. Who knows, once I get the rest of the work done, I might just pull everything out and fix the grounds as well.

Electrician's mess.JPG
Much Better.JPG

Thanks for looking... I will keep adding to this as I go along. Next up is path lighting around the patio. I found some lights at Volt lighting and have ordered everything. Waiting on things to dry out so I can not get so dang muddy while working.

--Jeff
 
WOW!!! You have a turbo attached to you!! That is a LOT of AWESOME work right there! So clean and well done.

-Stones around the end of the deck-LOVE how that came out! Did you add mortar to it? It looks like you did. LOVE it such a nice finishing touch!

-Why are you going to move the fence?

Now teach this teacher-I don't have a clue about your "manifold" thing/set up........what is it and why???

Was your auto fill already piped to the pool? So you had to do all of that wonderful (so glad I did not have to do it LOL) digging to get the water to it.

LOVE what you did in the box................reminds me of when the GOOD PHONE guy showed up to fix our lines after we moved into this house..........it was a MESS before he got his hands on it! A good trades person make life so much better as they CARE and have PRIDE in a job well done! GOOD PEOPLE!!

Kim:kim:
 
Thanks Kim! It reminds me of how sedentary I have become since graduating high school some 25 years ago. I used to dig trenches and move stones as a "workout". Now it is a chore.

I did add mortar to the top course, so there wasn't a gap to catch a toe in or anything. I used PL500 adhesive when I set the blocks.

We were going to move the fence so that we could build up the grade to the patio. Now with the stones, that project is much further down the list. The fence is about 10 years old and eventually will need to have some posts replaced and I have one rail that is cracked. So when all of that gets replaced, we will push it back about 4' or so.

The manifold was a project from about 4 years ago. Completely replumbed my house. The manifold allows for individual shut off to each fixture/zone in the house. It is not a necessity but definitely nice that I can work on any plumbing issue anywhere in the house and not have to shut off the main water supply. In this case, having a spare tap allowed me to run a dedicated line to the autofill, and not tie into a cold water line from another fixture.

PB did run the autofill to the pool. They brought it out just beyond the deck to a shutoff valve there. Running the water to it was not part of their contract. And I wouldn't have wanted to pay the plumber for trenching and running that! :shock:

Yeah - good tradespeople make life so much easier!

--Jeff
 

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