New Pool Build in Orlando, FL

kimkats said:

Ask them how the auto drain works. Most of the time it is a pipe with a grate towards the top of the waterline tile. The pipe will lead to a spot in the yard that extra water from the pool will not mess up. Sometimes they put it inside the skimmer towards the top so it is only needed if the water is over where is should be from a big rain.

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Thanks Kim - will ask about that.

Yargnits67 said:

Erik, our regrets are not with the filter or anything like that but with lack of lights. I wish I could go back and add some lighting on the steps. I also wish I went a little bigger/deeper. I know you live about 45 min from us but you are welcome to come by and check out the quality of work of Premier Pool.

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Interesting to hear about the lights and size/depth - I've been wondering if the 3' shallow end depth would just be a bit shallow. I've been keeping an eye on their FB page to see their projects, but I may take you up on that offer! Very kind of you!

BlueWave8 said:

My last house and pool build was in Narcoossee, not far from you! We had all Jandy equipment, which was okay. I tend to appreciate the the Pentair filters and pumps a bit more. My biggest gripe was the filter. I had an 8700gal pool/spa and the Jandy 150 sq ft filter. I had to clean the filter every 3 months, and that was after procrastinating for a month every time. Really seemed to need it every two months, and that was with a screen enclosure. I wish I had a much much larger filter, like one of the Pentair Clean & Clear PLUS 320 models.

I suppose if it was no cost difference you might as well get the larger heater. I had the JXi 260k and it always heated the spa up to 102 in about 20-30 minutes. I didn't use it to heat the pool.

+1 for more lighting. I had one light in the pool and one light in the spa and it always looked weird because large parts of the pool were too dark.

If you aren't sold on "salt" yet you need to be! I maintained my pool in Narcoossee with bleach and liquid chlorine the old fashioned way for about two years before I got fed up with it and converted to salt. It is just much more stable chemistry. In FL with our sun and UV, a LOT of chlorine is used during the middle of the summer. If you get lazy, travel, or forget to add chlorine for a few days, you may go to swim and realize you have algae starting. Maybe its a couple days before a pool a party and now you have to shock the pool to get rid of the slimy feeling before the party and your levels will all be off and your pool will reek like chlorine for your party. Ask me how I know Only had to have that happen twice before I converted to salt. Never again....

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Not far at all - I'll definitely ask about lighting placement and make sure we've got some good coverage, without blasting light back into our living room lol - and we're officially on the salt train now!

Hey Folks - got the first revision of the plans from the builder, just to confirm some layout and options on the contract (not signed yet). Initially we were interested in the sports pool, but with our space, it just won't work, so that needs to be updated on this.

Any input on placement of equipment/skimmer/lights/returns/etc? I'm thinking we need a return on the shelf to help keep it clean, besides the spillover, and maybe a second skimmer (no cage, but no trees)? Builder initially said the one skimmer is fine. Where the skimmer is, it gets direct wind at it for the majority of the day.

Another potential hurdle will be the sun shelf depth - the builder answered that the water depth on it would only be 6", which isn't deep enough for us, we're looking for 9-12". To get this deep, it causes the first step into the pool onto the shelf from the deck to be deeper, like 16"+ instead of the originally planned 12". I did some thread reading on here and it seems most folks put in a small 6" step on top of the shelf as an "easy entrance" for older/younger/injured people. Any experience here?

R = Return (or Spa Jet)

kimkats said:

You do need a return on the shelf for the very reason you state. Two would not hurt depending on how wide the shelf is. If your skimmer is placed where the prevailing winds would push stuff then one should be fine.

Shelf depth-get what you want. Make sure everyone is talking WATER depth and not just depth from the floor to under the coping. WATER depth should be from the middle of the skimmer opening to the floor.

YES put a step on the shelf to aid in getting out/in the pool. That is done quite often. If you want to get extra helpful you can also put in a hand rail for the time you have folks who need it at your pool. It might be you one day due to an injury or as you age.

What is going to be on the side away from the house? If it is grass you may not be very happy with the short distance from the grass to the pool. Mowing day will be a day of netting grass out of the pool. Just something to think about.

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Shelf is going to be the width of the pool, 16', and it's 6' long.

For sure about the WATER DEPTH, and not just some random depth figure. I've gotten in writing that any depth figure our builder is quoting is the actual water depth, or the middle of the skimmer.

Single stair was his recommendation too, so that's added.

It'll be grass outside of the pavers on those plans, and that's a good point that I hadn't thought about. I'm asking what the $$ difference is to extend the paver patio a bit. We don't have a ton of space to expand, since we want to leave some actual turf back there, but we'll see what he says.

So after a year essentially, I wanted to come back and provide an update on this thread. I’ve definitely learned a ton along the way regarding building a pool, and I’m back on TFP to get into the maintenance/care side of things to prepare for wrapping up the build.

First and foremost - if you are in the Central Florida area, DO NOT use Pinnacle Pools and their owner Matt, formerly Premier Pools of Central Florida. Matt is a likable guy and could sell rock hard candy to toothless Indians, but you can’t trust him as far as you could throw him. After months of promising 8-10 week build times last Sept/Oct/Nov when we started, and us telling him not to over promise multiple times, here we are coming up on 10 months and we just got waterline tile. We’ve called him out on numerous issues, found more mistakes than we can count during the build, and caught him in numerous lies while he hides behind his project managers. I understand supply and labor shortages in our current world, but we addressed that with Matt in the beginning, to which his response was that they had all the materials stockpiled and all in-house labor (except gunnite) - both of which have been fleeced out as total lies.

On to the next learning experience - builder contracts. I scoured our contract, made numerous strikeouts and additions (most of which were accepted by the builder), and even proposed a different payment schedule. One thing I let slip was having the proposed timeline included in the actual contract IN WRITING. I’ve got Matt’s 8-10 week spiel in an email, and obviously he said it orally, but get the timeline in the contract as well as resolutions if that timeline is not met.

Next up, trust but verify all work yourself. Thank goodness I didn’t let this builder run this project without any oversight. For example, the original staking’s dimensions for the dig weren’t even close to correct, and when they proposed leaving it as-is since it “gave us more pool for the same price” we forced them to lay it out again. Then when the pool was shot, the Sun shelf wasn’t built to the correct depth per our final plans (builder gave gunnite crew superseded plans). The waterline tile originally almost installed wasn’t what we selected, the equipment on the pad wasn’t what we agreed to in the contract, we currently believe an auto fill and plumbing is missing, and the list goes on. All of these things would’ve gone completely unnoticed by the builder unless we verified their work and spoke up.

Nobody will care as much as you do about your build, and after seeing how simple the construction has been, I really wish I could’ve found a gunnite company to work with me as a homeowner to allow me to GC this project myself. The only company in C. FL refuses to do so, which led to hiring the whole project out. If you’re so inclined, seriously give a thought to doing the project yourself as long as you can find the subs.

As we hopefully approach the end of this build in the next month, I look forward to learning about the upkeep side of things here on the forums. I’m sure I’ll have some questions on construction wrap up items as well.

Thanks everyone!

TampaKathy said:

Yeah, you really do need to learn how to build a pool just so you can supervise and correct everything! I had many of the same issues as you.

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While it’s not how it should be, the fact that we aren’t the only ones facing these issues keeps me sane haha.

Oh well, now we know for the next one!