indoor pool plan

[scheckaet]

Three years ago my wife and I started a small swim school in Oklahoma city (born2swimokc, i hope it's ok to post this shameless advertisement ; if not, mods please let me know and I'll remove it).
Anyway, thanks to this site and all the great info here, we dove in head first and bought the biggest above ground pool we could find and started teaching in our back yard.
The summer months are great but 3-4 months is not enough to sustain a business year long, we have the demand for winter classes, so we need a year round facility (read: heated and indoor) and are exploring what are the most viable option to get there.

I know all about the challenges of having a heated indoor pool, like keeping the moisture level low, chemical balance, getting fresh air to remove chemical smell, etc and I'm ok with that.
(I've done some math to get an idea on cost to get the place heated, need to do the same to get the moisture level in check using fans, dehumidifiers, etc.)

At this point, I am gathering info on what would be the most feasible and seek advice from the people from this site.

So far, I believe it would be less expensive to find a house with an in-ground pool, get it covered and heated, than finding land + building house + pool + have it covered.
(if we could, we would obviously build it from the ground up to get it to our specific specs but i don't think it's feasible at this point).

Anyway, does anyone have any experience or know how much it would cost (ball park) to cover an existing pool (minimum would be 16x32 pool with enough space to walk around, a place for client to change, store some swim equipment...) with insulation and heating? Are we talking 20k? 50k? 100k? more? to get it done?
I'd like to have general idea on what to expect before calling pool builder, contractor, architects .... we don't even have an in-ground pool yet...
Is this a plain and simple bad idea?

Any comment is greatly appreciated.

Will

 

[gwegan]

This is not an easy question. Most pool structures are not designed as heated and insulated and I have no idea of Oklahoma construction and permitting costs. Any number is more guess than estimate. I would try and determine what you want and then go have a couple of builders come and talk to you about it. Give you their ideas of how to accomplish that and a rough estimate of the price. This way you get some local expertise and maybe some creative ideas.

In California this would be a very expensive building if it contained many windows because of the high cost of Title 24 compliance. Who wants a pool building without windows? I have no idea of what Oklahoma would require.

 

[JohnT]

With a building just large enough for a pool, most of the heat comes from the water. You heat the pool and the relatively small thermal mass of air in the enclosure follows the water temperature. Moisture control is the biggest issue.

Have you looked into the inflatable domes? Here's an example: Inflatable and Removable Pool Domes in PA NJ DE NY for year round swimming There are fancier ones and cheaper ones available as well.

 

[scheckaet]

thanks for the comments.
Yes, we are really considering the inflatable ones like ameridome. I didn't know about the one you posted, thanks!
For 10-15k range, this is a very good candidate, (i am sold and convinced myself this is our only viable option for the near future) but i must check every option before we commit.
Like i mentioned earlier, I wanted to see what kind of cost we're talking about to build permanent vs dome since we'll hopefully get there at some point.
I really like the dome idea, because it can be ordered, installed and ready to go in a very short time, and they are relatively cheap. So the investment vs risk is quite low.
The problem is i can't find any location to check one out or much resource online from owners. Before I buy, i'd like to see one and talk to the owner to have a better feel on how well it does in the winter, how much of an electric/gas bill they have.
What I am worried about is the temperature inside in the winter. Operating a school, we'll have lots of small kids ranging from 6 months to toddlers (teens and adults should be ok with more "chill" temperature).
From my analysis/prediction, factoring in the coldest average air temperature for oklahoma, gas price, heat loss overnight from evaporation, etc, it would cost over 1200 for the coldest 3 months to heat up the place. (about 8K total a year to heat the pool to 86F which should keep the air inside the dome around 80F) which is doable depending on how many kids we have. Might have to shut down the operation for the coldest months and we're ok with that if this is the only option we have.
But all that is on paper, talking to someone that has one would put my mind to ease...

 

[cwritner]

I have an indoor pool and live in Oklahoma. The winter issue is keeping the water temp close to the indoor air temp to eliminate condensation. If I had it to do over, I would consider the cost of an evaporator as opposed to an air removal system. The is a company building products company that can design an aluminum support windowed structure to cover the pool. I will see if can find a builder that distributes these and get that to you. It would give you choices. They are much better at additions to cover your pool than free standing structures.


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[scheckaet]

one option i had forgotten about that would be kind of in between the dome and permanent structure is the pool enclosure.
Promotions | Models | AquaShield - Pool enclosure specialists

Wondering if this is better or worse that an inflatable dome. (heat wise)
Pros: it looks a bit more "professional" and is more permanent.
cons: more expensive and being hard top i'm worried about hail damage we have here almost every year. The inflatable would not have that issue.
I assume heating them would be the same as the domes.
Thoughts?

 

[cwritner]

These look really good and will be much easier if attached to an existing structure vs freestanding. Price quoted is in line with what I found. I had to build to the covenant of the neighborhood.


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[scheckaet]

do you have pics of your setup?

 

[greg.stevenson.90]

Remember this, if you R running a profitable business, it's a tax deduction. Yes you need the money upfront. I had a customer that was a personal trainer, they build a sport court addition on one end and a huge addition on the other and made the upstairs a full gym. It's nearly all tax deductible because it's for her business. Yet when the business is done (and it's paid off) it's yours and the value of your house is awesome. But I would be more concerned with the safety outside, like if a customer falls on your property in the winter when they come to swim...

 

[cwritner]

It's been a couple weeks. Sorry, dad gum job sure can get in the way of my pool stuff. The place I spoke of to build a structure to enclose your pool is at Laminated panels, pergolas, lattices and screenrooms by Metals Building Products. This may or may not be what your looking for. There is a tab on the web site on where to buy. I would attach pics if my set up but I will have to figure out how to do that. Basically I have an 18k gallon, Grecian pool with attached hot tub inside a 2000 sq ft building that matches my home. It meets all the covenants of our neighborhood but if you drive by it, can't tell it's there. Bathroom and kitchen included.


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