Bench Depth?

[platipus]

How deep are your benches? What seems most comfortable (and maybe share how tall you are)?

I was considering 21"/22" for most of my bench area and maybe having one a bit shallower for some variation. 22" comes up about 2-3" shy of my collar bone on me. I am wondering if that is too deep to relax in and sip on an adult beverage and not feel like you are going to float away.


Thanks
-plat

 

[QingGuy]

I'll measure mine in the morning for you. We have 47 linear feet worth.

 

[pooldv]

I like our bench depth. They are great for chatting and beverage sipping. All kids 12 and under love playing on them. I just asked the wife and she says they are perfect. She is 5'6, almost 5'7", according to her. I'm closer to 5'10" than 5'11". I'll conduct a full battery of tests for you tomorrow.

 

[platipus]

Thank you both (and anyone else who checks)! You would also each be doing me a personal favor if you enjoyed various adult beverages during this critical testing phase to ensure proper... functioning... yes... You know, for authenticity's sake.

SCIENCE!!!!


Please report back all findings.

Thanks!
-plat

 

[JVTrain]

 

[platipus]

Ha! Who nailed it?




That guy*.

(* Not me. Above me. I wish he was pointing angled up a bit higher...)

 

[TexKSAH]

I will be testing mine this weekend, adult beverage drinking around the pool that is. While I'm at it, I'll do some research on our bench depth and whether or not it's conducive to adult beverage drinking.

 

[QingGuy]

Here you go!

I measured to the top of the water which is about dead center on my 3" waterline tile.

I listed the shallow end steps and deep end "step" as we find many guests will sit on these and treat them as a benches. If I had to do it again, I think I'd do another 28" "step/bench on the opposite side of the bench in front of the planters as I enjoy sitting there. When I sit there the water comes up to the bottom of my neck. Other than that, the other benches are perfect for relaxing and enjoying adult beverages. The deeper benches make it tough to get your drink off of the deck without lifting up off of the "bench". Honestly, when they poured the shotcrete I was afraid we'd made a mistake on the tanning ledge and steps. After using the pool for a couple of months we love it, in-fact, I wish we'd made it larger so we could fit 3 or four chairs on there. We would have gone parallel to the pool vs. into the pool to maintain the current width of the pool if that makes sense.

We're so glad we did 47 feet of bench, they're quite popular and will provide years of enjoyment for us and our party guests.

Hope this helped. Oh, I'm 5'10 and my wife is 5'7", stepson is 6'5" and our middle school kid is 5'10" on his way to 6'6" - 6'8" according to his Dr. and I think benches are fine for them too. Now depth, that's another story, wishing I would have gone 8' vs. 7' as no matter what I tell these d%&n kids they still jump off planters which are +18" grrrrr

 

[platipus]

Here you go!

I measured to the top of the water which is about dead center on my 3" waterline tile.

#1 your pool is awesome
#2 the color is dead on what we want to achieve
#3 the glass mosaic tile really adds a pop
#4 the raised palm tree planters finish it off nicely. If that's a morning picture, there is going to be some nice afternoon shade from those as they grow. Prime seating underneath...

That all said, thank you for posting the pics with the depth call-outs!

47' of bench sounds like a lot to me but then again I've never heard anyone complain about having too much bench either. I wish we could add more, but as things stand the only place I could add it would narrow down the already skinny 13' main area. We've got about 22' of bench and I am happy to have that. We also don't have kids so we'll have less competition for good seating areas.

I think 28" would sink the wife though (5' 4") and maybe even me. Guess I'm all legs and no torso, LOL. I'm 6' even and I measure 28" to my chin just sitting in a chair. Something to be said for split level benches which we are thinking about doing. Like 18"/22". We definitely need to get in our friend's pool and measure before we commit.

Thanks!!!
-plat

 

[QingGuy]

Glad it helped.

Was a morning picture, plaster is quartzscape blue, it turned out really nice and we haven't had any warm water issues here in Vegas.

28' is a lot of bench, with no kids I think you'll be just fine.

 

[pooldv]

Ok, here is the scoop.

16" to normal water line
17" to max water line at overflow
21" to bottom of coping
23" to top of coping

 

[bmoreswim]

40' of our benches are 16" and 5' are 32". I would have preferred the 32" to be 40 or 42". But I still love the deeper standing benches for the deep end. We are mostly not tall and 16" works well.

 

[chiefwej]

I have a bench along one side the length of the pool and a sun shelf at the same depth. It was designed so tha sitting on the bench, the top of the deck is just right to put your drink and also so that two standard lounge chairs fit on the shelf with the water depth coming right to the seat level. It is the second step into the pool. The surface of the bench is 24 inches below the top surface of my deck and 16 1/2 inches below the top of the water.

 

[platipus]

40' of our benches are 16" and 5' are 32". I would have preferred the 32" to be 40 or 42". But I still love the deeper standing benches for the deep end. We are mostly not tall and 16" works well.

The standing benches are a neat idea. We are only doing sport depth 4-5-4, but if we were going deeper, these would be going in.

I have a bench along one side the length of the pool and a sun shelf at the same depth. It was designed so tha sitting on the bench, the top of the deck is just right to put your drink and also so that two standard lounge chairs fit on the shelf with the water depth coming right to the seat level. It is the second step into the pool. The surface of the bench is 24 inches below the top surface of my deck and 16 1/2 inches below the top of the water.

Wow, 16" sun shelf. That is DEEP! I like it! We want to have some bubblers on our sun shelf and so all the builders are warning us about even doing 12" which is what we thought would be a good depth. 16" sounds like a great depth though. We want the sun shelf to be usable by our dogs as well so 12" is probably the max for the smaller one.

Thanks!
-plat

 

[chiefwej]

My sons dog loves the sun shelf and running back and forth on the bench, but then he is an 85 pound Golden Retriever. We find that little kids also love the shelf. Like I said, the depth was set at the level of the second step down into the pool which worked out to be 16 inches.

 

[grottoguy]

Some bubblers come with optional attachments that stick up ( I mean not flush with pool). I suspect but don't know for sure that these would be helpful if your depth is 12 inches.

 

[platipus]

Some bubblers come with optional attachments that stick up ( I mean not flush with pool). I suspect but don't know for sure that these would be helpful if your depth is 12 inches.

I've heard of this (periscopes I think they are called). It is a possibility for us I think, but I also would prefer to have as little sticking up as possible when they are running for fear the dogs would run into it playing or even grab hold. Something to think on.

Thanks!
-plat

 

[Foxy]

The standing benches are a neat idea. We are only doing sport depth 4-5-4, but if we were going deeper, these would be going in.

Wow, 16" sun shelf. That is DEEP! I like it! We want to have some bubblers on our sun shelf and so all the builders are warning us about even doing 12" which is what we thought would be a good depth. 16" sounds like a great depth though. We want the sun shelf to be usable by our dogs as well so 12" is probably the max for the smaller one.

Thanks!
-plat

Glad I'm not the only one considering shelf depth for the dogs!
We are going to do a renovation and raise our shelf, it's too deep for our Boston Terriers, but I'll have to take measurements since I don't know the current depth, I'm thinking it's around 16" and I'm thinking to make it around 8". It's more of a bench depth at the moment, around chest deep when sitting on it.

 

[SoFloGal]

My sons dog loves the sun shelf and running back and forth on the bench, but then he is an 85 pound Golden Retriever. We find that little kids also love the shelf. Like I said, the depth was set at the level of the second step down into the pool which worked out to be 16 inches.

Hi! 16” total or 16” of water? I’m still trying to learn the lingo here. Thank you!

 

[chiefwej]

SoFloGal,
Post #13
”I have a bench along one side the length of the pool and a sun shelf at the same depth. It was designed so tha sitting on the bench, the top of the deck is just right to put your drink and also so that two standard lounge chairs fit on the shelf with the water depth coming right to the seat level. It is the second step into the pool. The surface of the bench is 24 inches below the top surface of my deck and 16 1/2 inches below the top of the water.”.