Owner/builder SoCal

[joanniern]

A couple of days ago we pulled our permit for building a pool. I'm a little nervous. I've built several houses before - I grew up in construction and my husband and I finished a two story addition to our house three years ago that was all DIY (not kidding. We just finished recovering physically). Anyhow, we have been saving up since we finished the house and hopefully won't have to be as hands on. Our style is contemporary but with traditional mixed in. I'm having a hard time visualizing what type of coping and decking to do around the pool and need some help. We like how turf is mixed with concrete and have synthetic turf in other areas of our yard. Our friends have a very straight line pool with exposed aggregate coping/decking. We love their pool but the shape of our yard made us go with freeform design to fit a bigger pool. We have dark gray stamped concrete in our front yard that looks like wood. We were thinking of going lighter for the backyard. Please help!

Here's the layout:

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The decking drawn is just for the plans we plan on going right up to the house and around it with whatever is chosen. We also plan on building a covered patio on the side of the house that faces the pool and connects with the back porch. Roughly 27' x 13'

 

[joanniern]

Here are some pics of the backyard:

 

[joanniern]

Dimensions:
960 s.f. Pool with Baja shelf, sports/bar area and 7' deep end. Roughly 31.5' x 29.5'. 9' diameter integrated spa

 

[Jimrahbe]

Jo Ann,

Just wanted to say Welcome to TFP... A Great pool resource...

We love pictures, so keep them coming as you build your pool.

Thanks for posting,

Jim R.

 

[joanniern]

I'm really excited to have TFP as a resource although I am a little nervous for everyone to see it

 

[joanniern]

I see you have pentair. We keep going back and forth between pentair and Hayward. Do you have any threads comparing the two that you recommend? We are going with a vs pump, de filtration, swg and fully automated controls - so we would like to pick one line for easy integration

 

[kimkats]

What fun this will be! Thanks for letting us help you spend your money! LOL :slidehalo:

It is best to stick with one kind of equipment. Check with the different brands. At one time one of them had it where if you bought 3 pieces they would extend the warranty! Worth looking into!

Have you found your trades people yet? That alone will drive you crazy as I am sure you know with your background!

Keep us in the loop with your equipment models so we can make sure you are going big enough. The bigger the better for the filter and SWG.

Kim

 

[Jimrahbe]

I see you have pentair. We keep going back and forth between pentair and Hayward. Do you have any threads comparing the two that you recommend? We are going with a vs pump, de filtration, swg and fully automated controls - so we would like to pick one line for easy integration

Jo Ann,

I am an unashamed and highly biased Pentair guy, I recommend their products to everyone. That said, I suspect that Hayward products are "almost" as good...

The real key to having a well working automation system, as Kim points out, is to buy all the electronic equipment from the same manufacturer. This ensures that the equipment can communicate with each other without any type of modification or workarounds.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[joanniern]

What fun this will be! Thanks for letting us help you spend your money! LOL :slidehalo:

It is best to stick with one kind of equipment. Check with the different brands. At one time one of them had it where if you bought 3 pieces they would extend the warranty! Worth looking into!

Have you found your trades people yet? That alone will drive you crazy as I am sure you know with your background!

Keep us in the loop with your equipment models so we can make sure you are going big enough. The bigger the better for the filter and SWG.

Kim

We have found someone to dig and have contacted a few rebar contractors for bids and have a few bids on shotcrete and one on stonescapes mini pebble. I just read about aqua bright and once the hole is dug I'll contact the installer in my area for a quote. As far as plumbing and electrical are concerned the sky is the limit since we will be diy'ing it...I know that may seem crazy to some but we are pretty advanced diy'ers in this area. We've even done rebar before and have the tools to do it but I hate working with the stuff...we are going to DIY the retaining wall for the subterranean kitchen/bar. The coping and decking we will sub out because finishing concrete is not something we are good at...what else? We'll probably do the waterline tile ourselves...we installed our synthetic turf in the other side of the yard and it has tempted me to do it again around the pool - since it ends up being cheaper than concrete but I don't like walking on it with wet feet because our dogs hair is all in it and it gets all over me.

 

[kimkats]

Never even thought of dog hair and synthetic turf.........I bet that would be a problem but it sure does look nice without all of the work of real grass.

SO neat you have all of those skills and will use them. I Like how you know what you do not like to do and what you are not real skilled at and are willing to let others do that.

With the plaster person........please make sure to check their current and past work. The installer is what will make or break that part of the build.

Kim

 

[joanniern]

It's been raining a ton here which is great for the drought! We have a break in the rain for a week or so starting today so we drew the lines. Tomorrow we start digging! I'm getting excited!

 

[kimkats]

Tomorrow as in only one more wake up?????

Kim

 

[joanniern]

Yes! Yay!

 

[kimkats]

It is TOMORROW!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wakey, wakey!!! Are they there yet???????????

Kim

 

[joanniern]

We had a little change in plans in the last week or so and my husband decided he was going to dig the pool...so, yes lol, he's here but I'm struggling to get him out of bed! I've been up for an hour. I'm like a kid on Christmas morning. I can only help him for a little while before the kids wake up. But he isn't a morning person. He may be setting the forms without me. We are going to do a time lapse video with our GoPro and he needs to mount that before we get started too.

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It's 5:59 am here is CA. His alarm just went off, let's see how this goes!

 

[kimkats]

LOL how funny! You have your "crew" right there BUT they will not get up! LOVE it!

Do you own the digger or did you have to rent it? I hope he knows how to use it!

Kim

 

[joanniern]

We rented one. It arrived yesterday. When the guy dropped it off I was outside painting the lines and Mike was picking the kids up from school. He asked me if my husband knew how to drive it and I smiled and said, "I don't know why he needs to know how, I'm the one digging it" you should have seen the look on his face. I laughed so hard. Then I said, "just kidding. He knows how."


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[kimkats]

I wish I could have been there!

You would think they would check the person knew how to drive and operate it BEFORE they dropped something like that off

My husband will tell you I know how to back a trailer better than him and most people. Jet ski, boat, utility, etc. I can back it. Might be slower but I can put it right where you want it and angled how you want it. I SO want to learn how to drive a tractor and back hoe but have not had any luck talking him into buying one for me hehe.

Kim

 

[joanniern]

Omg. I have to talk Mike out of buying one daily. I've been in construction my whole life but parking a trailer is not in my bag of tricks. My sister in law though smh, she can put a man to shame with her skills.


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[clambert1273]

We have to be good DIY'ers in SoCal or end up paying out the nose for stupid things lol This will be fun to watch!!!


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