I am about to have my in-ground cement pool resurfaced using an exposed aggregate. The pool was built about 35-40 years ago. I think the light niche is mostly cement and was built directly into the pool wall. It appears previous owners "repaired" this niche in the past with epoxy, cement etc but it has crumbled in a few small areas and has one or two holes (about 1/4 inch deep into the wall... not through the wall). In addition there is an old transformer and some areas of the conduit that are rusting out and so both conduit and transformer will be replaced.
Question - Is it better to try and repair this cement niche OR chip it out and cement in a new plastic niche (from Pentair or Hayward etc)? Now seems like the ideal time to replace the niche along with conduit etc. before the pool is resurfaced. So I am leaning to replacing the niche to hopefully prevent issues down the road. Aside from labor/cost is there a downside or concern with replacing the niche in its entirety?
Question - Is it better to try and repair this cement niche OR chip it out and cement in a new plastic niche (from Pentair or Hayward etc)? Now seems like the ideal time to replace the niche along with conduit etc. before the pool is resurfaced. So I am leaning to replacing the niche to hopefully prevent issues down the road. Aside from labor/cost is there a downside or concern with replacing the niche in its entirety?
