Water behind liner - does it ever go away?

[rcy]

If water gets behind the liner in a vinyl pool will it ever dry up or go away, or should I make some attempt to vacuum/dry it? The walls of the pool are galvanized (I think) metal.

Reason I ask, is the liner popped out of the track in a small section yesterday, and when I pulled it away and up to put it back in today, I noticed water behind it, and the metal was a bit rusty. As far as I can tell, there are no leaks in the liner - I assume water got behind there other times in the past when the liner was pulled away (i.e. over winter, a few section of liner popped out).

 

[JasonLion]

Water behind the liner should never appear in the first place, and should go away slowly if it is there, as long as the pool water level is higher than the ground water level.

 

[PoolGuyNJ]

Generally speaking, the weight of the water in the pool will seal out any water. If the ground water is flowing, some may get between the wall, hopper, or floor and the liner.

Water that does happen to get in there generally gets squeezed out.

Any cement used in forming the floor or hopper can be washed away by a persistent high water table, sometimes costing thousands to repair correctly. The cement is instrumental in holding the material, usually sand or vermiculite, close and to prevent dents and ruts from forming.

Water is a pool's worst enemy, followed closely by the sun and its bather load.

Scott

 

[rcy]

Thanks for the replies. I have a sump well beside the pool and weeping tube around the whole pool to deal with water (since the ground where I live is 2" of topsoil and then solid clay). This water I'm talking about got behind the liner up high over the winter when a small section of liner detached and snow melt/rain got in there. It's still there and was looking a bit green when that section of liner popped off the other day and I put it back on. It's right at the water line, so I'm guessing it won't get squeezed out. Maybe I should pull the liner off a bit and shove a towel or something down there to soak up the water?

 

[PoolGuyNJ]

Gravity will force it down.

Hooking up the drywell to a pump and pulling out the water behind the pool wouldn't hurt either.

Scott

 

[bob22]

I have this problem (clay soil and water behind liner). I pop the liner off at a corner in the shallow end, insert a 3.5' long piece of 3/4" to 1" diameter (internal) PVC pipe with an adaptor glued onto that goes to hose thread. I use a small $80 utility pump from HD/Lowes attached to this pipe to pump out the water. If you use the hose that comes with the pump, you will not be able to easily pull it out from between the liner and the metal pool wall (pressure of pool water on the liner presses the hose against the metal wall and the hose stretches). In the Spring, I ran the pump for 5+ hours (roughly 1,000 gals) before no more water showed. A towel isn't going to cut it I'm afraid. You may not have that much water but it will be more than a towel's worth I'm sure.

See my prior post with pics on the effect of the water at opening this Spring at:
groundwater-problem-with-vinyl-liner-t30071.html

 

[rcy]

This is not ground water behind the wall (I have a sump well beside the pool that I am obsessive about keeping drained). This is water that got behind the liner from above when a section of liner came out of the track over winter and snowmelt/rain got behind it. Still, I may try your method and see what I can suck out.

How do I remove the liner from the track myself? It seems to detach in certain area of the track on it's own, but I have no idea how to remove it myself.

 

[bob22]

I wait until the sun hits the liner in a corner and try to stretch/pull with finger tip friction the line up towards the locking bead and keep doing this until I get enough slack to get it to unhook. It is not easy (which is good for it not coming undone on its own) to do. There may be a better way but that is how I do it and I am too afraid of using anything tool-like that I could puncture the lining with.

 

[PoolGuyNJ]

Pour near boiling water slowly down the side of the liner, above the water line. It will make it easier to stretch and lift the little you need to unhook the bead from the track.

This trick also works well when the liner pops out of the track and you want to put it back in.

I use a big corn pot to boil the water and a smaller pot to ladle it.

Scott

 

[Bill pool]

After reading posts which recommended using a small store brought pump to pump out the water from behind the liner, I decided to use the most powerful pump that I already own which is my pool's pump. I connected my vacuum hose to my skimmer, primed it, then placed it behind the liner where the water pressure had already pulled the liner out. It took about a half an hour, and for most of that time I held the hose because, the vacuum kept pulling up the styrofoam wrap under the liner. But the end result was that once I got most of the water out the weight of the pool water flattened the liner back into place.