Successfully jacked up an Intex/Summer Escapes pool

[Jamison04]

Ok so long story short we go a lot of rain with the recent storms. Rain = GOOD for our rain fall totals here but not so good for the pool before I re-sloped the yard away from the pool on one side. Well this has been a growing problem since early spring when our pool over flowed due to lots and lots of rain causing 9 posts to slowly sink. Now mind you all 18 posts were set on those 7x12 concrete patio pavers on virgin ground when we set up the pool last July. The side that sank was roughly 3/4" lower than the high side from the get go so naturally when it overflowed it went out the lowest point. This was in early march. We also have been able to swim since mid march here. My observation was that with each day we swam and the walls flexed and moved so did the posts and you could see the water coming up out of the soft wet soil around the pavers and over time they eventually started to sink. The way the yard was leveled for the pool didn't help because the area in question would hold water if it was rainy or wet. So now as I mentioned earlier the yard and drainage has been corrected and tested with the rain the other day. Today I finally took a deep breath, grabbed the hydraulic floor jack and a 2x4, set up the dumpy level and slowly went around the pool jacking up the posts and shimming the low ones up with thin pieces of flagstone until I had everything back to with in 1/4" level from being completely level. The worst post was about an 1-1/2" low, two about 1" low, and the remaining 6 not more than 1/2". Not enough to really be a problem but my OCD made me make the top rail completely level. I wish I would have taken pics but I was too focused on makin it as perfectly level as I could again. I mainly just wanted to let others know that it can be done successfully and that even sitting on pavers that depending on the soil conditions the pool legs can still sink in poorly drained areas.

 

[Coastal Carolina]

Hi, (a woman asking this question)...can you explain in further detail exactly HOW you can do that? I understand how you can use a tire jack to lift up a car, but how did you get underneath the post? I am asking this because we recently had a tropical storm come through this area, and I have one that isn't sitting as pretty as I would like either! Thanks!

 

[Jamison04]

I basically put the front of the floor jack so it was right in front of the leg and slightly off to one side and used a long 2x4 and put one end of it right next to the pool leg under the "T" part and the other end on the floor jack and slowly jacked the leg up until the leg was slightly higher than I needed it to be so I could slide a piece of flagstone that was close to the thickness i needed under the leg. Then slowly lower the leg back down so it rested on the new stone. I can upload some pics tomorrow to better show my process. I just don't know how to better explain w/o some pics.

 

[Coastal Carolina]

Got it, thanks!!! :-D :-D :-D :-D

 

[Jamison04]

Here's how I set it up to raise the legs

And up top

This is shows how the concrete paver had sunk about an inch compared to the surrounding soil. A 1" piece of flagstone fit nicely under this leg.

 

[ShannyShan]

When you did this were you worried about the pool liner ripping due to the shifting water pressure? Did you drain any water at all? We have a similar situation, but are so weary of jacking it up because we are afraid of a seam giving out or something. We have a different pool, though, the 16' x 48" Ultra Frame.

 

[Jamison04]

I did it in small increments on all the the posts that needed to be raised. Only raised each leg about a quarte of an inch at a time going from let to leg that was low Also I failed to mention that I did this in the course of two days when the sun was out and the liner was really warm that way I wasn't putting too much stress on the liner. Trust me, I contemplated doing this for a long time before finally just doing it. Just take it slow and don't try to raise to much all at once.

 

[larry0071]

I admit that did similar with my Intex 18' round ultra frame. I used my engine lift, wrapped the T joint with a 3" lift strap, jacked the center of the three sunk legs and placed 1" thick slab of wood under it, then did the same to the 2 outer legs. I forgot to take pictures, but it seems to have worked. I was just set out to get the sunk legs back to where they started.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

[Jamison04]

Glad that it worked for you too! Such a blow to the heart to know that after all the hard work to level the ground that it could still sink almost a year later under wet conditions.

 

[dhoward]

I've done the same thing with a floor jack. Works great, no apparent stress on the liner.

 

[pregoinsummer]

Problems! So some of the legs on our 22'x 52 inte ultra frame were to far under pool liner after filling pool. There was some leveling issues but not too bad...well we started jacking up some of the legs tor re-align (using your method....now the t joints and frame not locking in place right with sitting locks. Please help. Also,the 2x4 started tearing one if the to rail sleeves slightly. Is this going to cause us problems?

 

[nefelimva]

Had the same issue last year. Wish I had thought to check this post before hand. I used some light scaffolding and hung two come-alongs from the scaffolding to the T-rail and slowly ratcheted up the pool leg and placed the stone block under the leg. It was pretty steady but labor intensive.
Oh, another tip. I had some sandy areas outside the pool that would not only tend to wash away but the dogs liked digging in it and flopping down to cool off. SO...I took some Portland cement and mixed it with the sand (low mix ratio) and the sand became hard enough that the dogs wouldn't dig it and it wouldn't wash away.

 

[jmullan99]

I have a similar problem. A heavy rain softened up the ground around one part of the pool. The legs sank. I used the trick here but should have waited until the ground dried out. After a couple of dry days I will try again. I have to admit, I was nervous the whole time I was jacking it up. But so far so good. The only problem is getting the jack close enough so it doesn't block the area being worked on.

I didn't do a proper measurement but going by the water level, it is out a little more than one "row" of those little blue squares.

I hope to fix up that area with some gravel and a larger block to spread the weight out a bit more, and try to ensure better drainage of rain water.

All opinions accepted

[attachment=0:1rvtd46n]pool_sag.jpg[/attachment:1rvtd46n]

 

[nefelimva]

I have discovered (the hard way of course) that if I don't keep the leg at the innermost edge of the stone (as opposed to centered under the leg) It will rub the pool liner and you will feel it inside the pool. I know this seems obvious now...but when I was placing them , centered seemed ideal for support, forgot about comfort.

 

[jmullan99]

Good point. I did think about "what good would a larger block do" if the legs necessarily have to be at or close to the edge. I figure it would just end up tilting the block raising the opposing edge of the block.

Quite tricky these things.

 

[nefelimva]

Tricky indeed
After jacking up and digging down and placing brick on 9 of the posts I am basically level now except for 3 posts that are about 1" high. Unfortunately it is centered on my return hose. My plan for today is to jack them up , dig down (and add brick support) low enough that it will actually lower the three posts by the 1" offset.
Fingers crossed

 

[Rumbum]

I'm glad to see I wasn't the only one brave enough to try this trick! Only difference is that I used a farm jack!

 

[reckerj]

I cannot tell you how happy I am that I found this thread. I thought I was the only goof ball that this happened to...not once but TWICE! We had originally emptied the pool and tried to level it but with rain we were back to square one. So I googled and found this thread and after contemplations for more than a week I said what the heck and tried it. It took me 5.5 hours to do just three legs (only inching the jack little by little) but now it's level and it has rained here for the last few days and it's still level!! I am SO excited to have fixed it without draining it AGAIN! My husband was looking at me like I was nuts the whole time, but I did it and it worked like a dream! THANK YOU!!!

 

[omegahacker]

I have this problem not because of settling (though that may come over the next year), but because I put the legs on the same foam insulation as the liner. The foam collapsed under all the feet, and the 4 legs along the "edges" of the foam tiling pattern that had the least support (see pic) slid out. My problem is compounded by the fact that one of the legs landed on pavers for the (pending) adjacent patio area, and they hadn't been brought fully up to level beforehand. That means I can't actually put the jack on those pavers, because they're the ones I need to move. I may have to come up with some kind of lever system, with the "riser" 2x4 lifted by another one that's spanning between the jack and either the ground or some platform, to give me the chance to deal with the pavers.

I'm seriously tempted to go around and jack *all* the legs in order to cut the insulation out from underneath and replace it with 1" thick of something else, maybe pressure-treated lumber or composite cut in a nice 32-sided polygon to ring the entire pool and hide the insulation while holding the legs up to the proper height.

 

[calivette2003]

How would you lift on a ultra frame pool where as the top rail is inbound as compared to the botom of the pool. I tried a car jack under the leg, lots of digging and precarious at best. It resunk again!