Large Wrinkles in an inground vinyl liner - builder says "controlled shrink"

[stillrunning]

Large Wrinkles in an inground vinyl liner - builder says "controlled shrink"

Good afternoon folks,

I had a vinyl liner installed 9 months ago and now I have large wrinkles everywhere in the shallow end. When I say large, I mean they raise about 2 - 3" from the floor and span 10+'. The guy who installed it says he can drain the pool and do a controlled shrink. However, I've never heard of this and was curious what this entails. I (obviously) didn't ask the installer and didn't give it any thought until now. Before I called him, I wanted to have an idea of the process before commencing. I haven't been very satisfied with the installer (I've called every other week since I first noticed the wrinkles in August for him to come fix the problem - everytime we talk he says he's coming out to my house).

18' x 36'
3' shallow
8' deep
TFP method for maintenance.

Richard

 

[JasonLion]

Re: Large Wrinkles in an inground vinyl liner - builder says "controlled shrink"

The easiest way to deal with this kind of problem is to drain the pool and then reinstall the liner. Draining takes the tension off the liner and it will almost always shrink a fair bit. Given the liner is less than a year old, this should work just fine. Older liners don't always survive the process.

Assuming the liner was installed without wrinkles, the wrinkles almost certainly come from "floating" the liner. Normally there is enough pressure on the liner to keep it in place. But if the ground water level gets above the pool water level the liner can float, removing the tension and allowing it to move around. When the ground water level goes back down it rarely goes back to the correct position, leaving wrinkles. The only way to avoid this problem is to keep the water level in the pool as high as possible when ground water levels are high.

 

[stillrunning]

Re: Large Wrinkles in an inground vinyl liner - builder says "controlled shrink"

I really appreciate the quick response. Thank you.