So I moved into a new (40 year old) house in October last year that had a gunnite pool in really rough shape. Tons of stains, chips, rust, missing tiles, etc. It had a PoolSafe pool cover which the previous owner told me "stopped working a while ago". The pool equipment was also antique, when I tried the jet pump it sparked and blew a breaker, the lights "never worked" per the previous owner, no automation, single speed pumps and a lot of rust. The deck around the pool was also in rough shape, cracks, peeling coating that I was told would be impossible to remove and replace well. On the deck the old system of French drains didn't work so various corners filled up with muddy water after any rain or splash event. Finally, the deck and pool had come separated by a lot (3/4"?) in some palces and there was no proper coping to allow for expansion. I knew all this going in to the purchase and it was factored into the price of the house - true fixer upper inside and out, so come January it was time to set about resurfacing and rebuilding it all. Pretty much the only thing that would stay was the pool shell itself.
I got 4 quotes, three of them in a decent range and one that simply threw me an outrageous number because he told me he was already "too busy". All were highly rated and offered references. The lowest quote ticked me off a bit with a change in terms the day after he quoted, the highest quote took weeks to get back to me and I had already written him off when he finally sent me his bid. The middle quote was the best pitch, best presentation, and it was the owner not a sales rep so I went with him. He matched the lowest bid plus $1K so I signed.
Here goes:
Old pool, looks OK from a distant picture but up close it was rotten.
Day 1-3: Concrete demo. I pity these fools. We have about 5 steep steps from the backyard so no heavy equipment. Jackhammers and wheelbarrows and elbow grease. They made a ramp, filled a wheelbarrow and got a head start to run the thing up the ramp. Brutal work. They crushed it all in 1.5 days and removed it all by day 3.
The space at the top right corner between the stairs, with the wooden frame, was an old deck that had long ago been removed. We'll come back to that later.
Day 5/6: Deck all cleared, and the gunnite chipped out, partially removed:
To Be Continued
I got 4 quotes, three of them in a decent range and one that simply threw me an outrageous number because he told me he was already "too busy". All were highly rated and offered references. The lowest quote ticked me off a bit with a change in terms the day after he quoted, the highest quote took weeks to get back to me and I had already written him off when he finally sent me his bid. The middle quote was the best pitch, best presentation, and it was the owner not a sales rep so I went with him. He matched the lowest bid plus $1K so I signed.
Here goes:
Old pool, looks OK from a distant picture but up close it was rotten.
Day 1-3: Concrete demo. I pity these fools. We have about 5 steep steps from the backyard so no heavy equipment. Jackhammers and wheelbarrows and elbow grease. They made a ramp, filled a wheelbarrow and got a head start to run the thing up the ramp. Brutal work. They crushed it all in 1.5 days and removed it all by day 3.
The space at the top right corner between the stairs, with the wooden frame, was an old deck that had long ago been removed. We'll come back to that later.
Day 5/6: Deck all cleared, and the gunnite chipped out, partially removed:
To Be Continued
Thank you very much for sharing the pics.