Built a pool, been operating it for a few years, mostly by feel...

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C

CavLancer

0
May 16, 2015
10
Bohol Philippines
Here on the island of Bohol one can't just run out to a pool store or walmart. I get powdered Chinese chlorine that I worry about, but people use it for drinking water so... That and muriatic is available. I can get stuff off amazon, have it shipped to family in Oregon and transshipped here, but that can take a few months so one has to think ahead. Trying to find agaecide currently and pool algaeside on amazon is spendy, so I searched a chemical listed on one and it came up with Arm and Hammer super washing soda and in the process I found this place. I have aq lot of reading to do, but I thought I'd just throw that info out and see if someone might know if it will work. Also want to show off the pool I built. :) Made a few mistakes but not too many but I'd never done anything like this before.

Here am I with a friend...



We're adopting a couple kids and like to have their friends and classmates over.



Peaceful pic...the place is often a crazy spot with kids but i do get it to myself sometimes. The pool is poured concrete, I bought a mixer a few years back when the road construction on the circumference road was finished and they soldf all their nice diesel mixers. Never made a better purchase! I used to do carpentry in the US, but no masonry. While here I learned what is possible with concrete and metal bar and have had some fun with the stuff. For instance the spiral staircase in the pic above. That actually drove me a little nuts but came out well.

 
Hi...

Built a pool and am doing okay with it, but want to do better. Currently have algae issues. We drained it a few days ago and washed it with muriatic. Likely fill it again soon, might have a pump issue and we'll find out then. The impeller gets filled with seeds from coconut trees and the problem might have been that, they're cleaned out now.

I live on the island of Bohol in the Philippines with my family but am originally from Oregon.
 
Re: Hi...

Welcome Cav!!

This is a bit different, in that I don't know what sort of testing equipment is there for you, or what pool chemicals you have ready access too. Stateside we suggest a proper kit for sustaining a high level of free chlorine until the pool is cleared. Do you have any sort of test kit? What product(s) do you normally chlorinate with?
 
Re: Hi...

Thanks for the nice welcome Patrick.

I ordered off amazon 'Aquacheck Select' test strips which used to come with a color match chart in each vial. Pretty basic... Nice thing is there's lots of water here and we can drain and replace fairly quickly. We do this about every 3 months.

The chlorine is powder from China, comes in a white barrel and can be inconsistent from one barrel to the next. I had one that was so strong it seemed like weapons grade! Nasty stuff, but it worked very well. Didn't like handling it though. One barrel it maybe 10-12 gallons and costs about $80ish. (P4000)

http://www.troublefreepool.com/thre...-few-years-mostly-by-feel?p=803261#post803261
 
Re: Hi...

With much reading here, you will see that we do not trust test strips for much of anything. These are the Recommended Test Kits ... the key is the FAS-DPD chlorine test.

There are multiple powder forms of chlorine ... all of which can lead to problems which is why we typically recommend liquid chlorine. Any idea what you are getting? Trichlor, Dichlor, Cal-hypo? Obviously you have to learn to deal with what you can get.

Have you discovered Pool School? These cover the basics which will help our discussion:
ABCs of Water Chemistry
Recommended Pool Chemicals
How to Chlorinate Your Pool

BTW, I think I am going to combine your posts into one thread to keep your story together. I am going to go look and see if that makes sense.
 
Thanks jblizzle! I posted a few places, hope I can find it. :)
I had a lot of help. I tell the guys what I want and how I think it could be done and they refine it using their skills.



Here's the build...



The round part that's out over the ocean. Some of the floor spans vacant space under.



Sho is waving. I put a truss over that round part to carry some of the form supports.

 
Re: Hi...

jblizzle said:
With much reading here, you will see that we do not trust test strips for much of anything. These are the Recommended Test Kits ... the key is the FAS-DPD chlorine test.

There are multiple powder forms of chlorine ... all of which can lead to problems which is why we typically recommend liquid chlorine. Any idea what you are getting? Trichlor, Dichlor, Cal-hypo? Obviously you have to learn to deal with what you can get.

Have you discovered Pool School? These cover the basics which will help our discussion:
ABCs of Water Chemistry
Recommended Pool Chemicals
How to Chlorinate Your Pool

BTW, I think I am going to combine your posts into one thread to keep your story together. I am going to go look and see if that makes sense.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Ya got me though, I thought I'd posted the above pics to the wrong thread. :d Felt embarrassed because I'm a mod somewhere else. :doh: Feel better now...
 

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smforte said:
This is just amazing!! Love those stairs and my gosh what a view!
Click to expand...

The stairs were something else. Each step contains a metal bar box beam. The spiral had to start at the bottom of the pool, turn to meet the lower bridge, then continue up to the 3rd floor to meet the upper level bridge. All this while the steps continue to turn around the post and raise higher each step. Nightmare. Not to mention the post had to be built b e f o r e the pool. I'd rather forget. ;)

Btw, I'm not rich, just cheap to do stuff here.

- - - Updated - - -

pooldv said:
That is a fantastic pool, view and location!
Click to expand...

Location is facing south to the Bohol Sea, love this place.

Where the 2 blue pipes come out is now the pump room. They are main drain pipes. Here the white pvc is blue, a little bit thinner, but the outside dimension is the same. Since I shipped my Hayward pump and filter from the US ("Give me the biggest filter that fits in this box.") I was glad to find pvc here, I didn't ship enough, not even close.

 
Yes jb, green stuff grows on walls. I find that with the powdered chlorine if I see a green spot developing I can pour chlorine on it or next to it. When we just drained the pool there was a considerable amount of algae and we cleaned it off with muriatic. The pool gets drained maybe every 3 months, and at certain seasons stays empty. So once dry for a while, abused with chlorine and muriatic, the algae doesn't want to come back, and I can understand that, I wouldn't either. With the calcium in the chlorine its a good idea to drain anyway.

One thing I haven't seen here is anything about using perlite instead of DE, or adding perlite to a sand filter. I saw this on youtube when I looked up perlite which I'm using as a refractory insulator. Lots of uses for the stuff. Bohol has a lot of limestone and it comes in with new water and was very hard to clean out until I found out about the perlite. The stuff I have comes out of a volcano on Luzon and is available here cheap. I've read that some folks with DE filters prefer it over DE> Great stuff.

here's a pic from a few Christmases ago. I'm posting this to mention the planned water slide. If you follow the stairs post up you'll see a landing to its left. This will be the launch point for the water slide. You can see what looks like 3 black pipes sticking out from the floor of the landing. This is flexible black pipe covering rust proofed metal bars that will be part of the floor of the slide. There is a pipe in the post and landing which runs up from the pump room, and 3 posts built into the pool, two of which have plants in them and one is burried in the floor of the pool. I intend to pour the slide, but know very little about the correct angle, out of pumice for the gravel and pumice dust for the sand, to keep it light weight, and portland cement. This project is years away.

Anyone know bthe minimum angle to the ground of a fairly sedate water slide?



The 2 plant pots are on posts but the really strong one (Deep with a large foundation) is in the floor (raised tile) next to where my adopting daughter is. That post will carry the weight of most of the slide and at that point the slide will turn to make a circle around the other two posts.

 
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