Can you tell me if I have an issue with pebble sheen install?

[Ezun]

Hoping you all can help out. The white spots and rust stains on the bottom of my pool have slowly gotten worse over the last 5 seasons (pool built in 2018). At first I thought they were just calcium deposits but then I dove down and noticed these areas feel very rough and pitted.

So I took some up close videos (attached) and would love your review and thoughts. Is this normal after just a few years?

I’ve been keeping my water chem testing in pool math and have been extremely diligent in maintaining the right chemistry for years.

Thoughts? Help!?

 

[Ezun]

Requesting the insights of @MAPR-Austin and @JoyfulNoise

 

[JJ_Tex]

If you look closely at anyone's pebble, you will find imperfections. With that said, here are a few things I noticed:

- Rust - Do you know what this is coming from? If it is just something that fell in the pool, you can lift the stains using a sock full of crushed up vitamin C pills. Place the sock on the stain for a few minutes and the acid will lift the stain away.
- Your pool math logs show some very aggressive water at times (-1.07 in May, -0.83 in October, -0.75 2 years ago, etc.). That aggressive water will leach calcium from your plaster and erode it. Keep your CSI closer to zero to avoid further erosion.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Looks like inconsistent acid etch of the plaster after it was applies. Typical around drain areas because that is where the acid will pool when then are acid etching and if they don’t neutralize with lots of soda ash, then plaster will etch.

Also that rust stain looks like a piece of rebar tie. Perhaps when they were applying the plaster they picked up junk from the construction site. It happens which is why it is vitally important to maintain a clean work site.

There’s nothing you can do at this point but continue to maintain good water chemistry and then replaster the pool in the future at some point. You got a substandard plaster job probably from either an inexperienced crew or a lousy subcontractor. Happens more often than you think. At 5 years out you don’t have much recourse and anything the PB would suggest will just make the situation worse, not better.

See if you can remove that rebar tie. It looks like it’s embedded in the surface. You can spot clean the rust stain with a sock filled with crushed up vitamin C tablets.

 

[Ezun]

Thanks @JJ_Tex
Those aggressive numbers are usually at pool opening and pool closing. as soon as I open the pool I do my best to get it in line.
I'll go back to my logs and see how long it sat at those numbers. Hopefully you can see that I'm keeping as close to zero (generally .0x) as I can.

 

[Ezun]

Looks like inconsistent acid etch of the plaster after it was applies. Typical around drain areas because that is where the acid will pool when then are acid etching and if they don’t neutralize with lots of soda ash, then plaster will etch.

Also that rust stain looks like a piece of rebar tie. Perhaps when they were applying the plaster they picked up junk from the construction site. It happens which is why it is vitally important to maintain a clean work site.

There’s nothing you can do at this point but continue to maintain good water chemistry and then replanted the pool in the future at some point. You got a substandard plaster job probably from either an inexperienced crew or a lousy subcontractor. Happens more often than you think. At 5 years out you don’t have much recourse and anything the PB would suggest will just make the situation worse, not better.

See if you can remove that rebar tie. It looks like it’s embedded in the surface. You can spot clean the rust stain with a sock filled with crushed up vitamin C tablets.

Got it, thank you for your response, @JoyfulNoise
How do I "See if you can remove that rebar tie?" I don't see anything that I can grab onto and I'm concerned I'll pull up plaster with it.

 

[JJ_Tex]

Thanks @JJ_Tex
Those aggressive numbers are usually at pool opening and pool closing. as soon as I open the pool I do my best to get it in line.
I'll go back to my logs and see how long it sat at those numbers. Hopefully you can see that I'm keeping as close to zero (generally .0x) as I can.

Ok. May and October seem to be your worst months for aggressive water, seemingly correlating to low water temps and lowering the pH to the low 7's. Try staying 7.5-8.0 when the water is colder to keep it from being so aggressive.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Got it, thank you for your response, @JoyfulNoise
How do I "See if you can remove that rebar tie?" I don't see anything that I can grab onto and I'm concerned I'll pull up plaster with it.

I was looking at this -



Use Vitamin C to lighten that up and see if there is anything there. If the same spot keeps coming back then there’s something embedded in the plaster that is causing that stain. The only fix is to chip that area out, remove the debris and then patch it. The patch will not match the rest of the plaster so whatever you do, it will look worse, not better.

 

[MAPR-Austin]

Looks like a 5 year old surface that was exposed a bit too heavily from the beginning. The whitish areas are where the top layer of pebble has shed and you are seeing more of the cement paste.

@JoyfulNoise is on the right track with the rust