New Build - North Texas; Wise County

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slpybeartx

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Mar 7, 2017
43
North Texas
Here we go, here is my contribution to the forum; our new build in North Texas, Wise County

We spent the last several years getting quotes and bids from several PBs. We came close to pulling the trigger several times, but our oldest daughter is graduating this year and heading for college in the fall. So, we decided to wait until all of her details were lined out before proceeding.

Design

We looked at several free form styles over the past three years. We knew we wanted a few things and did not want some others. (Salt Water? YES! Built in SPA? No. Etc...) Quotes came from three different PBs, pricing was the same, but the designs were almost all identical.

This fall we had another PB recommended to us. Long story short, he wasn't who we wanted, but he had several designs and one of them caught my wife's eye. She works in the custom home business, managing the office for a builder here in town. She took one of the designs we liked, worked with her boss, and came up with a new design from it. She came up with the design that we eventually went with. I would say it is a geometric/roman/not-free-form design?



We had this design quoted from the final two choices of PBs, got final quotes and made our selection.

Specs

The pool will be an in-ground gunite pool. Approximately 16,000 gallons. Generally using Hayward Equipment and NPT finishes.

Hayward Pumps, Cartridge Filter, SWG, LED Light, Light Controller.
Jandy Valves
Waterline Tile - NPT Blue Seas - Rustic Blue Tile - 6" Porcelain Tile
Spotter Tile - NPT Jules - Rustic Blue Blend - 1" Glass tile for double row of spotters
Plaster - NPT Quartzscapes Reflections Series Plaster - Aruba Sky with three bags of Abalone shells
Coping - NPT Travertine stone, Torreon
Back Wall or Beam - Stepped 6", 12", 18" with three sheer descents, covered in split-face, dry-stack travertine Torreon and Noche mix, topped with Coping travertine
Tanning ledge - built into right side of pool, 12" deep with two bubblers and umbrella socket
Resting bench in deep end
Depth of 4' - 5.5' - 6.5'
Decking - Concrete with Rock Salt Finish, plenty of umbrella sockets, deck drain separating it from existing sidewalk
Two Skimmers, north and south end of pool
Auto-fill system; Overflow drain in back of skimmer

Waterline Tile



Plaster



Spotter Tile

 
Excavation

We signed our contract and had an excavation date less than a week later. Excavation started on 2/17/17 and finished the next day. Two days instead of the normal one because we knew we were going to have issues with Sandstone a few feet under the surface. We were hoping to avoid using the jack-hammer on the excavator because of the high fees it would add to the build.

Calm before the storm...

IMG_8269

IMG_8271

Hitting Stone

As we knew we would, we hit the sandstone anywhere from two to three feet beneath the soil. The crew was able to dig through a large portion of it with the bucket of the excavator. Then they would use a ripper in place of the bucket to break up more rock, then switch the bucket out to scoop it out.

IMG_8275

Here you can see them marking the perimeter again to remove more sandstone.

IMG_8281

Here it is all dug and ready for steel.

IMG_8294

Here is a panorama of the soil profile.

IMG_8290
 
Welcome to TFP. Love the design, especially those curved corners. Your design is similar to mine, the shape and even the colors. I look forward to watching your build. Good luck. My first advice is that you can't read enough on TFP. Tons of knowledge shared on here on every aspect of pool ownership, design, construction, maintenance, you name it.
 
Cool design, this will be interesting to watch. The waterline tiles you picked were our second choice, and your plaster color looks very similar to ours, so I'll definitely be interested to see how it looks all finished (to see if the wife...errr...we made a mistake..LOL!!) I wish you a very fun, very smooth build. It is very comforting to be able to lean on the TFP forum during the build, as someone has almost always been there if you have a question. And most importantly, post a lot of pictures during the construction..:)
 
Steel, Plumbing, and Electrical

We moved quickly on these. The steel is 1/2" rebar on 10" centers, with the bottom overlapped. Combining that with our "in-rock" hole for the pool, we think it should be very stable.

Steel

Our dig made its "own" gravel for the bottom. :) Very solid.



Plumbing and Electrical

Plumbing and electrical came on the same day. That went quick. We double checked the steel and the plumbing against the plans. Everything was where it was supposed to be.



 
Gunite

We set Feb 27th as the day for Gunite. I took off work to watch the gunite crew work. I was very excited as I had never seen this before. The crew arrived promptly and started work early. Visiting with the crew chief I learned that they would be working on two pools that day, Mine was first.



That guy on the hose did almost the whole job. He was very stout; I wouldn't want to get into a fist-fight with him!



The crew took care to keep the house clean and were finished after the gunite gun had been running for three hours.



Here are some pictures of the finished product...



 
Coping and Back Wall

We were ready to finish up some other things at this time... The Equipment pad was assembled, setup, and connections were finished up. Electrical was run to my shop, (the small building you see in the pictures), where I had a 50A breaker added to my box to power the pool pad. Pics to come on all of that.

Coping

The Travertine install went great. We did the coping first and then came back to the wall later. The 12" sheer descents in the curves were custom made to fit the radii so we had to wait a couple of more days for them to come in.

Our stone crew did a really good job. Very pleased with how they fit everything together. I was happy with how the curves turned out. Sorry I didn't take a lot of closeups at this stage. I will get some of those up at the end.





Back Wall

The sheer descents came in and were able to get the wall started. Here are a couple of pics that show it. We are very happy with this design element as well.



In the last picture you can also see the waterline tile that the stone crew also installed.

 

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Decking

We poured our decks on March 14th. Our contract included 400 sq ft, we planned on adding more once we had everything laid out. Our final plan included 552 sq ft and gives us a very large entertaining area. We went with a Rock Salt finish and used about 42' of tan deck drain to separate the existing sidewalk from the new deck.

Here are the forms set after inspection and ready to pour.



In this one you can see where they have left the rebar flat on the ground with a board along the way and a section of the forms out. This is to bring the wheel barrows of concrete into the pour-site.



Here is the pour and initial spread with the screed...



Here they are with the finish out and adding in the control lines (joints).

33118545490_df58833344_c.jpg


Here is the finished product after the rock salt has been spread on top and "patted" into the concrete. It's the last step and the salt will dissolve after watering.



Another view of the finished decking...



...and a closeup showing the finish and a tiny bit of the deck drain and sidewalk.



I will get a few more closeups of the Rock salt finish and post them later. We are not staining or coloring the concrete, but instead want the natural whitish grey to go with our stone choices.
 
TexasDeano said:
Welcome to TFP. Love the design, especially those curved corners. Your design is similar to mine, the shape and even the colors. I look forward to watching your build. Good luck. My first advice is that you can't read enough on TFP. Tons of knowledge shared on here on every aspect of pool ownership, design, construction, maintenance, you name it.
Click to expand...

Thanks Deano, I enjoyed your build thread, especially all the dog stories. Sounds like you have lots of "help" there! Beautiful pool and I see we share a lot of design elements. Please let me know how it goes this summer.

BeachHead said:
Cool design, this will be interesting to watch. The waterline tiles you picked were our second choice, and your plaster color looks very similar to ours, so I'll definitely be interested to see how it looks all finished (to see if the wife...errr...we made a mistake..LOL!!) I wish you a very fun, very smooth build. It is very comforting to be able to lean on the TFP forum during the build, as someone has almost always been there if you have a question. And most importantly, post a lot of pictures during the construction..:)
Click to expand...

Thanks BeachHead! I have been following your build thread for weeks now. I think your design that wraps around your house is one of the "coolest" I have seen. And you have one of the sharpest looking pool decks and color scheme around. Great job!
 
So, that catches us up to this weekend. Tomorrow we should be seeing the stone crew again. We have some extra work we decided on for them. We are adding a step to each side of the pool that is the same level of the lowest level of the back wall... think that back wall being extended four feet on each side to cover the end of the decking. This step will use the same travertine that caps the wall and coping, we have some travertine tile that will face the step. We will then extend that down the right side of the decking for about 16', forming a retaining wall to help with the drainage and dress things up. The wall will be covered with the travertine tile.

Future plans for the steps are sidewalks out to loop around the back of the pool and to our outdoor kitchen planned for phase 2.

And then the big day... Monday the 20th they will be plastering. We are very excited for that! More pics to come...
 
I am in love! That is an awesome pool design! I love all of your picks as well!

I can tell you have been reading with all of those pictures! THANKS!

Whoever did the coping-WOW! They are truly artists! They did a awesome job with those curves!

Thanks for letting us come along for the ride!

Kim:kim:
 
Well, our plaster crew was delayed by one day, so clean out of the pool/prep for plaster has started this morning instead of Monday. That should mean plaster tomorrow AM and acid wash and fill on Thursday. Looking forward to seeing the blue on the pool!
 

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