New Pool Build - Nashville suburbs

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This week has been CRAZY! Had a full crew at the house Tuesday (PB, concrete guys, electricians). A lot of progress was made:

- staked out the forms that define the concrete patio boundaries

- poured and tamped 1/4" gravel

- selected plumbing contractor to install natural gas line - ~ $1K

- installed 4" pvc storm-pipe under planned sidewalk to provide future utilities access to house w/o digging. (cable, fiber, phone, low voltage lights)

- concrete guys cut phone line by accident. We became a strict cellphone family 2yrs ago. Not sure I'll bother fixing it. I currently have Comcast but if I ever switch to U-Verse I'm pretty sure they'll run me a new line from the street for free. I might try to splice the lines myself but they look to be 22g or smaller. It'll be a PITA.

- Pavilion contractor is supposed to start work Saturday morning if he's able to finish up his Friday job on-time.

- Electrician will come by Saturday to start running conduit to pavilion posts.

- PB provided an integral color concrete color palette. My wife picked that up along with a 2ft sample of our liner pattern. Scared the heck out of our PB b/c she mumbled something like, "I'm not sure that color goes with our liner." Gave the impression that she wanted to change liner patterns. She didn't but the PB mistakenly interpreted her comment that way. The liner had already been ordered. Cost for the integral color varies with the vibrancy of the color chosen. We didn't want anything too bold so the mixes we've been looking at are in the beige/tan/sand family from Schofield. We've got a color in mind but the color wheel we were given doesn't come close to matching the colors presented on the website. And my monitor is calibrated. :? Upgrade cost of $200 will cover the entire project. This is hands down the most economic way to upgrade ordinary white/gray brushed concrete. 1 bag of pigment per 4yds of concrete. Very affordable!!! :whoot:

- Great weather forcast for the next 5 days.

With a bit of luck, the deck and pavilion will be done next week. :party:

I'll post pictures this evening.
 
Pictures of the progress:

Pavilion pad framing
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Backdoor steps framed, liner track installed,
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Concrete framing on backside of pool. We need to widen the walkway near the ladder (upper rhs on this pic). They kept the 4' spacing constant even though the ladder supports consume part of the walkway.
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Got home from work today and found a trailer full of lumber. Looks like we're on for tomorrow!
 
We made a ton of progress Saturday!

Our pavilion builder might be the best contractor I've ever worked with. If he says he'll do something, he does it promptly and with a level of quality that is almost beyond expectation. He showed up Saturday morning at 730 with 2 assistants. They worked like gangbusters until 1100 when they broke for lunch.

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The crew returned at noon and worked non-stop until 5pm! :shock:
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It doesn't really show in the pictures but the quality of the work is pretty high. All cuts were mitered to within a degree or two of perfect. There's no gaps between rafters and lintels. Posts were precision cut and positioned. Nothing was done by eyeball.
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The detail under the roof added by the T1-11 was a nice touch. Props to my roofer for that suggestion.
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The shingles on our house were discontinued so the roofer wanted to consult with us before he purchased the shingles he felt were the best match. They'll come back out this week to shingle and finish the trim. We're pleased with the progress. It should be a nice refuge from the mid-summer TN sun. In our excitement we hit Lowe's last night and picked up a new indoor/outdoor ceiling fan.

I just got done talking to the electrician. The plan Monday is to hang the fan and wire for a single on/off switch, wire for tv in one of the upper corners facing the house, 3 outlets on the backside of the rear posts, and a 300w transformer for the landscape lights on the far corner-post. I'll do the wiring for the landscape lights once the final grade is done. I'll also wire for sound. I've got my eye on some Polk Atrium 5's and I've been on the lookout for a used/cheap receiver on Ebay. I'm probably gonna need a small lockable cabinet to place it in to protect it from the elements and from mischief minded neighborhood teens.

We also finalized the concrete color with our PB. Solomon_Color(Desert Tan)

There's still quite a bit of work to be done but we're finally getting a feel for what the finished product might look like. :party:
 
Thanks for the compliment. There will be a 6' vinyl privacy fence 10' behind the pavilion. The house you see in the photos is probably 20-25' feet away. Our pavilion and their spa/pergola are each 10-12' from the property line per code. Fortunately none of our other neighbors are that close. We strategically placed our pool, pavilion, and tanning areas such that once the fence is installed we should have complete privacy.
 
It's looking great, aeromorris05! I see that you're in Murfreesboro; we lived in Nashville for many years, and in fact I was there last week on business. Beautiful day on Monday, so-so on Tuesday and pretty wet on Wednesday!

Are you having Ethernet cable run(s) from the main house to the pavilion? When we moved a couple of years ago, I had Cat6 cable installed from the basement to practically every room of our house, and I'm glad because shortly after that it became obvious that we'll be receiving most programming via IP. Wireless can work, but I'd rather not depend on it if I can help it.
 
edcard said:
Are you having Ethernet cable run(s) from the main house to the pavilion? When we moved a couple of years ago, I had Cat6 cable installed from the basement to practically every room of our house, and I'm glad because shortly after that it became obvious that we'll be receiving most programming via IP. Wireless can work, but I'd rather not depend on it if I can help it.
Click to expand...
We've got a wireless router. I've never tried it this far from the house but judging by the signal strength that I detect my neighbors wi-fi, I don't anticipate any problems with reception. I was actually thinking of going strictly OTA HD from Nashville. Last year we wanted HD in the master bedroom but we felt Comcast's costs were a bit rediculous so I purchased a small but extremely effective antenna from Amazon and placed it in the attic. We get ABC, CBS, NBC, CW, Fox, PBS, and a few other channels that I've since deleted, crystal clear and in HD. The picture in our bedroom is better than Comcast's because it's uncompressed. I'll probably run a splitter w/signal amplifier from the current antenna out from the attic, down a wall, and out to the pavilion. I can hide a single coax cable better than I could hide an antenna on the pavilion.

If anyone reading this would like to know if this setup would work for them here's a site that will tell you the stations within your viewing radius.
TVFool

And this link allows you to view individual tv station signal strengh on a topographical map.
TVFoolmap

As for antenna recommendations I've got info on those too and they're much smaller than the large directional rooftop units that graced our grandparents rooftops. Hint stay away from the set-top units sold at bigbox stores. If you're w/in 50mi of a major metropolitan area such as Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, etc, going this route is almost a no brainer. If only ESPN was OTA it would be perfect. :goodjob:
 
It's been a busy week. Tuesday our PB came out and installed the deck drains. On Wednesday they poured the deck. I've attached a few pix below with comments that detail the process:

The equipment pad and pavilion electrical conduit before and after
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Ceiling fan controls & utility outlets.
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Pouring the concrete
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In this photo you can see the styrofoam coping mold.
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View from rear of pavilion. The diagonal brace in the upper right of the photo will be home to a small LED TV.
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We asked our PB to have the deck contour follow the shape of the pool. I think they did a pretty good job.
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Tanning area kick-out. We widened this to 10ft. Should be plenty of room to walk around lounge chairs.
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Sorry if this post was too photo heavy. I always get a kick out of seeing other people's projects. It's kinda neat to see how folks customize their glorified hole in the ground. I owe everyone here at TFP a ton. Just thought I'd do my part to give back.

Additional work performed:
All the downspouts were tied into a 4" drain line buried in the gravel beneath the concrete. In addition there are two ~14' rectangular deck drains up against the house that are also tied into the same drainage system. Had our first torrential downpour today. No standing water in the muddy pool bottom! Plumbers also installed new 1.5" natural gas line. They'll coordinate with our utility to have a larger gas meter installed and will return once the PB installs the heater on the pad.

Up next, pool floor, equipment pad, electrical hook-up, liner, etc. We can finally see the finish line. Our kid's spring break starts Monday. Fingers crossed...
 
In that last photo you might've noticed the precarious nature of my crawlspace access door panel. The plumber was able to get in there this afternoon without too much hassle. Before the deck it was a manageable crawl but now you pretty much have to slither inside. There's a small pit in front of it but it's a tight squeeze. If I had it all to do over I would've chopped the deck off to the right of door. Continuing to the edge of the house serves no real purpose. :hammer:
 

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Who knew Rutherford County would be so well represented? Small world! :)

Fishunt - I really like the shape of your pool. Is it symmetric along the centerline? It looks huge!

Karen - Have you opened your pool yet? What's your normal pool season? May 1st to Labor Day? Any guidance you can give would be greatly appreciated.
 
fishunt said:
AERO, I am thinking a lot should be done on our pools this week. Pool Guy told me he should be done this week :party: I hope every thing is going well over your way.
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Our yard was graded on Monday. The pumps, filter, swcg, and liner were installed this afternoon! Two hoses are filling the pool as I type this! :party:

Pix tomorrow evening!

Fishunt - I hope you've made progress on your build. The weather this week has been perfect.
 
My apologies for the slow response. I'll try to get to the pictures this evening. Things have been a bit hectic. Our current status is as follows:

-Pool was completely filled Saturday morning. It took approximately 28hrs!

-We're very happy with our choice of liner. I wouldn't say we were worried that we wouldn't but it's a semi-permanent decision. At least for 7-10yrs. The water is the perfect deep blue. Not too dark yet nowhere close to turquoise.

-95% of the wrinkles have been resolved. There remains some "slack" in the vinyl on the stairs. PB was upset that his guys didn't resolve it before the pool was filled to the max. Still fixable just more difficult. The liner also needs to be better secured in the track above the steps. All of this should be resolved by this afternoon.

-Electrician and PB got the pumps (main & booster) and heater working Friday. Main filtration pump is very quiet in high-mode and pretty close to silent in low.

-Polaris 280 pressure side cleaner works like a charm. Our family has nicknamed it Willy for it's propensity to squirt water from it's tail at unsuspecting people. The sound it makes when it breaches is kinda similar to a whale's blowhole.

-Deck jets are functioning well. Thus far I'd say they were worth it. The added sound of the 3 jets hitting the water blocks all neighborhood background noise. It's VERY relaxing. PB is going to reduce the nozzle area on the jets to get us a bit more height and projection.

-Electrician forgot to connect the pool light so unfortunately we didn't get to see that over the weekend. It should be resolved later today. Electrician also needs to start/complete work on the pavilion.

-First grade of the yard was completed Wed or Thursday. I met with the guy that drives the Bobcat Friday morning and requested that they add more dirt on the sides of the pool so the descent from the pool deck into the yard is less steep. It should have the desired effect of raising the ground where we will place our fence. What's the use in having a privacy fence if the pool deck is substantially higher than the fence? They were very understanding. My wife just confirmed that they are on site as I type this.

-I received my blue, 12mil solar cover in the mail on Friday. I opted for the 20x40 rectangle. Saturday morning the wife and I spread it over the pool and performed a rough cut. We'll do the final cut after it's had some sun so that some of the wrinkles due to packaging have time to relax.

-The 400Btu Hayward heater sounds like a jet engine going into afterburner! The low rumble of the blowers would impress even Tim "The Toolman" Taylor. There's no shortage of power there. Woke up this morning to find the water temp at 65°. Turned the heat on at 7am and set it to 79°. I'm hoping for 2°/hr. My wife will check it @ ~230p and at that point we might bump it up to 82°ish.

-Absolutely love the Aqualogic automation. Wow. It's like setting a programmable house thermostat. There's a learning curve but it's very intuitive.

Tonight we swim!
 

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