Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (from concept to cracks to water)

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Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

LOL about that board. Here is a tip for you if you ever have to experience a board and concrete (or gunite) again...
Spray the board with PAM cooking spray. It will come right outta there after the concrete is dried. Easy as pie.
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

NOW you tell her! LOL I am betting there will be NO next time!

Good work! I am glad you all were able to get it out. You and I both know you did a better job than anyone else would have.
Kim
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

Yup. That's right.

if you ever do any concrete molding work, or any concrete crafting, just spray the mold or the board or whatever with PAM. Concrete will not stick to it and the board will come right off and the surface of the concrete will be smooth.


Theothermelissa said:
Dave - really?! You're saying a can of pam would have saved us five hours?!!!! Wow. Next time. :brickwall:
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- - - Updated - - -

LOL...
well.. no one asked! and besides that, I was too consumed with her story to think about it! So it's all her fault for being such a good story teller!!! :) :)


kimkats said:
NOW you tell her! LOL I am betting there will be NO next time!

Good work! I am glad you all were able to get it out. You and I both know you did a better job than anyone else would have.
Kim
Click to expand...
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

Too funny about the Pam. We still have a bit of PTSD re: the darn 2x4. We were out of town for the weekend and as we returned and checked on the pool my husband said, "Is that board still out." LOL. Like it would have crawled back in out of spite.

Big week this week. We begin coping and tile! My tile arrived last week and by arrived I mean I drove to the store and picked it up -- hours after I had driven to a shipping warehouse to pick up the slate for our raised bond beam. All 588lbs of slate were hauled from Carson, CA to Pasadena in the back/middle seats of my husbands 4-runner. Not something I would do again, but we made it. And now we have slate and tile waiting for installation later this week! I tried to take a picture but the boxes are in the garage and the lighting is terrible. Pictures coming later this week. Only sad thing is I'm back at work and so I can't be here all day to watch the progress. We choose a plaster company that will do the tile and coping work as well and I'm VERY comfortable with them (knock on wood) my husband will be home mid-day and FF will be over as well to keep an eye on the work. So I'm sure it will be fine but I'm a little sad that I won't be able to be here letting my control freak flag fly...
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

LOL that poor 4-runner! Good thing you did not get stopped by the DOT for overweight!

Tell your hubby to take LOTS of pics to share with you and us!

Kim
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

Anyone know what this is and why it might be dripping/ leaking?


I noticed wet dirt around it this am. Thought it might be leaking at the bottom but then noticed a small drip coming from under the green cap. I have an e-mail into the plumber but thought I'd see if any of the experts here know what it is and how big of a problem the drip is…
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

That picture is a Pressure Vacuum Breaker valve. Some people call them backflow preventers, but that actually is incorrect to call them that. (backflow preventers are designed completely different, but ultimately serve the same purpose).. Anyways.. they are required by code if you have plumbing connected somehow into the city water supply.

At a residence, PVB's are most comnonly used on irrigation systems.
The reason for them, is in case there is a main water line break, the break will cause a vacuum to all of the waterlines to all of the homes connected to the broken Main pipe. That vacuum can suck all of the water out of the homes pipes. Irrigation sytems pipes can possibly have contaminants in them from leakage of the sprinkler heads that allow fertilizer, weed killer and what have you to get into the water in the sprinkler pipes. THe PVB valve prevents this contaminated water from being sucked into the city drinking water supply, should there be a vacuum caused by a broken Main, or from whatever else might cause a vacuum on a Main Water Line.



On a pool, I suspect its there because perhaps the plumber connected an autofil to either your sprinkler system, or to the water supply of your home.

The PVB's have O rings in them and one is either gone sour, or pinched and thats most likely why its dripping water. This is very common and should be a very easy fix. It possible though that the valve mechanism is bad and the valve need replaced. There are rebuild kits for them so still, should be an easy fix.
 

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Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

We had good news and bad news today. Good progress and bad progress.

But let's start with the good. Work was done today! Our water feature was set in the raised bond beam. Going off the inspiration photo we had five scuppers/ channel spouts custom made. The plumber was essential in the process as he knew what company made them. Originally he thought 1x3" rectangular scuppers were our only option. But I wasn't in love with that. I wanted something that was more of a statement. Ideally 3x3 squares. So he called back to check if they had 3x3 squares. They didn't, but they could make them for me. It was not cheap but it was worth it to me. So here they are set in the wall:



View from behind/above. The vertical pipes were set when the plumbers did their initial work. They will come back out next week to connect the water features to the stubs.



Tile guys also had to float/level and smooth the edge of the bond beam where the cover rail is going to be installed.



Maggie standing over the newly finished edge:


And now for the bad news...

While the tile guys were working they found cracks in the shell. :shaking: They are very thin but they are very long. One goes most of the way across the deep end with a few branches outward. And one goes perpendicular from the shallow end down toward the deep end. I'm still super upset about these cracks. The shotcrete guy is coming out in the morning to look at them and see what we need to do about them. I have scoured the fourm and the web for info on cracks. Some of the stuff I read is downright terrifying (one pool that had to be completely demolished and redone because of cracks! to be fair those cracks looked way worse then ours and developed after the pool was filled but it was still enough to make me question everything). Other stuff I read said there are such things as shrinkage cracks that can be easily repaired. I'm not sure what kind of cracks ours are. If they are bad or BAD. But honestly no matter what kind of cracks they are I'm not happy. We watered the shell as instructed and then some (we were told by our shotcrete guy to water 3 times a day for 10 days. We watered at least 4 or 5 times a day. Really well each time, especially on the hottest days). But the 10 days passed so I had stopped watering and stop studying the shell. And sometime between now and when I stopped watering these cracks appeared.



This is the crack that goes across the deep end. It's the most noticeable.



I adjusted the clarity and color in this photo so you can better see the crack:


This is the one that starts in the shallow end and heads down the middle of the pool.


Sigh...

If anyone has any experience with cracks please chime in. How were your cracks repaired? If you have repaired cracks did they eventually surface in the plaster?

I'll let you know what the shotcrete guy says tomorrow. But for tonight this adventure is not all it's cracked up to be. Ugh... even the pun is painful.
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

I'm sorry that I cannot help you with the cracks. Someone should be along sometime today to help you determine if this is a pressing issue or not.
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

I love that they were able and willing to make the 3x3 scuppers. Those are going to look neat when running!

Cracks-no idea but I do have to ask..........this is not the final finish is it? Will they be putting something over it?

HUGS! It will all get better when you have water in the pool and a drink in your hand!

Kim
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

kimkats said:
I love that they were able and willing to make the 3x3 scuppers. Those are going to look neat when running!

Cracks-no idea but I do have to ask..........this is not the final finish is it? Will they be putting something over it?

HUGS! It will all get better when you have water in the pool and a drink in your hand!

Kim
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Kim - they will be putting plaster over the shotcrete. So this is far from the final finish. But if we don't do something about these cracks now odds are they will spread into the plaster...

Still waiting on the shotcrete guy. Was supposed to be here between 7-8am. At 7:50 his office called and said he'll be here at 9:30. Hopefully that happens. Thankfully I have the day off (Good Friday) so I am here all day and can be here while he looks at the cracks.

There is other work happening today. Cover rail is being installed as I type. The rail guy took a look at the cracks and said he'd seem cracks like them before but added, "Those are pretty bad. I'd definitely want them to fix them if it were my pool." Not that I was ever considering not fixing them, but hearing someone say they were pretty bad confirmed some of my fears... ugh. ugh. and ugh.
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (aka Our Great "Adventure")

Fine cracks in shotcrete are completely normal/expected, and don't usually mean anything. As long as they remain very fine and less than 1/2" deep there shouldn't be any transfer to the plaster.
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (update: we have cracks :-(

post to edit title. As much as I'd like to pretend we don't have a crack problem we do. Last night when I was losing sleep over this I searched the fourms more and found a bunch people with cracks that looked like ours that posted pictures but never posted the resolution/ fix. I adjusted the title so my thread will show up for people like me looking for crack information. And whether this turns out good, bad or ugly (or all of the above) I promise to update to the end so at the very least people can learn from our experience.
 
Re: Pasadena Pool Build by Owner (update: we have cracks :-(

Our gunite was shot in july in texas. It was good-n-hot, we watered a lot and we had plenty of little hairline cracks like that. My BP said don't worry about it. Three years later no issues.
 

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