Please review my build before I sign

[Jimrahbe]

All good points. I'll discuss it with my PB and make a decision but I think I'll just go with the IC40. Worst case, I can just buy the IC60 if/when it's replacement time?

Mike,

I think that is a good plan...

If you were buying this, then going with the IC60 would make some sense.. but since you are having it installed by a pool builder, then the more it costs the more the pool builder will mark it up and you end up with zero savings...

When it comes time to replace the cell, which should be about five years and maybe as long as 8 years, you can then decide what size makes the most sense..

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[Brentr]

All good points. I'll discuss it with my PB and make a decision but I think I'll just go with the IC40. Worst case, I can just buy the IC60 if/when it's replacement time?

Or you can do the opposite..... I have a 6,000 gal pool and a T-15 cell which is rated for 40,000 gal pool. Can I go with a smaller one? Yes I can but I got 7 years from my SWG so I purchased another T-15. Like I said you will not regret going with SWG period. Congrats on going that route. I can just think of all the trips I would have spent lugging 5gal jugs of chlorine and the time. Ask youself this question.. What is your time worth I rather spend my time floating in my pool with a cold one

 

[mikew2069]

Mike,

I think that is a good plan...

If you were buying this, then going with the IC60 would make some sense.. but since you are having it installed by a pool builder, then the more it costs the more the pool builder will mark it up and you end up with zero savings...

When it comes time to replace the cell, which should be about five years and maybe as long as 8 years, you can then decide what size makes the most sense..

Thanks,

Jim R.

And just to confirm, the IC60 can easily be swapped in place for the IC40 down the road? It's a simple plug and play?

Or you can do the opposite..... I have a 6,000 gal pool and a T-15 cell which is rated for 40,000 gal pool. Can I go with a smaller one? Yes I can but I got 7 years from my SWG so I purchased another T-15. Like I said you will not regret going with SWG period. Congrats on going that route. I can just think of all the trips I would have spent lugging 5gal jugs of chlorine and the time. Ask youself this question.. What is your time worth I rather spend my time floating in my pool with a cold one

Exactly. Glad I found this site. Definitely helps to be informed while making these decisions!

 

[Jimrahbe]

And just to confirm, the IC60 can easily be swapped in place for the IC40 down the road? It's a simple plug and play?

Yep!!! The power supply inside the EasyTouch supports the IC20, IC40 or IC40.. The cell just plugs into the bottom of the EasyTouch, so it is literally "Plug and Play"

Jim R.

 

[mikew2069]

Questions about my 2D design.

Is there enough decking on the left for sun bathing? Do you think there's enough decking around the fire pit?

Is 7' for the tanning ledge pretty big? I'm thinking about dialing it back to 6'.

The swim space here is really only 29'. Is that long enough to swim laps?

How many adults do you think can sit in this spa comfortably?

 

[OrangeAndBlue]

I think you should consider extending the deck on the left and make it a little wider. Consider a typical outdoor chaise lounge is about 6-1/2' long and you will probably want to put those over there facing the pool / spa. Just leaving one foot of space to walk between a chaise and the spa is too cramped in my opinion.

 

[sehrmude]

I agree with Orange and Blue on the deck space on the left - we have an area that is 14' x 18' and this fits three or four lounge chairs with small stands between comfortably. I could fit 6 loungers, but there would be little space between them - not enough for side stands/drink tables.

If you intend to use lounge chairs on the tanning ledge, IMHO you really need 7'. Lounge chairs are 6 - 6.5' long. At 6', with a 6' lounge chair, you would have no room to walk around the chairs. Our shelf is 9' x 12' and two lounge chairs fit well - three if we remove the umbrella. I just took a second look at your design and realized that the 7' is directly in the middle of the shelf and the curves will likely mean that you only have 6' where the chairs are shown in the plan. If you shorten the shelf to 6' in the middle, you (most likely) would not be able to put standard lounge chairs on the shelf.

I like the firepit design and would be happy with that amount of space. I would probably have a portable propane heater to supplement if you have more people that seats around the pit on a cool night.

I don't have a spa, but my first instinct was to say 5 comfortably - I like my personal space. If you have people who are comfortable sitting close to one another you could probably seat 8 without it getting weird.

 

[mikew2069]

I think you should consider extending the deck on the left and make it a little wider. Consider a typical outdoor chaise lounge is about 6-1/2' long and you will probably want to put those over there facing the pool / spa. Just leaving one foot of space to walk between a chaise and the spa is too cramped in my opinion.

I agree with Orange and Blue on the deck space on the left - we have an area that is 14' x 18' and this fits three or four lounge chairs with small stands between comfortably. I could fit 6 loungers, but there would be little space between them - not enough for side stands/drink tables.

If you intend to use lounge chairs on the tanning ledge, IMHO you really need 7'. Lounge chairs are 6 - 6.5' long. At 6', with a 6' lounge chair, you would have no room to walk around the chairs. Our shelf is 9' x 12' and two lounge chairs fit well - three if we remove the umbrella. I just took a second look at your design and realized that the 7' is directly in the middle of the shelf and the curves will likely mean that you only have 6' where the chairs are shown in the plan. If you shorten the shelf to 6' in the middle, you (most likely) would not be able to put standard lounge chairs on the shelf.

I like the firepit design and would be happy with that amount of space. I would probably have a portable propane heater to supplement if you have more people that seats around the pit on a cool night.

I don't have a spa, but my first instinct was to say 5 comfortably - I like my personal space. If you have people who are comfortable sitting close to one another you could probably seat 8 without it getting weird.

Thank you thank you for the input. The travertine decking just adds so much to the cost. I'll see about getting another foot or so on the rounded part.

Any insight on swimming laps in this thing?

 

[rhawke]

Any insight on swimming laps in this thing?

If you want to swim laps then you should maximize your length. My parents in law have a 30 ft pool and I would say that is the absolute minimum. (If you google this forum you will find answers that people think 45ft or even 50ft is the absolute minimum for them). On a 30 ft pool, I can get about 7 strokes for one length and I'm not trying to go hard or fast, just swimming free style. I also don't push off the wall, if I were to push off hard I would already be in the middle of the pool when making the first stroke. So 30 ft works if you want to do a few leisurely laps. My wife used to swim a full mile in that pool every day (yes that's 80 laps), but for our own pool we decided we wanted it longer. We hoped to do 40 ft but with the layout of the backyard and everything it came out to 37ft.

Therefore, I think you will have to decide between the balanced look you have right now and a long swim lane. If lap swimming is important to you then redesign the pool so that you can swim the full length. Your pool is already big so it would not cost you anything extra to incorporate a 40 ft lap distance with some redesign. It just probably won't be as symmetrical as it is right now. You can take a look at our pool build thread to see how we positioned the shallow areas and spa to ensure we would still be able to swim the full 37 ft of our pool (would have liked 40 but this was the max space we had). It makes for a bit of a skinny layout but we focused on lap swimming.

One additional thing to consider: if you plan on swimming laps you might want to heat the pool in the winter. In this case less gallons is better because it will cost you much less to heat.

 

[rhawke]

One more thought on the spa in case you stick with the current layout:
I agree with 5 people fitting comfortably, one on each short side and 3 in the center. If you add another 1.5-2 ft to the current 5.5 ft you could add a bench on the straight pool side as well which will get you an 3 extra people. But that of course either shrinks your deck or your pool area.

 

[Green Goblin]

On lap swimming, as I mentioned earlier, I previously had a 28 foot pool. I thought this was a very nice size for general pool playing, big enough that it never seemed crowded, yet small enough that it was easy to take care of and heat. My opinion on lap swimming, you could swim a few laps, sure, but I wouldn't really think that swimming a regular workout in there would be a ton of fun, so much turning around. A mile in a 29 foot pool would be about 180 lengths, or if you count a "lap" as to the other end and back again, then about 90 laps.

You could of course swim from corner to corner in the pool rather than end to end-- the hypotenuse that is. You'd get roughly an extra 4-5 feet per length that way and would cut a mile down to about 78 laps.

Obviously you have to keep in mind shallow end depth and your arm length-- you don't want to be scraping your hands on every lap.

Seems kinda hard to say what I'm thinking, and this is just one person's opinion: if in your mind you're thinking that every now and then you might like to swim back and forth a little bit to get the 'ol blood circulating, probably 29 feet would be fine. But, if what you're thinking is that maybe this pool could also be a great platform for exercise, and maybe you'll want to start swimming laps for 30 minutes every day for the long term, well if it were me I'd try configure the pool more to provide a bit more length, and sufficient depth for that.

 

[mikew2069]

On lap swimming, as I mentioned earlier, I previously had a 28 foot pool. I thought this was a very nice size for general pool playing, big enough that it never seemed crowded, yet small enough that it was easy to take care of and heat. My opinion on lap swimming, you could swim a few laps, sure, but I wouldn't really think that swimming a regular workout in there would be a ton of fun, so much turning around. A mile in a 29 foot pool would be about 180 lengths, or if you count a "lap" as to the other end and back again, then about 90 laps.

You could of course swim from corner to corner in the pool rather than end to end-- the hypotenuse that is. You'd get roughly an extra 4-5 feet per length that way and would cut a mile down to about 78 laps.

Obviously you have to keep in mind shallow end depth and your arm length-- you don't want to be scraping your hands on every lap.

Seems kinda hard to say what I'm thinking, and this is just one person's opinion: if in your mind you're thinking that every now and then you might like to swim back and forth a little bit to get the 'ol blood circulating, probably 29 feet would be fine. But, if what you're thinking is that maybe this pool could also be a great platform for exercise, and maybe you'll want to start swimming laps for 30 minutes every day for the long term, well if it were me I'd try configure the pool more to provide a bit more length, and sufficient depth for that.

That's great insight, thanks. Yea I don't see this as my primary source of exercise. Mostly for the kids to play in but I would definitely like to swim laps for 10min or so every once in a while. Really just in the summer when its too hot to run. With the other upgrades we're adding, we're already blowing our budget out pretty bad so I don't think we can even afford more pool if we wanted it. Maybe a foot or two but that probably won't even make a difference.

 

[rhawke]

That's great insight, thanks. Yea I don't see this as my primary source of exercise. Mostly for the kids to play in but I would definitely like to swim laps for 10min or so every once in a while. Really just in the summer when its too hot to run. With the other upgrades we're adding, we're already blowing our budget out pretty bad so I don't think we can even afford more pool if we wanted it. Maybe a foot or two but that probably won't even make a difference.

best way to see if you are ok with the lap length is if you go to a neighborhood pool or a friend's pool and measure out 28 ft and then swim it. Most likely you will get about 6 free style strokes out of it. As I mentioned earlier, if you want more lap swimming distance you can reconfigure without needing to spend more but you would have to change your design a bit. For instance if you are ok with putting your sun shelf into a corner or against the long side of the pool, you would instantly get 36 ft of swimming length without any extra cost.

 

[mikew2069]

What kind of drain should I ask for? I feel like I've read people recommending channel drains? Can someone post a link to what that is? I'm guessing I would just have one right in the center? And what about the spa?

 

[rhawke]

Have a look at my pool build thread, a lot of drain discussion. We ended up using the superflow 360 drain. They are expensive though, about 300 per drain the PB said.

 

[mikew2069]

I posted this in the lighting section but I don't think that section gets much traffic. Need opinions and info on Globrite lights.

Keep in mind, we are already WAY over our initial build budget. But we keep seeing cool stuff and keep thinking, well if we're going to do it right, we have to do it now.

We are having a 360 infinity spa built and we saw some pics online where they lit up the 'trough/channel' surrounding in the spa. Talked to the PB and they recommend putting 3 Globrites in there represented by the blue circles below but I'd like to save a few bucks and do two lights if it will still look ok and light it up like we hope.

My question is, could I get away with 2 globrites? How bright are they? I couldn't find any details on lumens. Are they bright enough to reach the center of the rounded trough/channel? The channel is about 8" wide and the width of the exterior of the spa is about 11.5'.

​

 

[bizzle]

best way to see if you are ok with the lap length is if you go to a neighborhood pool or a friend's pool and measure out 28 ft and then swim it. Most likely you will get about 6 free style strokes out of it. As I mentioned earlier, if you want more lap swimming distance you can reconfigure without needing to spend more but you would have to change your design a bit. For instance if you are ok with putting your sun shelf into a corner or against the long side of the pool, you would instantly get 36 ft of swimming length without any extra cost.

One other aspect to a possible redesign is that I would suggest the tanning shelf be facing south to maximize solar exposure.

 

[jaymantx]

Hi,

I'm a noob about to sign a contract as well. Are you sure you want the full infinity spa? I was going to get it, too, but I talked myself out of it because it's very impractical.
1. I can't put my cold beer can or wine glass near me when I'm in the spa. You have to reach out and put them on the deck. If you put a TV near by, you can't put a remote control near by you either...
2. We host small parties often and some people don't bring swimsuits or they don't feel comfortable wearing one.. Then, they can't even put their legs in the spa without getting their pants/skirts wet, because they can't just plop down on the infinity ledge. I guess they can just stand in the spa...LOL
3. It's rare but several builders told me that spa edges need to be perfectly flat and even to get the infinity overflowing look. Even if your builder creates the perfectly flat and even edges, soil under the spa can sink and cause the spa to tilt just slightly... Now, water fall through just one or two edges...
4. If you decide to use darker glass tiles, hard water will leave nice white crusts (scaling?) near tile grouts. <-My potential builder has an infinity spa, and he told me it looks terrible if he doesn't clean it often. Maybe SWG will prevent these water scaling from forming...

For all these reasons, I decided to put copings on two edges, and the other two infinity edges.
Just my $0.02.

Good luck!
Jay

I posted this in the lighting section but I don't think that section gets much traffic. Need opinions and info on Globrite lights.

Keep in mind, we are already WAY over our initial build budget. But we keep seeing cool stuff and keep thinking, well if we're going to do it right, we have to do it now.

We are having a 360 infinity spa built and we saw some pics online where they lit up the 'trough/channel' surrounding in the spa. Talked to the PB and they recommend putting 3 Globrites in there represented by the blue circles below but I'd like to save a few bucks and do two lights if it will still look ok and light it up like we hope.

My question is, could I get away with 2 globrites? How bright are they? I couldn't find any details on lumens. Are they bright enough to reach the center of the rounded trough/channel? The channel is about 8" wide and the width of the exterior of the spa is about 11.5'.

View attachment 75840​

 

[rhawke]

Hi,

For all these reasons, I decided to put copings on two edges, and the other two infinity edges.
Just my $0.02.

Good luck!
Jay

and those $0.02 probably saved you a few of thousand dollars!

Mike, looking at the design above my guess is that the globrite lights alone are adding over $1,000 and then probably at least another $2,000 for the added cost of adding in the additional gunite, rebar and tile work!

The 8" gap between the spa and pool is also inaccessible to any pool cleaner, so you would need to clean that manually more frequently.

Plus you could add those extra 8" to your pool size or to your spa size AND save a whole bunch of money at the same time.

 

[mikew2069]

The one thing we didn't really consider was jayman's #2 comment. I'll have to run that one by the boss but I can almost already guess what her response will be.