pond to pool reno

[JoshR]

Hello,

We bought a house a few years ago that was a foreclosure. It came with a pool and a hot tub that have been neglected for a long time. I'm starting this thread in hopes that if I provide you with an entertaining and amusing story of pool restoration WITH PICTURES that you will provide me with some much needed technical assistance. Deal?

Lets begin by looking out how things were when we got it:

This is one of our ducks and our goose named Frank enjoying the pool. Its hard to imagine a more tranquil and beautiful aquascape.

Here is our dog enjoying it:

Who would ever want to disturb such beautiful serenity?

Alas. We have children who have a very different vision for the pool.

 

[JoshR]

So last year we decided we were going to roll up our sleeves and get started. The pool itself seemed really intimidating so we started with the hot tub.


We drained a bit of the water out to see what we were getting into.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/ZXyQnwPMNtSaiuPe2

We found more than we bargained for:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/d84XH2o2Au7DqgNJ3

We spent a few weekends mowing and scraping weeds out of the deck too.

Finally we decided that the job was too big for us and that we needed a pro.

This Spring we had some pros bid on the project and eagerly awaited their write-ups. Unfortunately their quotes were way more then we expected. So we are back at it!

 

[riley00dog]

Hi Josh! Oh wow [emoji50] I can understand you putting the cover back on after finding those cane toads! I admire your determination to get back into it. One day you will be able to look back in amazement at these photos. You are in very good hands here (not mine, I’m here to witness the transformation, as I’m still building). All the best and keep us posted with updates and photos. Ask anything and everything you need to.

 

[kimkats]

Ribbit!!! to the max! They seem so happy there! Time to find a new home guys!

I hope you can keep putting the pics inside your posts. If you become a supporting member you get more photo storage space and we get to keep the servers running! CLICK HERE to Become a TroubleFreePool.com Supporter!!

Round up is your friend for now! Those weeds and grass has to go!

Do do you have all of the water out yet?

Where is your equipment at? What do the pipes there look like?

We are here to get that thing going for the kids!

Kim

 

[Casey]

Youve got your work cut out for you! Whatever you do... DO NOT PAINT THAT POOL!!!

 

[jimim]

Wait wait. Is that actually grass and brush growing on the cover? Awesome!

best of luck to you! I bet it will end up great!

Jim

 

[Flying Tivo]

For sure you will need a pressure washer when empty and a lot of back work. After you remove all debris and water make sure to inspect all the surface. If its badly cracked or deteriorated might as well not spend in cleaning it and go straight to resurface. Best of luck and also will be following.

Felipe

 

[MinerJason]

Looking forward to the transformation. And your signature is awesome!

 

[kimkats]

We had one that did not have a cover on it at all. It had sat for YEARS. It had a whole eco system growing in it. Cattails, frogs, fish, etc. His family all worked together to catch as many critters as they could and moved them to a pond down the road. Then they started pulling up all of the plants and such. Once that was done they started with the BIG clean up of the pool surface. He got it all done and it looked great! The last I heard the kids had learned how to swim and Dad was loving it!

Kim

 

[bmoreswim]

That really is a beautiful game reserve you have there. Really, fantastic! It will also be a fantastic swimming pool. A paver patio is a great DYI project, though there are some intricate cuts required. But it's not rocket science. Just prepare the base correctly and it can be VERY rewarding. I built about 1500 SF of paver patio (basketball court, patio and walkways a few years back). I did have someone do the base prep as it was major ground moving and leveling up the base, but talk about rewarding.

Not that many other aspects of this project are as easy (technically speaking) to DIY, unless you are handy with chipping out plaster, setting tile, trenching and plumbing (this one is reasonable if you have a plan) and electrical (only if you know what you are doing). But even if you DIY a paver deck, have the coping professionally installed with the waterline tile. But if you really want some DIY stimulation, check out this thread for DIY inspiration. However, you will be required to go shirtless if a guy and where flip-flops if you are a gal. It was a new owner build, but also with a major amount of DIY. Owner builder - SoCal

I'm guessing your reno. quotes were the size of some new builds. Reno work sometimes seems like buying auto parts. You buy them separately and spend 10 times what the whole car costs.

Can't wait to follow along.

 

[JoshR]

Okay so in the last couple of weeks we drained the hot tub. We also mostly drained the pool. We scraped, raked, and shoveled. Many many wheel barrow loads of weeds and dirt. Partially draining the pool let a lot of the stuff dry out a little bit. It was simply too heavy when it was wet. We were finally able to pull the pool tarp back.

Our pool has a unique sitting area at the deep end which is what you can see above. You sit in that hole and dangle your legs in.

As you can see our coping is brick. Most of the brick is loose enough that we could remove it by just picking it up. (Pool with removable coping - please don't be jealous) A lot of the bricks and tile have fallen into the pool. This was a few weekends worth of work.

The pool seems a bit overwhelming at the moment so we have been focused mostly on the hot tub. We removed the tile and coping. We started removing the tile with a hammer and a wonder bar. I was about 1/3 of the way through after a couple of hours. I took $50.00 down to Tractor Supply and picked up an air hammer for my air compressor. OH YEAH!!! Money well spent. For the next 10 minutes tile was flying everywhere. We got all of the tile and coping off. We also removed the thinset that held the coping on. We left the thinset that held the tile. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to remove it or not.


So what do you think? Will the new tile go on right on top of what is there or do I need to chisel it back down to the cement to make room for new?

In the picture where the air hose is draped over the side next to the skimmer line we have little bit of bond beam degradation. I'll need to figure out what to do about that.

 

[JoshR]

This weekend I started trying to figure out where the plumbing comes and goes. Here are some pictures of our equipment:


Unfortunately I can't just turn the pumps on because a lot of the pipes have been broken. There is a spot and a switch for a heater. We had somebody steal a lot of our outdoor stuff as we were moving in so our theory is that they took the pool heater and broke some of the plumbing in the process. Thieves are so inconsiderate.

So I tried running some water through the pipes with the garden hose but didn't have much success. I've started digging to try to figure out where they should go and picked up some plumbing fittings to try to re-hook up some of the pipes.

I did find a bucket of chlorine tablets. The horror! It makes me think they weren't TFP people.

 

[riley00dog]

I can’t see your attachments from 4/4. Yay for removable coping and air hammers! I have no idea about any of the questions you’ve asked, but I’m sure others here will. Sounds like you have made great progress so far.

 

[kimkats]

I am sorry. I forgot to ask someone about the tile replacement. I thought I saw the pic from 4/3 but now I can't. Can you repost them please?

Kim

 

[JoshR]

I re-loaded my images on 4/3. I guess I'm still learning the ropes.

You can see the thinset for the tile in the same area where the air hose goes over. It is the thin white layer.

I worked on digging some more this weekend to try to figure out where the pipes are going. Not as easy as I would think. I tried disconnecting the pumps and running water into them. With on of them it came out in the hot tub. The other I was hoping would come out the hot tub drain but instead it seemed like it was stopped up or went to a shutoff valve or something. The water just filled up and overflowed.

We have a pool and hot tub but 3 pumps. I'm a bit baffled by that. I'm pretty sure this is before the era of having a booster pump for a pool cleaning robot.

 

[kimkats]

On the thin set......Is it as thin as it looks in the pics? What I would do is pretend to put one on using something like putty to see how close it fits and if you will get away with not going any further with the removal. It should be easy to take off if you don't let it dry. Just a cheap tile that is the same as the tile you are thinking of using.

Pipes- NOT fun that the one backed up instead of going through I will do some more thinking to see what I can come up with as far as ideas to try to help save you from more digging

Kim

 

[riley00dog]

I can see the photos now. That’s a fair amount of progress just there. Looking so much better already. No advice sorry re the thinset.

 

[PoolGate]

With the state of that pool, have you considered a complete replaster? I don't know that many people just replace the trim tile. I would pitch all of the equipment and start with all new. Sad someone let that pool get in that condition.

 

[BBailey]

My next door neighbors rehabed their pool that had been sitting 7 years without a cover. They just cleaned out, pressure washed the pool, and did not replaster. I will say it does look interesting with the natural colors in the plaster in their backyard next to a lake. I real cement pond

 

[JoshR]

@kimkats - I didn't know if the thin-set was what held the tile which means i would need to remove and replace when I'm re-tiling or if it just goes behind the tile. If I can just use puddy to stick it back to the tile that would be easier.

@riley00dog - Thanks for being the cheering section. I think I'm going to need plenty of that before this is all done.

@poolgate - Yes I am planning on redoing it all. It is a painted pool though so if I do plaster it won't be a re-plaster, it will be an initial paster. I'm not sure what to think. People seem to think that plaster is better, but I also think the paint has lasted a long time and through a lot of neglect. The other thing is that the tile is recessed a little so that it will be even with the paint. If I decide to do plaster I may need to add more thin-set so the tile will be even with the plaster.

@bbailey - Ours was way beyond being able to just clean it out and turn it on. Broken equipment. Bricks falling in. Etc. I guess the quickest would have been to clean out and replace equipment but it would have been a mess if that was all we did.

So I have been digging some more. My thought was that I might get a lot of bang for my buck if I dig in the pool shed instead of between the equipment and the pool. That way I can tell what is hooked up to what at least equipment-wise. I don't know if it will tell me what I need to know or not. I'm still a bit baffled by having 3 pumps for a hot tub and a pool. Maybe the water that backed up in the pipe was because it was going to a shut valve? We can hope.