Repair or Replace Pool?

[Cooper07]

Good afternoon everyone! We have some pool repair/replacement questions that I am hoping someone can help us with.

First some background about our pool. We have roughly an inground Fox 16’ x 32’ kidney shaped pool that was originally installed in the mid-1970’s by the previous owners (we bought the house a couple years back) and now we need to replace the coping, repair the side walls and put down new vermiculite.

One pool guy that come out to look at it said we could cut out the bottom part of the coping and install a vertical coping piece that would get screwed into the side walls to accept a new liner. This would allow us to not have to tear out the concrete, but the original coping (and all its ugliness) would remain. As we would like to redo some of the elements around the pool regarding the layout with the equipment and seating and would like a cantilever bullnose coping in concrete or tile, we are leaning towards tearing up the concrete so that we can do all of that and fully replace the vinyl liner coping at the same time. However, the pool guy warned us that we may uncover larger issues with the bracing and walls if we remove the concrete, in which case we might end up needing to replace the entire pool all together. While we are hoping to avoid this, we also do not want to have to deal with major repairs again several years down the road because there was a problem that we didn’t see now. Our current goal is to reuse the bracing and side walls that exist if possible.

We have been told that Fox pool bracing design has not really changed in the last 50 years so we are anticipating seeing their X-brace when we open up the concrete. Is that accurate?

We were able to dig out one side of the pool on our hill to see the top of the braces in that location and there is some rust and damage to the point that the top of the brace appears to be rusted apart? See attached photos. In your opinion, are these beyond repair and need to be replaced?

Let me know what you all think. This will help us determine if we leave the concrete and tie in the new vertical coping, spend the time to take out the concrete so as to reuse the bracing and sides, or just tear the whole thing out.

Also – if we do have to tear out the pool and put a new one in, what are your thoughts on buying a pool kit and installing it ourselves (minus the concrete work, which we would hire out)? We are both pretty handy (architect and electrical engineer) and think it’s doable, but I’d like to know your thoughts and any tips will help!

Thanks!

 

[kimkats]

Seeing that brace rusted all the way through tells you every thing you need to know..........if you take up the concrete you will need to do a LOT of replacement of just about everything.

Have you tried using bleach to clean the concrete with a powerwasher to see how clean and pretty you can get it?

Kim

 

[PoolguyinCT]

OP -

That is a Proprietary kit braced pool wall - after backfill & decking the steel you picture serves as a deck support & the part that is not buried serves traditional A frame, for the pool wall.

You photos do not indicate a “pool replacement.”

Your big questions are aesthetics vs. budget.

If it were not worthy, pool would have moved or folded without water in it.

A simple liner extrusion as the pro discussed or yank & pour a new deck, your in pretty good shape with that pool.

 

[Cooper07]

Our issue isn't that the concrete itself is ugly (it is cracked in a couple places, but for the most part okay). We do want to expand our area around the pool and create a new pad for the equipment (for a future pool house/shed) and push the fence out on the one side of the pool (on the right in the original picture posted above) so as to have additional seating there. This was always going to be a future project for us, but if we do end up tearing up the concrete now we want to include that work as well. We are just trying to determine how big of a problem we will have with the pool itself it we do that.

The issue we are having with the vertical coping option (and not tearing up any concrete) is that from our understanding, the original coping would be left in place and that is not in good condition. See photo above. You can see the previous owners had already sealed some of the cracks in the past and even between the concrete and coping (where I am guessing it was pulling away). Is there anything we can do to cover that original coping somehow aside from just sealing all the cracked areas?

 

[PoolguyinCT]

The issue we are having with the vertical coping option (and not tearing up any concrete) is that from our understanding, the original coping would be left in place and that is not in good condition. See photo above. You can see the previous owners had already sealed some of the cracks in the past and even between the concrete and coping (where I am guessing it was pulling away). Is there anything we can do to cover that original coping somehow aside from just sealing all the cracked areas?[/QUOTE]

Your contractor is correct. A ring can be cut around perimeter & a masonry coping with a footer installed, though it may be as laborious as deck replacement..

that old mounting system, is certainly goofy.
Unfortunately it can’t be disguised.

 

[Cooper07]

PoolguyinCT - Yes, the bracing and walls do appear to hold structurally just fine, nothing has moved or caved in and it has been empty for a couple weeks now. We know that that is not ideal, but we didn't expect this when we went to open the pool up. Water had drained from our shallow end, the liner was pulled away in several locations and was hard and cracking. We thought we just needed a new liner until we did some additional research and spoke with some pros. And getting people out to look at it has been a pain. But the pro that we did get out to look at it even said our walls were in good condition as he has seen walls that were way worse in pools that were much younger than ours.

Okay so all that said, it is our understanding the Fox pool X-brace has rebar connecting the two steel braces and that rebar (and top of the braces) gets buried in the top concrete. Is that what we are seeing that has rusted away? If we choose to tear up the concrete and do a whole new coping and cantilever edge (and the other work noted in my previous reply), do we have to do anything to those braces to pour new concrete? We would most likely be missing that rebar connection between the braces because the tops rusted away. Originally we were thinking we would just need to replace the rebar if cut when the concrete was removed, but because of the rust we are not going to have the top anymore. Do you see that as an issue if we do new coping and concrete?