Sport type Pool or Traditional Deep End?????

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We have only been in our pool for a month now and the deep end (9.5') gets a lot of action from all ages. We also didn't want a diving board, but did go with a diving rock which really has been popular. It is a nice addition to the landscape and only is an addition 12" off the water surface. The sitting area in the deep end get a lot of use and I wouldn't have a deep end without at least one.

Good luck.
 
Grew up with an IGP (diving board) last year put an AGP in for my daughter(6 turning 7), I did not think I would care for it but I actually like the fact that is shallow all through. Our IGP had a hopper that sloped to 11 feet, the majority of the pool though was slope and hopper and I realize now how it actually limited the pool. Now we're all in ~ I also have boys in their mid 20's and we're not all confined to the shallow end when noone feels like treading water on hanging off the sides. Now in all honesty I might prefer the all shallow because I am older, but everyone in the family we range from 2 years old to 95 prefers the AGP and none of us adults felt we as adults would enjoy it as much. We thought we were installing a more permanent kiddie pool.

When I was a teen, had a ton of pool parties. And in 11 foot of water, water accidents do happen, multiply the propensity especially when the kids grow up a bit get drinking around a deep end/diving board. No parents wants to think booze and drugs will be around their pool area, but it does happen. Several nights a week we rolled a keg out after the rest of the house went to bed and went nuts. Looking back I am mortified to think what could have happened, we were very lucky. It's nice not to have to worry about that as much now. Although my son comes home on military leave through the night tonight and we're about to see how crazy its going to get ~ this house will be packed with bonus kids the entire time he is home & it will let me see how the 20 something group (outside of our immediate family)enjoys & handles the water.

Either way you are going to enjoy what you get. I can say now though having both and being completely sure I wouldn't use the pool that was all shallow (I loved to dive and swim deep), if this pool were to collapse tomorrow and I installed another pool regardless if I went IGP or AGP for the fun by all aspect: I would put one in without a hopper and deep end just because more of the pool is able to be utilized. For safety and liability purposes: I would put one in without a hopper because of how I was with one growing up and things are so much different now 20 years later ~ everything is a lawsuit now. Accidents can happen though in any pool selected. An all shallow pool will not eliminate something taking a left.
 
Late to this, but we want a deep end too. Not the trend anymore, but we must have one. It's a very personal thing with us, but we just feel like it's more like a pool should be. I'm not knocking anyone's choice, as it is purely subjective. We just won't play volleyball or games too much but lot's of folks do. I also guess it's also our age as every pool used to have a diving board and deep end. Great discussion with everyone weighing in, and hope some more do as well. Sorry to hear about your niece Anthony. There is a guy at a customer sight who just came within a hair's width of being paralyzed. However, he dove head first in too shallow a depth but it was a very close call the Doctor said.
 
If I go Gunite I will get a shaped pool more than likely with no deep end

These are 2 of the Gunite ones I looked at that I loved. I love that it looks more natural, neither has a deep end. I would not do a waterfall, but would absolutely to a Spill-over spa and maybe a couple decents on each side of the Spa.

t9ioax.jpg


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I have an AGP but I love the whole pool being 4 feet deep. When DD was young, she could not reach but we were always in With her and she used a life vest. Now that she is tall enough, she and her friends can play anywhere. If I were to get and IG, I think I would prefer a sports pool with something like a 4-6-4 or an all 5
 
We have 8 and 10 year old girls- and I think we would really miss the deep end.

I believe ours is 8 or 9 feet. We have a small diving board. I find that they kids spend more time in the deep end than the shallow. Also, this allows people to dive head first, cannonball, creative jumping (all day apparently!). They float all day on tubes etc. The smaller kids stay in a roped off area that is about 3 feet.

If you go all one depth, I'd say so make it as deep as possible with a small shallow end (2 or three feet) for the little ones. Still swimmable, but accommodates the little ones.

Just my opinion. :)


Bernie
 
We enjoy both the shallow and deep ends of our pool. truthfully the shallow end gets more use.
We love our 6" deep tanning ledge, big enough for a couple of lounge chairs. A friend has an 18" deep ledge, it is a popular place for kids to hang out and everyone likes sitting on the edge of it. That would have been nice to have both depths but a pool can end up pretty big if you try to put everything cool in it!

I would have liked a deeper deep end, ours is close to 7' and that is adequate, I like swimming around under the water.

If you have limited space and budget, a pool without a deep end would be the way to go, otherwise you just have steep slope to stand on as was said earlier.

If you only have space for one depth tanning ledge, I am not sure what the best depth is. My wife likes the shallow one we have but that 18" depth of my friend's gets a lot of use.
 
Of the 2 pool you showed I really prefer the second picture. First one with the more "natural" look I would be afraid of unwanted critters moving in (I am terrified of snakes) critters seem to love rocky areas. Something about those nooks and crannies makes me leery of algae. With that, both are totally gorgeous.
 
DKT113 said:
Of the 2 pool you showed I really prefer the second picture. First one with the more "natural" look I would be afraid of unwanted critters moving in (I am terrified of snakes) critters seem to love rocky areas. Something about those nooks and crannies makes me leery of algae. With that, both are totally gorgeous.
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I like the lay-out of the second, but the Decking of the First. I would not do the Rock waterfall, that would all just be landscaping. The first is actually the owners sister who works for the company and is actually my designer.

Every one they showed me were shallow, from 3-6 feet, they all also had the In Floor Cleaning system.
 
I like the first one :)

I don't know about the in floor cleaning. I like running my pump on low all the time, with the in floor cleaning you would need it on a high speed everyday for sure. I use my Polaris twice a week, pump on high and booster pump on.I would like to get a robot and not have to use the Polaris, I think the pool would be cleaner and less electricity.


Edit: if you have trees or other source of large debris in the pool, you need a Polaris or similar cleaner.
 

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I have an in floor system in my current pool. My previous pool had a dedicated boster pump powering a Polairs. Of course there is the fact that you have to put the Polairs in and out, and you have to empty it's collection bag, but it does a better and quicker job of cleaning the pool. With the in floor many times you have to run the pump longer than you otherwise would to get the pool clean, or you drag out the manual vacuum to quickly get all the debris out of the bottom of the pool. Considering the cost of the system, I don't know if I would recomend it.
 
Ok, I know I am late to the party, I have been thinking about commenting here for a few days, and this is what I have came up with. Keep in mind I have a traditional hopper style 20x40 x 8.5 deep end pool with diving board, I also feel that this about the minimum pool size for safe diving from a diving board. While it is true the shallow end will get more use per sq ft, it is also true that kids tend to love jumping into the water, either from the side or the diving board, personally I have no interest in jumping into a pool, never really have, but I do enjoy having a deep end, swimming under water, etc. After giving this a bit of thought, I feel that the question of to have a deep end or not comes down to a couple of things, at least they do for me if I were to ever build another pool, and that is how big is the pool, and how many people do I need for it to accommodate, a small pool with a deep end will feel a lot more crowded than the same pool that is all or even mostly shallow, there is also a point where a deep end becomes too small for even doing cannon balls from the side, I am not sure exactly how small that is, but suspect it is when the deep end surface area gets smaller than about 12-14 ft long and about the same wide. I know on my pool when adults do cannon balls from the side they often hit the water 6-8 feet from the side where they jumped, sometimes more, so anything less than about that 12-14 ft would put them in danger of hitting the far wall on the way down.

Ike

p.s. I feel a comfortable occupancy for my pool is around a dozen people as this still gives everyone plenty of personal space, although it has held 2-3 times that during swim parties on numerous occasions over the years
 
Great information all, I think I am leaning away from the In Floor System, I could get a top of the line Robot MUCH Cheaper.

I am looking at about a 20X40 pool so my shallow end would still be decent enough sized. I do agree that people like jumping in, my fear is if I get a shallow pool someone will dive in not knowing and get hurt.

I am leaning towards my first PB which was a liner 20X44 double roman with Spill-over Spa.

Thank you again everyone, this has helped a lot.
 
Carnut12 said:
If I go Gunite I will spring for the Pebble. If I do liner I think I will do a deep end. I am thinking about doing Gunite and the ones I have looked at look so good with no deep end. The company I am dealing with make they look like a natural water hole in your back-yard.
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You've posed a great question. We went with deep end and it was based on our teenagers' desire to have a board and also my preference for diving in and swimming the length under water.

I researched the diving envelope specs and we added a small buffer above and beyond what is recommended in terms of the length of the deep end before it begins to slope up and the degree of slope.

I do feel that you can get a natural look with a deep end (although the diving board will not make it seem like a natural water-hole I guess).

I have a thread over in the construction forum http://www.troublefreepool.com/new-pool-southlake-tx-near-dallas-t63592.html where you can see what we are building.

I guess I won't know for a number of years whether I made the right choice.
 
FirstPoolLastPool said:
Carnut12 said:
If I go Gunite I will spring for the Pebble. If I do liner I think I will do a deep end. I am thinking about doing Gunite and the ones I have looked at look so good with no deep end. The company I am dealing with make they look like a natural water hole in your back-yard.
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You've posed a great question. We went with deep end and it was based on our teenagers' desire to have a board and also my preference for diving in and swimming the length under water.

I researched the diving envelope specs and we added a small buffer above and beyond what is recommended in terms of the length of the deep end before it begins to slope up and the degree of slope.

I do feel that you can get a natural look with a deep end (although the diving board will not make it seem like a natural water-hole I guess).

I have a thread over in the construction forum http://www.troublefreepool.com/new-pool-southlake-tx-near-dallas-t63592.html where you can see what we are building.

I guess I won't know for a number of years whether I made the right choice.
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Very Nice Pool so far, I wish labor was as cheap in the North East as it is in Texas, Gunite would make a lot more sense. I have an appointment next week for the Designer to come to my house and go over options. I am hoping this will make up my mind for me between Gunite and Liner. After that if I choose Gunite I will have to investigate this further.

So many different Options
 
I think it depends on how active/athletic your kids are as to whether or not they would use a deep end much. We have a small gunite pool, 3-5 ft depth, 15x30 feet in length, and we don't miss having a deep end at all. My kids are 12, 13 and 17 yrs old and are perfectly happy to splash and hang out; they swim nearly every single day. None of them are avid swimmers; they can swim, of course, but when we belonged to the neighborhood pool they would dive in the deep end every now and then, but 95% of the time play and hang out in the shallow end. I could see if your kids were very active and liked to dive and cannonball then a deep end would be nice. When their friends come over they hang out and play water games and everyone has a great time. I made a sign that says "no diving" in large red letters that we put out when kids are over. I also tell them that the "deep" end is only 5 ft deep and there is to be absolutely no diving. So far so good, never had a problem yet.
 
We are thinking about "shallowing out" our 8 ft deep end and removing the diving board when we remodel our pool. It would make sense for how we (two adults) use the pool, but whenever we have parties (or eventually have kids), both the kids and adults go crazy for the diving board and love it, which gives me pause. Maybe a diving rock would be a good compromise?

I will say, our neighbors' teenagers have figured out a loophole in their no-diving-board pool - they jump off the roof and into the pool. Scared me to death the first time I happened to look out the window and see it in the middle of a summer afternoon. I thought about calling their parents, even called the HOA for the number, but ended up chalking it up to regular teenage high jinks. Later that week, when they were having a loud, drunken party in the middle of the night in the pitch dark, and decided that giving the drunk teen girls who got cold feet and didn't want to do the roof jump an extra "push" off the roof to throw them in the pool was when I had to call the cops and get them busted - before someone broke their arm or leg, or worse, their neck. Even good kids can be idiots when their parents aren't watching. I know I was.
 
ComputerGuyInNOLA said:
We went with a play pool. 3.5 to 5.5 to 4.5 feet. Our pool is 14x28 so it is a small pool. When we have guests, every part of our pool is used. I put in two corner benches and wish I would have done more. We like volleyball and hanging out so we don't miss diving. If I could have added another 15 feet in length to my pool I might have added a deep end. 14x24 gets filled up quick with just eight people in the water. If your pool is going to be small be aware of how much play area you will have for just hanging out.
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My pool will be 26’ in length not including tannin ledges. Considering a sports pool at 3.5-5-4. Now that you’ve had your pool for years, how are you enjoying it? And how do you like the middle at 5.5 vs 5?
 

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