Howdy all,
First time creating a thread here, but I've been lurking for a while. I'm just wrapping up a new pool build, and startup was about a week and a half ago. Unfortunately, I'm already seeing the edges of my limestone chipping off. Obviously this is bad, but it's especially bad considering how lightly the pool has been used so far. The kids have swam a time or 2, but mostly it's just been brushed. I don't recall letting the brush pole fall against the stone, but it's possible that the kids did so.
For background, we broke ground on the pool back in July. I used byop.net for the design/contractor selection, and everything ran fairly smoothly until the tile/coping phase. These guys disappeared halfway through finishing the waterline tile, and didn't come back for almost 3 months. They claimed that the reason for the delay was due to white limestone availability, which they had ordered pre-cut from the quarry. After about a month and a half of waiting, they stopped responding to texts/phone calls, so I started working on other bids (no one else had problems getting limestone). I was at the point where I was going to pull the trigger with the another company, so I notified the original company.
At this point, they became super responsive, and said they had a pallet of limestone that they could use for my project. He had previously told me that this stuff was not "good for pools", but he now walked that back saying that the install is just easier for them to have limestone pre-cut at the quarry. I told him that I was going to research, and he showed up the next day unannounced with a pallet of limestone. I probably should have turned him away at that point, but I didn't. I was antsy, tired of my yard being a wreck, and the second company was still a month out.
Anyways, fast forward to now, and I have limestone chipping already. We had overlooked a few grievances (the stones varied significantly in thickness, they chose slabs with rusty looking veining, and they chose slabs with lots of shell looking things that didn't look good), but the chipping seems like a much bigger deal to me. So, that said, I have a few questions:
First time creating a thread here, but I've been lurking for a while. I'm just wrapping up a new pool build, and startup was about a week and a half ago. Unfortunately, I'm already seeing the edges of my limestone chipping off. Obviously this is bad, but it's especially bad considering how lightly the pool has been used so far. The kids have swam a time or 2, but mostly it's just been brushed. I don't recall letting the brush pole fall against the stone, but it's possible that the kids did so.
For background, we broke ground on the pool back in July. I used byop.net for the design/contractor selection, and everything ran fairly smoothly until the tile/coping phase. These guys disappeared halfway through finishing the waterline tile, and didn't come back for almost 3 months. They claimed that the reason for the delay was due to white limestone availability, which they had ordered pre-cut from the quarry. After about a month and a half of waiting, they stopped responding to texts/phone calls, so I started working on other bids (no one else had problems getting limestone). I was at the point where I was going to pull the trigger with the another company, so I notified the original company.
At this point, they became super responsive, and said they had a pallet of limestone that they could use for my project. He had previously told me that this stuff was not "good for pools", but he now walked that back saying that the install is just easier for them to have limestone pre-cut at the quarry. I told him that I was going to research, and he showed up the next day unannounced with a pallet of limestone. I probably should have turned him away at that point, but I didn't. I was antsy, tired of my yard being a wreck, and the second company was still a month out.
Anyways, fast forward to now, and I have limestone chipping already. We had overlooked a few grievances (the stones varied significantly in thickness, they chose slabs with rusty looking veining, and they chose slabs with lots of shell looking things that didn't look good), but the chipping seems like a much bigger deal to me. So, that said, I have a few questions:
- Is there a type of white limestone that is better/worse for pools? I understand that it's a more economical stone, but we chose it for the look.
- Is this chipping typical of limestone? At this rate, it doesn't look like we're going to get more than a few years of longevity before it looks like Crud.
- What should I expect this company to do at this point? I owe them their final 20% payment, which is the last bit of leverage that I have.
- Any other recommendations on having someone look at/check the limestone?
