Wrinkles in Vinyl liner

[jcarroca]

Just opened my vinyl lined pool for memorial day. Water was pristine clear. Major problems though, long unsightly wrinkles along the the shallow end of the pool, maybe one dozen of them some measuring 3 feet or more long. I live in the North East so we do freeze. I drained the pool to 3" below the skimmer before winterizing. How do I fix this besides draining the pool. Also I have pavers that butt against aluminum coping which I really don't want to disturb. I guess my point is do I have to live with the ugly wrinkles, since I don't have the tons of money to have a contractor fix something that may only be cosmetic! This is my third year with this liner and IG pool.

[cleancloths]

I had a similar problem, which was caused by low water level in the pool over the winter and our high water table. Don't know if this will work for you, but here is how I fixed the problem. I pulled the liner out from the coping so that I could insert a garden hose behind the liner and flood water under the liner. Once I did this I was able to get in the pool and with my foot kick the liner wrinkles out and respread the liner. I then reattached the liner to the wall. No here is where you may have problems - how will you get the water out from behind the liner. When my pool was built the builder installed a drywell under the deep end which I can pump out by valving it through my main circulating pump and pumping to waste. The concrete under the deep and is a mix of concrete and vermiculite so the water permeates through it. So, I just pump the water out from behind the liner and everything is great.

If you don't have such a setup I would imagine you could use a small pump connected to a hose that you feed behind the liner to pump the water out before you reseat the liner.

[jcarroca]

Thanks for your reply. I do have an extra pvc hose in my setup that I believe the contracator used to vacuum out the ground water while he was doing the vermiculite flooring. I think this would be the same pipe that would be attached to a vacuum while the pool was drained, if for example I needed to replace the liner. How could I get at the liner coping without disturbing my pavers. Were you able to get all the water out.

[jcarroca]

Hello, just looking for more feedback. The wrinkles are long and all are in the shallow end and where there is a slope. The wrinkles are thin not flappy, but the still bother me. The more I read about this, leads me to believe that the low ph in my pool caused this. I use trichloro tabs in the auto chlorinator. I guess the ph tens to run lower. Can I drain the shallow end and try to fix it there. I tried to pull it with a toilet plunger but did not work. It seems like the liner is very tight even where the wrinkes are. Can someone give me a step by step way of fixing this or do I have to go into debt to hire a pro. I think it is cosmetic, ie no leaks but it really bothers me.

[cleancloths]

What I did was to push down on the wrinkle while kicking the corner where the floor meets the wall with my heel at the same time. If it is too far away you could always use to people. And yes, I can pump out all the water with my pump.

[Chardonnay]

If you do not have a high water table problem, the low pH will definitely cause the problem that you have with your liner and there's not really any way to reverse it. The best way to deal with it is to try to move the wrinkles to the bottom of the wall (a toilet plunger works well for moving wrinkles around).
To avoid the problem again, you need to guard against low pH especially when you combine it with a high chlorine level.