Watermom's New Pool Adventure

[Watermom]

Got an estimate for the deck a couple days ago and he will be back to start in another week or so. We usually build our own decks but decided to hire it out this time.

We were out of town over the weekend and came home to find pieces of ripped black landscaping cloth around the yard and scattered stone complements of those pups. (We had the black cloth and stone put around the outside of the pool after the pool was installed.) So, my 16 year old son cleaned up the scraps and re-positioned the stones to cover the black cloth again. I'm sure they'll try and dig again. That's what puppies do, unfortunately. I'm on spring break this week so will be home and can watch and scold when I catch them so hopefully we can put an end to this prank.

Lots of stuff falling from my trees into the pool, so hooked up the Polaris 65 to get most of it out and then threw in Wanda the Whale to get the remaining little stuff on the bottom so it looks much better. Of course, in the spring, this is repeated over and over as we have lots of flowering trees and maple trees with all their 'helicopters' all over the place. But, I don't mind because the trees in WV are beautiful.

Since it is a new fill with no CYA, I threw in some trichlor which I seldom use but now is a good time to use it as it will add chlorine and CYA at the same time. It also will drop the pH so since mine was 7.3, I also added some Borax.

Once the deck is built and the yard is back to normal, I'll get my solar panels hooked up and start getting some heat in the pool. I have to buy a new solar cover since this pool is larger than the old one. My Solar Roller Cover Stick that I ordered did come in the other day, but I haven't yet opened the box.

I haven't forgotten about more pics but want to wait until the deck is on and the yard is cleaned up first.

[Watermom]

Deck is done, pump and filter have been relocated and now we are working on burying the PVC/hoses that will run from the pump/filter's new location to the area where my solar panels go. If we can get a few dry days, this should be finished this week. Also, still have to install the pool steps which mount on the top of the new deck. Then, I'll take some pics and post them.

I also bought a large (11.5 ft.) off-set umbrella that will shade a portion of my deck. I get tired of having to continually move my umbrella stand around the deck to account for the position of the sun. This new umbrella won't totally solve that problem, but will help for much of the day.

Anxious to swim!

[TheGoose]

How about some pics?

I can never keep my umbrella facing the way I want when I off-set it.

[Watermom]

So far the umbrella has stayed where I position it. I looked at several different ones before I bought this one from Sears. I cleared off the deck of construction materials and hosed it off this afternoon. I'll try and get around to some pics at some point this week.

[itsparadise]

Hello Watermom-

Congrats on your pool progress. We just had installed our very first AGP and we are very excited. Anyhow, the reason I mention this is that our yard is sloped EXACTLY like yours half of our pool is dug in like yours. I just emailed my husband your retaining wall pic and he loved it and was asking if you had a finished picture. So I'm hoping you can post soon so we can get quotes. Thanks for the great idea. Maybe this is too much to ask, but do you recall what your retaining wall cost? My husband isn't a DIY kind of guy so we'll need to hire someone. Thanks in advance. -Susan

[Watermom]

Actually, that is all there is to the wall. It only goes a portion of the way around the pool due to the lay of the land. In the picture above, it does kind of look unfinished but that is just because during the removal of the pool and deck, some of the top layer got bumped around and when that picture was taken, some of the stones had not yet been put back in place. I'll look and see if I have any other pictures that show it better. As far as cost, I have no idea. It was built years ago when my first pool was put up. Each piece is a separate block. They have a kind of lip on the bottom of each piece that catches on the one underneath so they can't slide or anything. You just stack them together. No mortar or anything. Easy to put up and pretty sturdy. Go to Lowe's or Home Depot or someplace and take a look at the blocks. I bet your hubby can do it. It is just stacking them. Nothing more than that.

Just to clarify --- my pool isn't dug in. There is a walk space between my pool and the retaining wall. I'll add some pictures to this thread this weekend to show you better. Check back on this thread.

You are going to love having a pool! Welcome and thanks for the subscription, by the way!

[FlowerPool]

For years, we have fought with our solar cover. It is a huge piece of vinyl and even cut into smaller pieces, it is still a pain. The last few years, we cut our cover into fourths and rolled each piece onto a piece of PVC pipe and then lifted each out onto the pool deck. This has certainly been better than any other way we have tried but even still, I've continued to wish for an easier way. Recently, when looking on line, I ran across something called a Solar Roller Cover Stick. I think I'm going to buy one and hope that it works as well as it appears. You can take a look at it at the following link and there is a place on that page where they have demo videos of how it works. If any of you have bought one of these, I'd love to hear your comments.

http://www.solarroller.com/products/...over-stick.htm

I just watched the videos for the cover stick yesterday. The woman demonstrator didn't give me much confidence about the ease of the process tho. Watermom I am going to wait for your feedback after using it for awhile so do keep us posted here. Also, when your cover was cut into fourths didn't it blow off or uncover in some areas while on the water in a strong wind? I have tons of trees and debris from them and battle such all season long. While the cover and i are in the water kind of fold the cover into a burrito and fold the ends in to trap the rain and debris in and then hoist it onto my deck as fast as possible so the filthy water doesn't dump right into the pool. Sometimes there is gallons of dirty water I am attempting to hoist up. I then unroll the burrito on the deck so all the water n yuck drains thru the deck. If really bad I have to then hose down the cover and then the deck. Yesterday I saw on poolsupplies.com some plastic grommets to insert into the cover to allow water to drain freely...but then I would have debris coming out of 6 grommets and have filth draining all over the pool vs one spot of to heavy to hoist. I then have to hurriedly grab the net to snag the big stuff while the green and tiny stuff floats away and creates more mess to vac at some point. This process is the worst part about owning a pool as I can't afford an automatic pool cleaner and clean with a stick pump run vac. Please lmk how the cover in fourths worked for u or send me the link. Videos would be even better!

[Watermom]

No videos of the cover cut into fourths. Sorry! It did NOT blow off of the pool. One thing we did do was after all the pieces were unrolled off of the PVC pipes and were on the pool, we took the empty poles and laid them across the cover in various places.

I will report back on the Solar Roller Cover Stick. I'm hoping it works really well.

[BigDave]

I hope it does too. Thanks Watermom!

[robbym70]

Can't wait to see pictures of the new pool and deck...Good luck with the new set up !!