We have a 23.5'x13.5' AG pool! Now how to fit top rails?

[zephans]

I'm nearly finished constructing our 12'x24'x54" AG BF pool. Water is in and kids love it. I am putting in the top rails but something isn't working well.

PROBLEM: The top rails are too long around the corners! I have about 8" too much rail even after squishing slack out of the other curved rail sections.


OPTION A: Use drill to extend adjustable slots in each rail until I can get them to fit with columns level.

OPTION B: Cut and re-drill the "center" round top rail section. (Only one top rail rework, but probably prevents several columns from being level.)

<Insert options I haven't thought of here >

OPTION F: Tear down and make pool 12'.
(Option F is a huge task (~2 days that I don't have) that I won't do unless 3 trusted people here all agree leaving as-is will be a catastrophic mistake.)


WHY DID THIS HAPPEN?
My fault. I squared the pool carefully making sure each tower was 42" from each other and corner-to-corner measurements matched exactly. I noticed that corner measurements were a bit bigger than instructions said (169.5 instead of 167), but what's 2.5" as long as pool is squared, right? I think I checked 12" width toward beginning of tower placement but I don't think I re-checked at end of construction. (Note I measured 13.5" from top of side towers. They could be leaning out slightly in which case I have no idea why the metal wall was 6" short. Frankly I had one bottom strap buckling slightly because I didn't stretch the towers farther apart. I have no idea why bottom straps could allow 1.5" extra width.)

When we installed the metal wall we were 6" short! I decided to shorten each round by pushing several of the bottom rails past their stop "bump". I tried my best to evenly distribute these so I don't think roundness or pressures will be a problem. Only side-effect I'm left with is the curved columns are a bit closer to each other. That doesn't matter until you go to install the top rail.


PS: To be honest I though this might happen after I cheated some length (evenly) out of the bottom rails in each round area to make the pool wall connect. What I should have done was stop when wall came up 6" short and re-measured EVERYTHING. However with sand piled in the middle and family coming soon and 4th of July swimming goal comming quickly I decided pulling 6 inches from the rounds was the easiest solution. I just hope it is acceptable.

PPS: Turns out I'm able to rework the metal top rails purely by accident. The "Diamond Star" pool I ordered from http://www.sunenterprises.com/ specifically shows 11" resin top rail (and was part of the reason I bought it). However they shipped metal rails. I'm not happy with bait-and-switch, but it gives me options to solve this problem that I wouldn't have with resin.

I'm going with Plan A in next couple days (after I do my initial backwash). Post if you have any thoughts.