Pool for the deployed troops

[sandstormoasis]

Thank all of you for your replies!
We had one of the "locals" com by yesterday to give us an estimate on both, doing everything, and just providing the materials/equipment. Should hear back from him a in a few days. I'm a little skeptical of their abilities, but will see what they come up with and I will be sure to run it by you guys.

I have had some experience with pools growing up, so I'm not worried about chemistry and such. I'll get to reading to brush up on my knowledge. I think my biggest concerns are under sizing the equipment, and properly sealing the pool. When I say this is a rough concrete pool, I mean rough. It looks like the plywood used to build the forms used to lay the concrete were on the light side. There are a lot of bulges and deformities in the walls. It has been empty for years, and seems to be holding together ok besides several cracks along the bottom that stay wet from seepage up through the concrete. I'll look into the Waterplug, Waste mentioned. I've seen the pool epoxy that looks like play dough, you cut equal amounts to kneed together. I know we had a diver that used this to plug underwater leaks. Waterplug is most likely a more economical product. Due to concrete being so porous, You think the concrete will allow water to seep out with out a good 'sealing'?

Is there a good/easy way to pressure test the piping?


I wish I could post pictures, but due to security reasons I can't. I may see if we can make an exception to policy so you can at least see up enjoying it!

Thanks again for the responses! We are all getting stoked about it!

Robby

[CarlD]

Yes, without sealing it, concrete is porous unless it's waterproof concrete, which was developed by the Romans over 2000 years ago--but it was very expensive then and still is today.

If you are not familiar with our techniques of pool chemistry, you really should read up on them. Most of the information out there for many years, and most of the ways most pool owners manage their pools, is wasteful, expensive, and sometimes not as effective. There are "rules" that are simply flat-out wrong, for example, that 3ppm is the maximum safe chlorine level. This is flatly untrue in more ways than you can imagine.

A number of our members, including Ben, the PoolDoc and site owner, are VERY experienced managing large, public pools like yours, but even we moderators and other posters know the chemistry SO well we can do the calculations.

Maybe you are familiar with our B-B-B method and T/A lowering methods, but if not, they may surprise you as they contradict much of what pool stores tell their customers.

[sandstormoasis]

Apologize for the slow response. Things got a little busy for me.

I got the estimate from the guys to get the pool up and going. They quoted over $14K for parts and labor. $8K of that was in painting expense. I know epoxy paint isn't cheap, but $8K??? We finally got an itemized estimate and as I suspected they are saying a 60'x40'x5' pool required 22x 20 liters of paints. Well, about all I know is what a 2 ltr bottle of soda looks like. So I went to a conversion program and found 20 liters is ~5 gal. So, 22 x 5 gal = 110 gallons of paint. How they came up with that figure I have no clue. From my calculations, I estimate ~ 30 gallons of paint for 2 coats. Am I close to what you estimate?

All the other prices/equipment look about right. After correcting for the paint 'error', looks like ~ $4,800 for parts. The only question I have is they call for two "500 liter filters". Can anyone convert that to something that makes sense?

[PoolDoc]

I've looked at this thread several times, but have stayed away because I really have to focus on other things. But, this sort of problem is the kind of thing I love to work on, plus I would like to help anybody serving over there. (My first cousin was Petraus's chief of strategic plans a couple of years ago; his son was wounded there, my brother-in-law with the Corps of E spent 6 months at Camp Victory doing EOD design & supervision; a close friend is a chaplain in Kabul and was there during the recent attack, etc. . . . and my 15 year old is planning to be a Marine officer. So . . .)

Anyhow there are several things you probably can do to improve the quality of info you've got:

1. Take pictures and sent them to me -- I'll work out a way to post them here. (send to poolforum AT gmail.com)
- skimmers, main drain
- pool inlets
- piping in pump area
- pool surface details
- pool over all
2. Find out what sort of treatment chemicals are available to you, and at what price. That will determine the 'best' way for you.
3. If you are in a sand area, you can probably use indigenous sand to site-build a vacuum sand filter, with block, concrete waterproofing, and sand -- if that would be cheap for you.
4. Find out what sort of electricity you have (volts, cycles, available amps, hours per day) and the effective cost to you.
5. Describe weather conditions during your building period - you can't do epoxy when it's too hot or too cold.
6. Check all piping inlet and outlets, in the pool and at the pump, and enumerate them, including inside diameter SIZE and piping MATERIAL.
7. Verify that you have piping available that you can connect to what's existing.
8. What is the cost and availability of fill water? It's possible to fill from a sewage canal, but you have to plan for it. Water cost determines how important it is to avoid leaks.
9. Pressure test the piping, and check flow rates to verify usability BEFORE you start work on pool.
10. Identify any code limitations you face.

I know this is a lot of information, but you need it to do it right in the first place. And, it's much much better to find this stuff out now, rather than later. For example, if your effective cost of cyanuric acid (stabilizer) is $50/lb, because it has to be air shipped from the US . . . you need to know that NOW. It could be a disaster to put in a salt system (because salt and electricity were not too expensive) only to discover that it was unusable because leakage required to use more water, salt and $50/lb CYA than you could afford.

PoolDoc

PS. The good epoxy paint is about $80/gallon delivered in the US. A 2 coat finish requires primer at about 100sft /gallon and finish at 140sft / gallon, plus about 1 gallon of solvent ($20) per 5-10 gallons of paint. I'd be happy to see if Kelley Tech might donate the paint, or sell direct. Painting tools are a loss at the end of each painting session -- cleaning epoxied rollers is not practical BUT you need high quality roller covers. Power mixing is ESSENTIAL. You cannot paint when it's rainy, very hot, cold, or windy (ie, dusty). Epoxy is NOT forgiving; you MUST do it right.