In ground vinyl pool question

[txdon]

I see my backhoe, I feel the heat, I see a nice place for a pool, Can I do it?

There is a group of friends who meet weekly for a fierce game of water volleyball. I can see the use for the pool 7 days a week for about 5 months a year. The in ground vinyl pool kit is about $7,000.00. with decking etc... I figure 10-12K.

Has anyone installed an in ground vinyl pool? Any suggestions welcome.
Any one have the perfect size and depth for a volleyball pool?

I really feel the heat.........

 

[bones1]

I think a couple of palm trees and a Tiki bar would do better.Lot cheaper too.

 

[Bird]

I've never done one myself, but we had one installed by a pool company in the backyard of the house we sold when I retired. I guess we'd had it 11 years. Ours was only 12' x 24' (3' deep in the shallow end and 6' deep in the deep end) with a 7' slide; no diving board. I would never want one again, but if I did, I would not recommend anything smaller than 15' x 30'; however, what we had was just the biggest thing that would fit into our little backyard.

 

[bmac]

Don,

My vinyl liner pool was installed by a pool contractor. So, I can't really offer any installation tips. As rain will cause delays in the install, your current drought conditions should allow for a timely installation.

I would think a 20' X 40' rectangular would be ideal for v'ball. I assume you would not want to be treading water while playing so a uniform depth of 4'-4.5' I'm guessing would be what you want. Have you checked to see what is available in liners as far as size and shape goes?

While vinyl is the least expensive type of inground pool, the liner is kind of slippery. Traction might a problem for the hardcore v'ball players. You would have great footing with gunite, but more expensive, hard on the soles of the feet and not really a do-it-yourself job.

FYI, my 20'X40' vinyl pool w/ slide, diving board, spa, gas heat, salt chlorine generator and a large area of concrete decking was in the upper $20 K's 3 years ago. If you can put one in yourself for 10-12K, that sounds great.

 

[HEC]

I put in two with a friend of mine many years ago,he had a dump truck and backhoe, he was good with backhoe I was good with a transit and the rest of it.We use stone dust up here in Maine for the base for the liner.The trick is is to make the hole as close to specks as possible so you don't disturb to much of the ground you are going to put the sand dust on , just makes things much easier. I can't remember how thick the sand dust was but I would say we used a small dump truck load on each 20 by 40ft. pool.I did poor a cement footing around the outside edge for the walls to stand on.If I remember correctly the outside walls were 4 ft. high, we have to deal with frost up here so maybe that was the reason for the cement footing,sure made things easy to put up the walls with a good level footing..The tricky part was the deep end as that is all formed with stone dust after my friend did the digging for that very nicely .Both pools came out very nice,his even had built in steps at the shallow end.If you are handy with tools etc. you should be able to it ok,it was actually a very fun project.The plumbing part was very basic, just follow the directions.I was a fire fighter so I just borrowed some hose hooked up to a hydrant and if remember correctly they each held something like 33,000 gallons of water,I could be way off on that figure.
Have fun,they were only $3000 back then,and that was for the best one we could find,my friends was a little more as it had the steps.

 

[Bird]

I do remember that ours had a 3' high steel wall all the way around. It was supposed to be copper bearing steel panels bolted together; no footers under the steel. We had 4' wide fiberglass steps out the side in the shallow end. Sand, with a small amount of dry cement mixed in, was dumped in and smoothed for the bottom; flat in the shallow end and sloped inward from the bottom edge of the steel wall in the deep end. When the liner was put in, they fastened it all the way around the perimeter except for leaving a few inches not attached, then inserted a vacuum hose in that few inches to suck the air out from under the liner and get it smoothed into place as we were filling it just with a garden hose. Then a 4' wide concrete walk was poured all the way around the outside perimeter and surfaced with some kind of material that kept cooler than ordinary concrete would have.

 

[jinman]

Any suggestions welcome....
...I really feel the heat.........

Don, I think a pool where you put it would totally wipe out the ambiance of your cabin. Then again...ambiance won't keep you cool in 105º, so what is it worth?

 

[Bird]

ambiance won't keep you cool in 105º

And he'll definitely need something to keep him cool when he learns how much work and cost is involved in maintaining a pool.

 

[txdon]

Don, I think a pool where you put it would totally wipe out the ambiance of your cabin. Then again...ambiance won't keep you cool in 105º, so what is it worth?

Jim, with the right pretty little cedar rustic shade structures and landscaped with cactus like plants, and native rocks etc...

I agree the ambiance would change from a remote, woodsy, hill country, desert, ambiance to a more oasis feeling (I hope).

We are thinking about building a house in front of the cabin instead of the more westerly hilltop location because of it's central location. The cabin would then loose all ambiance and just be the pool house.

One think for sure, I'm not building in the Summer again.

Jim, Thanks for your observation, We will think and re-think before we dig.

I do think the 20' by 40' is the best size. The depth should be about 4' on the ends going to 5' in the middle.

Bird, thanks for the warnings. I know you are right, but darn it sure is HOT and dusty and HOT.

Are there any pool owners that like their pools after the first year??

 

[midlf]

We bought our house in July 04. It had a 16x32 in-ground vinyl pool. The pool was not a + on our evaluation of the house. We bought it anyway and figured if we didn't like the pool and/or it was too much fuss we'd fill it in. I figured we'd live with it for two years and then decide. The previous owners said they felt the same way when they bought the place 22 years earlier and ended up liking the pool enough to have it relined in 01. When we were floating in the pool on a hot day in 05 spouse said "we're keeping the pool." We like it. Don't use it a lot but it doesn't take a lot of care. I test the chemicals about every 3 days with the easy to use test strips. Once in a while I do the full test with the traditional liquid test kit. Put some chlorine pellets in the chlorinator about once a week. Back flush the sand filter as needed, about every three weeks. The spouse goes out with her net and rescues the frogs, toads, chipmunks and mice that get in over night, usually 2-3. Once a week we vac and brush the pool. It takes a day to prep it for winter, and a day to open it in the spring. Late winter it takes some time to siphon the rain and snow melt water off the cover. Expenses: About $50/year for chemicals, electric for the pump I don't want to think about.

Overall, being in our 3rd summer, we still like the pool. On a hot day, when all sweaty from some project and jumping into the pool, we love the pool.