Landscaping - Swimming pool removal?

Just a small update - but we have a loose date in the diary of late October for the following;

Air source heat pump install
New coping stones fitted
New tile band
Steps re-profiled - rounded edge with the same tile as used on the band covering the round

The stone for the coping is yet to be chosen, but the options are pretty endless. We may go natural stone rather than porcelain for their through colouring and being easier to shape, however I do like the idea of porcelain for ease of maintenance and more uniform finish.

Current pool state, and the mosaics for the band which we've chosen - the top middle one.

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https://imgur.com/a/BNfZVk5
 
After the eye watering quote to have the whole patio re-done, yes we've started to clean up the existing as a temporary "fix" to get the pool up area up and running :p

We've been told that the reason they're in such poor shape is that they've been dot and dabbed in place, with inadequate drainage in place too - allowing pooling, freezing and then subsiding. Eventually we'll ditch the existing slabs, take out a few inches of what's under them and re concrete the whole pad - all in we're looking at £25k+ due to the 200sq/m of concrete and new slabs required.
 
Firestar_3x said:
Looks good, thought about painting the pool render?
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Yes, we've had discussions with our pool guy - basically painting the render is great as a short term fix only. The correct way to paint the pool is very labour intensive, and takes weeks in curing time before you're allowed to fill the pool with water and use it, he said to go that route it if we were selling the property within the next year as it'll look great. But because it's not a long term fix, and needs to be repainted regularly it's not an economical option for us as long term owners. We'll be looking at tiling the whole pool, when funds permit.

He's confident that with an acid wash, and the standard chlorine and other water chemicals, the marbelite pool render should come up nice and white again.
 
dowie said:
Have they chopped part of the garden off before selling or something? There seems to be an exit from the pool area to another bit of garden that isn't outlined as being yours above?
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We tore out that door last night, and took out the lintel too - ready to be blocked off soon! This thread is seemingly going to turn in to a complete house renovation log :p


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We've put many more hours in to the outside pool area, still waiting for final drawings from the architect so nothing can be done indoors which means this has still been our primary focus. A digger came in to take out the flowerbeds and any tree roots which were in and around the pool area, and then we moved on to removing all the patio slabs ourselves by hand. We've binned 2 skip loads of wastage slabs, the rest have been taken off our hands via Facebook market place which made our lives easier.

We've now ordered 260sq/m (:eek:) of 20mm porcelain tiles to be laid out here, but still have an awful lot of prep work left!

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Underneath the slabs the concrete base appears to only to be roughly an inch thick on top of soil which seems surprisingly soft! This weekend we'll get in a digger to smash this concrete, and dig out a fair few inches of soil, allowing us a decent base to lay our new porcelains on. When lifting the existing slabs the whole floor which they were laid on was shifting underneath us.

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Serious amounts of dot and dab going on!

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Lighting cables directly under the patio stuck down with the dot and dab too.

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The thin concrete over the soil is cracked all over the place!

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As far as we know the patio was installed a good 30 years ago, and it was an extremely common method back then to just dot a dab like crazy!

We need to dig out 8 inch of depth of the surrounding earth, lay 4 inches of 40mm down hardcore and then a 4 inch reinforced concrete bed on top of all that - like I say, we've got plenty more prep work to be doing :p
 
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We're dug out! We need to arrange to have the pool pumped out again, and have the pipes pressure tested once more due to the digger unearthing a few - no obvious signs of breakage but definitely worth doing before burying under hardcore and concrete.
 
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We are retrofitting lights in the side of the pool facing away from the house, as well as ensuring we have power being fed to all 4 walls so we can have lighting and exterior sockets. Cables will be far better buried than the old ones shown here https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/posts/35192267!

Long term plan is to have a big-ish pool house / bar, and use the existing pump house as our toilet/shower block for outside.
 
Ideas and opinions needed people!

We'd like to do the prep work ourselves, in the hardcoring and laying the steel rebar given that the quote we've received is eyewatering!

We'll arrange to lay some 40 down hardcore fully compacted, and shutter off 6 inches from the boundary walls to install French drains

The quote details drilling and pinning steel dowels in to the back of the pool, so when concrete is laid it will stay true to the pool edge - how exactly is the drilling and pinning of these dowels achieved? I assume the dowels are then just tied in to the steel reinforcement mesh rebar?

We'll have someone else lay the concrete though once we've prepared the area.
 
dale1uk said:
Out of interest, what colour is the pool pipework? If it's white ABS pipe I'd seriously consider replacing it, regardless if it passes a pressure test or not, with PVC-U pipe. A lot of old pools were piped up in ABS pipe, however it's gets brittle over time resulting in it failing. Running in new PVC-U pipes whilst everything is exposed would be my recommendation.
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Thanks for the recommendation, pipes are indeed white! Any idea of potential cost involved in making the changes?

ANDARIAL said:
There are a few ways of attaching reinforcing

You can drill a hole for a piece of rebar and resin it into place then either tie the rebar to this spigot or weld it to the mat (if laying a rebar mat)
or drill a hole for a long thunderbolt or rawlbolt and do the same
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Awesome, will look into epoxying rebar in to the wall to tie too, sounds relatively simple!
 
We have made big progress since the last update! Our pool guys have been in, the tile band has been made roughly an inch wider than the previous, this was to ensure the worst of the pitted plaster at the water level line was cut out.

The stairs have been rounded off and retiled to make a smoother transition in to the pool, and also less prone to toe stubbing etc when pratting around in the shallow end.

New skimmer fitted, new return line fitted, and new lights fitted - the lights were trunked down the side of the pool about 2 inches below the new tile band, but as they're large dish style lights you cannot see where they were installed.

The coping stones were freehand cut, bullnosed and stuck down and all grouted up.

The hose has been in the pool for about 18 hours so far, and it's been calculated that with our hose flow rate it should be full by Friday afternoon, ready for an icy weekend plunge!

For a 30 year old and completed neglected pool, it's not come up too badly! There are bits in the plaster base which aren't perfect and not much can be done about that, but if we get good use out of and love the pool we'll potentially look in to tiling the whole thing.

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ANDARIAL said:
Damn!Thats looking nice m8:)
Now do something about that tatty greenhouse in the background :D:D:D
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It's not ours unfortunately, but the weather will do something about that in the next big storm, I'm certain of it ;)

Martynt74 said:
Awesome stuff. So glad you've decided to keep it. Fortunate there's not many trees around too, so rubbish being blown into the pool should keep it clean.

How usable is an outdoor pool in the UK? Some family friends have an indoor pool which is heated, but i would've thought in the UK an outdoor unheated pool would be cold a lot. It would be awesome for an ice bath in winter after exercise :D
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It has stayed remarkably free of debris which is a real win, long may it continue that way! We're based in Guernsey so do have ever so slightly warmer/longer summers, but I think we will get it heated with an ASHP at some point in time, all the heating work is done in the pump room so can be relatively easily retrofitted.
 
Before and after chemicals - it almost looks inviting now despite being 8c!

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Currently in the process of chipping render off the boundary wall, so the whole thing can be smooth rendered in one hit - hours of "fun"!
 
We've got a 3kg Milwaukee SDS which is barely making a dent in it, and a 7.1kg Hikoki SDS Max which is tearing through it relatively easily. Handling of the 7.1kg SDS Max is the challenge though - thinking that angle grinding a grid of sorts in to the render will allow it to come off more easily.

If not, we need a middle ground 5kg SDS!
 
No pool cover at present, there will be one by the time we're finished as we intend to introduce heat at some stage - which is a crazy idea if you're to leave it uncovered!
 
theone8181 said:
You got and "friends" that you don't like that could give you a hand:cry:.
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https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/posts/35414976/ ;)

We gave him the 7kg Hikoki :cry:

Matt-Page said:
Been enjoying this thread from the start so keep on with the updates!
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I enjoyed your conversion too, and will be stealing ideas from it to convert our pump house/store in to a shower room.

Thanks for the feedback guys, it's been hard work as we've done as much of it as possible ourselves and by hand, but there's still a long way to go!
 
Right guys, I need to learn what I need to do in preparation to have lights and sockets on that back wall, anyone here able to teach please? :D

I understand I will need to chase the wall out, but what am I chasing it out for? Am I chasing it fit in conduit?
Do I need a junction box at the top for where the light fitting will be, or just loose cable hanging out the wall?
Do I go armoured cable to a buried junction box, and from that armoured cable/junction box to normal cabling to connect the lights to?

What thickness cable do I need for lights?
What thickness cable do I need for a double socket?

All cables will be run back to the plant room where there will be a small consumer unit for the pump, pool lights and chlorinator.

I'm clueless as to the wiring, but if I can do the wall prep and cable runs leaving enough slack then it'll save me money.
 
I'll likely route a CAT 6 cable in to the pool house too, and mount an AP to the outside of it.

The pool house currently has no fixed supply, but it will have lots of power going to it when we're done - over 40a given that we want to run a ASHP which will demand 5kw at full chat.

SimonR said:
Or at least run SWAC from the pump house to a local JB and spur from there.
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This sounds like a good shout. I could mount the JB the back wall, then run all sockets and lights from that in a more localised area. If I was to run that to the back corner of what will be the patio area it'll be hidden by the shed/bar building we're planning on putting on it.
 
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