saskia07

Hi

I'm on 'me 'olidays' at the moment and my mind turned to swimming pools, and how good it would be to have my own year round. I had one in a previous life in a rental property in the US, but had a man who came once a week and did all the necessary with chemicals etc, so I didn't need to consider maintenance.

I read an article about natural eco pools which don't need chemicals, solar powered etc. I hate chlorinated pools so it struck me as a good idea.

If anyone's had a 'natural' swimming pond as I think they're called, I'd love to hear what you think of them?

Cheers Sas x

maddhobs

We have a saltwater pool and it is great to swim in and easy to maintain. Don't know if there is a saltwater version of a hot tub but would consider one if they did.

Purley

I got all keen on switching my pool from chlorine to saline, but the only place I could find to do it was too expensive. If I could do it myself, I would - but its not likely to happen. I can put the chemicals in and take the DE filter to bits, but I wouldn't have any idea or the capability to do anything more.

I think if I came into a bunch of money I would certainly rather have a saline pool.

G586

http://www.rustictubs.com/Home.html

A tub like this doesn't have to use chemicals. I've had a look at natural swimming pools and they look great but are fairly expensive to install and I assume not all year round!

maddhobs

Thanks for the link G586

saskia07

Thanks for all the info folks, much appreciated.
Sas x

Paul Wildy

I dont have a question about chlorine versus saline but while we're on the subject of swimming pools I do have a couple of questions as we are planning to have one put in soon...

- the company we are planning to use are proposing a new design of pool which is aluminium with rigid insulated (R10) walls. Apparently it can be installed above ground, inground, or part way between the two. It seems attractive to us because although the pool kit is more expensive we want to install it on a slope and it avoids the cost of having to build a retaining wall etc (they can just back-fill around the pool). The company has never installed one in our area before though - they are supposed to be fairly new. Does anyone have experience with this design?

- cant decide on best option for heating either. How much shorter is your swimming season without heating? How much does it cost to run the various solar heating versus heat pump options?

Cookie

We had a new deck and pool built last year. We use bromine pucks in our pools. It's a little more expensive but is kinder to the skin with no bleach smells lingering around either.

Here is eHow "How to maintain a bromine pool".

We bought a bucket of pucks last year and only used half over 8 weeks (pool and deck not finished until mid July).

Our house looks like a bungalow from the front but has 2 levels at the back as its built on a slope. We can walk in the front door straight though our living room and onto the deck. The existing deck (on stilts) had no stairs leading to the back garden so we decided to get a major deck built and was really thrilled with the results.

The best thing we did was use glass panels instead of rails on every side that looked down onto the pool from the house. The results are fab. We bought the panels from Home Hardware (building contractor through them too) and if I remember correctly they were around $90 per box of 5 (may have been on special - check your flyers).

We also have no nails showing on the floor of our new deck either as they were screwed from underneath using metal brackets. All the boards were picture-framed too for a nice look. All worth paying extra for as the results speak for themselves.

(We were however spending our newly exchanged GBP (in early 2007) and had factored the price into our new home budget).



Here are some pics

Paul Wildy

Hi Y-C-D - the deck looks great! If you dont mind me asking, how much did it cost to have the deck built (labour and materials)? I'm trying to decide whether to do it myself or get someone in.

saskia07

Hey, you've been busy! Not sure I'm up to building my own deck, but thanks for the info. I hate getting chlorine in my eyes.

Sas x

Cookie

Hi Paul,

Our deck cost us around $21,000 including all labour and tax. Using the no-show nails method was more labour intensive, plus we used pressure treated wood all around the side of our lower deck instead of lattice-work which also cost more. Ours was a fixed price quote which I think worked in our favour as it took around 4-5 weeks to complete using 3 guys (1 master carpenter, one apprentice and a labourer - some bad weather days and our master C was ill with kidney stones for about 7 days in total too).

Our 15ft x 30ft pool was approx $7000 or less (fully installed) including all equipment, tax and 3 loads of water delivered (we are on a well so got red Devil to fill it @ $130 per load).

Therefore the total was $28,000. At the time it worked out 12,500 GBP for everything (early 2007 money exchange). Of course, the exchange rate is not so good now.

Now, our deck is really big as you can see so that's why it was costly. Even on a small deck I would use glass panels as the effect is very good. Surprisingly it never looks grubby either. If only my windows could look the same