Plumbing Placement

   Eli showed up today to lay out plumbing locations for the main drain, return, bubbler, and sub locations for the LED lights.  The main drain was located in place and a length of rigid PVC was connected since it would be entrapped by the concrete when it's shot for the pool shell.  The returns and LED lights were marked on the pool forms and just consist of enclosed pipes filled with gravel for weight.  They'll be jammed into the sand at their designated locations to provide pass through for their respective functions.  Since the bubbler will be in the sunshelf, it's just laid near the location of installation.  The skimmer boxes were again marked on the wood forms as well as placed at the desired locations, while having their orifices blocked to prevent ingress of concrete during the pour.

   Here's a picture of the deep end of the pool.  The long PVC pipes leaning up on the wood forms are the stubs for returns and LED lights.  The trench on the right side of the picture is the main drain line coming up from the deep end.  You can also see the skimmer box on the right side of the picture.  The PVC with the 45 degree pipe isn't marked for anything, so I believe it's extra.

   Here's where the main drain pipe comes up from the main drain.  The pipe stub comes up to the ground level, but I'm not sure if it will ultimately stay that depth (height?) or if it will be cut off at a lower depth before the pipe run is attached and run to the pump manifold intake.

   Here's the main drain in place with the drain pipe attached.  There's a 45 degree fitting that looks to sit in the concrete shell which I hope won't cause any issues to the strength in that location.  When the pool is completed, there will be a surface matched cover that covers the drain.  You can see that the pipe being used for a pass through stub is labeled "LED lights"  It doesn't mark at what depth the lights will be placed at, so I'm guessing there's a standard depth for such things.  After the pool shell is shot, the ground where these stubs are will need to be excavated to access the dirt side for whatever they're passing through.  They're probably just sleeves for the lights, but I'm not sure if the returns will use the actual PVC as a connection, or if the PVC stub is oversided to allow passage of the actual return pipe.

Some additional wood was installed around the skimmer box locations.  The top and the pool opening have been closed off to prevent concrete incursion, but a single 2 inch drain pipe has been attached.  There's an additional cover that goes on the top of the skimmer box, which will sit at the level of the pool deck so height placement is very important for this item.  The skimmer boxes also determine the height of the water in the pool since you don't want the water level too high above the opening.  Generally the pool water level should be about half way up the skimmer box opening, so getting this placement needs to take the final height of the coping stone into account.  Probably the most important detail of the initial pour process.

   Here's a look at the plumbing coming off the skimmer box.  Both skimmer boxes will be placed on the lake side of the pool and the return jets will circulate the water clockwise to promote flow into the boxes.  We have a lot of trees around the yard, so hopefully this will help keep the pool free of leaves.

   Here's the placement location of the second skimmer box.  Both skimmers are in concave parts of the pool to help with the trapping of surface objects.  I think the wood forms will need to be cut away here before the concrete is shot, but that will be done by the gunite crew.  Again, additional wood supports were installed in this location and I believe it to just be supports, not forms for the skimmer box.  The skimmer box will mostly be immobilized in the pool shell and I don't think they'll use any concrete on the outside of the shell to lock in the rest of the box, but I'm not sure about that.

   Here's a shot from the shallow end, showing the path of the main drain plumbing and the two skimmer box locations.  The PVC pipes placed on the rebar are for the returns, 4 in total.

   At first I was a little confused about the height the main drain plumbing takes to get out the pool.  When the gunite is shot, that whole channel will be filled in, so it looks like the drain pipe will level off at the or near the height of the water.  I thought you would want the pipe at a deeper depth so the pump wouldn't experience any head loss on the drain side.  After reading a bit online about plumbing design, it looks like you don't want the main drain suction dictated by the depth of the pool.  By raising the drain line up to near the water level of the pool, you're making sure that only the pump is dictating the suction strength at the drain, and water pressure or siphon.

   Here's the bubbler plumbing.  There are two PVC lines connected to the bubbler.  The larger 2 inch line is the water return and the smaller gray conduit is for electrical lines since the bubbler also contains an LED light.  Eli mentioned that there are a few different openings for the bubbler that dictate the height of the water fountain.  He also said that the bubbler will be able to flow water out the sides a bit to keep the sun shelf water circulating and clear of debris.

   Here's a last look of the pool with the PVC stubs and metal in place before they come and shoot the gunite.  I think the gunite shoot is a 2 step process; 1 shoot for the rough shell and a second shoot for the final shape and sun shelf/swim steps install.  The shell needs to be hardened a bit for the later two items, but I don't know the timing of the two shoots.  After that will be the long wait while the shell cures strong enough for final surface treatments.