What's the best way to remove a concrete pool?
Question:We recently bought this 30 year old house that has a swimming pool that has tons of cracks and is not repairable, so we want to have it removed and get a new pool (fibreglass model). The one pool guy who came to look at it said that the concrete is hard to break up because it has a rebar frame, which is cemented into the concrete so it will have to be broken up by hand (jackhammers...etc.,not by bulldozer) and it will take quite a while. He quoted approx. $20,000 for the removal...ouch!!Does anyone have any good ideas or experiences with pools to share?
Answers:
Just some food for thought. Some communities (like mine) require you to remove ALL concrete, piping and rebar before filling or installing a new pool. They even require a building permit for the removal and inspection before the hole is filled so check your building codes. Get some more estimates, 20K is a very steep, and don't let them tell you it's a lot of work to jackhammer by hand. Any contractor worth his salt, owns or can rent a huge jackhammer attachment for his loader. I've seen these machines at work and they can break your pool up in an afternoon. If codes allow, putting the fiberglss pool in the footprint of the old one makes sense. A couple of other options also exist. If you can live with the shape and location you can fasten wire mesh over your entire pool and have it resprayed with gunnite, or your old pool could be covered in fiberglass. The pool edges can be removed and redone in any new style you like. This next option is the one I like the best and it's a "green" solution, a combination water feature (with or without a waterfall) pond and pool, a swim with the fishes approach. Repair the cracks as economically as possible and paint it a dark green. Then go to a pond store and get a biological filter set-up to replace the old pool filter. You might even be able to use the existing pump and save a couple hundred bucks to spend on koi and water lilies. Just think, a swim with the fishes, without those chlorine eyes. RScott
A pool with rebar is next to impossible to complelely remove. And $20K sounds like it could be a reasonable price. We just filled ours in with dirt, had the edges jackhammered out, but left the "body" in and filled it in. Can you get the edges removed and add the new fiberglass in a smaller size to fit inside of the old pool?
Get a price from them to remove the edges to -2' from the top of the soil. Then bring in fill dirt to fill in the pool and compact it. The rest of the pool will remain in the ground under the new dirt. Then just seed the area and you'll have a yard. Much cheaper than removing all the concrete and reinforcement.
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