Need help with waterfall and pools. Concrete and mortar???

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Hello. The story so far is bought a house with a waterfall but it was neglected and rotted out. I mean algae super thick in the pools and the upper liner was rotted out and patched with plastic bags and black goop. Just gross stuff. A 3 hp pump with a missing drain screw and stripped out threads around the same drain hole was another issue. Long story short I have replaced the pump with a 3/4 hp which is much nicer, the 3 was way too much flow and too loud. And I have relined the upper pond and the bottom pool liner still holds water well.

My problem has always loosing water. That old upper liner was the most obvious issue, I had tried patching it at first but replaced the liner the next year. It used to run for about 2 hours before the fill valve couldn't keep up and it would need to be turned off. New liner would make it run to like 6 hours. At this point both ponds held water just fine, then I used waterfall foam to seal the big joints in the rocks where most of the water runs and places it would pool and run into the walls, and this has brought me up to about 8 or 9 hours of use before I need to shut it off. I can see trickles of water coming out from behind rocks so water is definitely getting back there. It's also kind of concerning knowing I'm putting so much water back there all summer. I'm sure there must be something out there that is made for sealing up rocks in water like that?

The things I want to accomplish is, I want to seal up the joints in the water fall, and I want to finish up both ponds with concrete or whatever people do to finish up these things. Something to make it more streamline so I can blast pine needles out of there with a pressure washer when drained would be ideal.
Looking for recommendations on products and advice because I have never really done anything even related to this kinda thing.

The pics show what the waterfall looks like, the trickling coming out behind some rocks, where the water fall leaves the top pond, and the drained and de-rocked lower pond.
 

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So there's no liner that runs behind the rocks? I wouldn't continue with that - you're gonna have a collapse at some point.
 

brc

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It looks to me like there is liner (and not only that, but it appears to be the good stuff). It's almost 100% certain that there is liner behind the waterfall.

Trying to seal up between the rocks is probably never the way to go. You'll never get it to seal completely, and your rocks will be left with stuff stuck to them that you'll end up working to remove.

Since you say that using sealant seemed to help, you may want to look around the bottom of the waterfall, and make sure there's an opening for water behind the rocks to get out. It's possible that some water always goes back there, but silt / debris / leaves eventually clogged that pathway up, and now the water is going someplace else. This is a very common cause of leaks that also applies to the rest of the system - upper pool, and the whole path down. Debris can cause the water level in one spot to rise just a little too high, and it'll go over the edge of the liner. This is very common, because of the trade-off between keeping the water in the pond, and keeping the liner out of sight!

If you already replaced some liner because it was rotted out, it's possible that the liner that's behind the rocks has also gone bad. However, I think it's the sun that really does in pond liners - so I wouldn't immediately jump to replacing it. Most likely, the liner behind the waterfall is fine, and the problem is something you can fix in a few minutes, once you find it.

You could also poke around the whole perimeter of the waterfall / upper pond as much as possible (all that stone might complicate things). If it's losing enough water that the auto-fill can't keep up, that sounds like a lot of water. There may very well be a wet spot somewhere, and if you find it, it might tell you where to look.
 
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I can see trickles of water coming out from behind rocks so water is definitely getting back there. It's also kind of concerning knowing I'm putting so much water back there all summer.

@brc that's the part that made me wonder why he's concerned about water getting behind the rocks. Also in one picture you can see what appears to be the edge of the liner exposed under a rock. Not sure, but just trying to understand the concern.
 
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So there's no liner that runs behind the rocks? I wouldn't continue with that - you're gonna have a collapse at some point.
Honestly I don't know if there is or not. I'm kind of staying cautious and saying not. It has been standing since 92 tho, so that gives me some confidence.
 
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It looks to me like there is liner (and not only that, but it appears to be the good stuff). It's almost 100% certain that there is liner behind the waterfall.

Trying to seal up between the rocks is probably never the way to go. You'll never get it to seal completely, and your rocks will be left with stuff stuck to them that you'll end up working to remove.

Since you say that using sealant seemed to help, you may want to look around the bottom of the waterfall, and make sure there's an opening for water behind the rocks to get out. It's possible that some water always goes back there, but silt / debris / leaves eventually clogged that pathway up, and now the water is going someplace else. This is a very common cause of leaks that also applies to the rest of the system - upper pool, and the whole path down. Debris can cause the water level in one spot to rise just a little too high, and it'll go over the edge of the liner. This is very common, because of the trade-off between keeping the water in the pond, and keeping the liner out of sight!

If you already replaced some liner because it was rotted out, it's possible that the liner that's behind the rocks has also gone bad. However, I think it's the sun that really does in pond liners - so I wouldn't immediately jump to replacing it. Most likely, the liner behind the waterfall is fine, and the problem is something you can fix in a few minutes, once you find it.

You could also poke around the whole perimeter of the waterfall / upper pond as much as possible (all that stone might complicate things). If it's losing enough water that the auto-fill can't keep up, that sounds like a lot of water. There may very well be a wet spot somewhere, and if you find it, it might tell you where to look.

Thanks.
I hope the guy built it right and put a liner under the falls part, those rocks are way too big to move around and look behind, and there is concrete or similar on most of the joints already but I think most of it washed away under the falls.

I cannot see a spot for water behind the rocks to drain out, or at least nothing obvious.

The top liner was the only one constantly exposed to sunlight. The house was built in 1992 so if the bottom liner could survive unscathed pretty sure the falls liner if there is one is still good too.

The point where the top pond dumps the water into the falls could easily be a spot where water is going somewhere. What I think I want to do is concrete up the upper pond and continue the concrete over the falls at least a little so it's not creeping back under the top pond liner. Any thoughts on that?
 
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If there is a liner under the falls, the top pond liner should extend far enough OVER the edge and down the wall and the waterfall liner should extend up UNDER the pond liner so you don't have water going where water shouldn't go. Basically you need overlap in both directions. If you can see the edge of your pond liner at the top, that's a construction problem. And if you can, then you should also be able to see liner at the top of the waterfall, if it's actually there.

I understand your hesitation to start moving things - those are big rocks - but I would be worried about water weakening that wall over time. You say it's been there for a long time, which is true, but it may just run for a bit and then have time to dry out because it keeps leaking. If you get it running more consistently you may erode the dirt away being the rocks and create a bad situation.

You could patch it together with mortar I suppose, but it will never give you good performance. Concrete and/or mortar are not waterproof. They will both absorb and allow water to seep behind the wall. Plus they will continue to crack and need repair.

Just one opinion...
 
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If there is a liner under the falls, the top pond liner should extend far enough OVER the edge and down the wall and the waterfall liner should extend up UNDER the pond liner so you don't have water going where water shouldn't go. Basically you need overlap in both directions. If you can see the edge of your pond liner at the top, that's a construction problem. And if you can, then you should also be able to see liner at the top of the waterfall, if it's actually there.

I understand your hesitation to start moving things - those are big rocks - but I would be worried about water weakening that wall over time. You say it's been there for a long time, which is true, but it may just run for a bit and then have time to dry out because it keeps leaking. If you get it running more consistently you may erode the dirt away being the rocks and create a bad situation.

You could patch it together with mortar I suppose, but it will never give you good performance. Concrete and/or mortar are not waterproof. They will both absorb and allow water to seep behind the wall. Plus they will continue to crack and need repair.

Just one opinion...
Yeah I know what your saying. I guess I'm okay with good enough as in sealing the exterior of the rocks. I know it won't be 100% but it won't be in the realm of worrying that it will collapse. I know there is hydrophobic concrete that repels water, and I wouldn't be opposed to using epoxy based products. It's very hard to get names of products to use for this.
I just don't see any other solution because even if I do remove some rocks and see that it's wet I will not be able to remove all the rocks without heavy equipment, and pretty much building a waterfall from scratch. My budget is not in the thousands of dollars, more like in the dozens.
 
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This doesn't sound like it's going to be a small job, unfortunately.
I would move and investigate behind what small rocks you can and maybe plan for a different route for the water to take - a route that you know won't result in water loss.
 

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