Swim Pond Adventure!

[btoby203]

Hello all - I thought I would put up some pictures to document our swim pond build here in western CT (Newtown). I finally got my building permit about two weeks ago and the excavator is set to arrive on Thursday or Friday of this week. Exciting! I'm following the pond design of Total Habitat (link here), with a few exceptions and substitutions.

Here is an overhead view of our property from the early spring - the pond will go where the semi circular wall is (got a solo stove for the blue stone patio that we prefer for outdoor fire nights)

Here's a summertime view of the plantings in the backyard - over time will be a beautiful garden

Cedar logs I purchased from a local tree service for the underwater wall, and the portable sawmill company I had come out and turn the logs into lumber:

First segment of the 10-segment underwater wall is complete:

Liner being delivered (just yesterday!):

 

[Tula]

Beautiful property! It'll be fun following your build....gosh that liner looks heavy !

 

[GBBUDD]

a couple questions.
the 4" approximate width board in the center that is going to bow why would they not make that the top board and bolt it in like the others but now you could have bolt4ed it to the top rail as well making it what is called a strong back and both the top horizontal board and the 4" board could have been bolted and made each other stronger a win win for both pieces .

will there be additional boards added inside the studs between each other so when you add stone it sits on this board and helps hold the wall down and in place?

 

[btoby203]

a couple questions.
the 4" approximate width board in the center that is going to bow why would they not make that the top board and bolt it in like the others but now you could have bolt4ed it to the top rail as well making it what is called a strong back and both the top horizontal board and the 4" board could have been bolted and made each other stronger a win win for both pieces .

will there be additional boards added inside the studs between each other so when you add stone it sits on this board and helps hold the wall down and in place?

Good point! Thanks for that. I’ll swap the skinny one to the top.

 

[GBBUDD]

Good point! Thanks for that. I’ll swap the skinny one to the top.

if you don't want to fight redoing the entire panel, put a strong back onto the 4" on the back side like a 2x6 and this will also help rock to sit on and hold the pannel under water. screw it in to the vertical studs

 

[btoby203]

Hello all! A busy couple of weeks at my property. The crew and I (my son, my daughter's finance, and me) finished the 10th of 10 underwater wall segments over the weekend. I'm really happy with how they turned out and feel confident that they will mate up well when they go down in the hole. Here is the 10th one, with a recess in the middle for the beach section. (Just a slightly lower section to make it easier to leg-in to the pond from the gradual beach entry.)

 

[btoby203]

I've had a local landscaping crew out to dig the pond last week. This is the biggest expense of the project, and one that I knew I would have to out-source due to the scale of the dig and my advancing age!

 

[j.w]

I've had a local landscaping crew out to dig the pond last week. This is the biggest expense of the project, and one that I knew I would have to out-source due to the scale of the dig and my advancing age!

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Gonna be a nice huge pond for you all to enjoy for sure!

 

[addy1]

What a neat project!

 

[btoby203]

Busy week last week! My son came down from Boston and took the whole week off work, and I took some half days from work to focus in on the pond project. With the hole dug by professionals the week prior, now was the time to rally the troops and unroll that huge liner! It's 40 mil RPE from BTL and it is very heavy! We pulled and grunted and once my son's girlfriend figured out that we should all synchronize and do the "parachute" motion things went faster.

 

[btoby203]

Once we had all the wall segments down in the hole, we spent Monday and Tuesday carefully fitting up the walls as best we could with nice gapless angles between them. A pair of screw-tightening bar clamps came in really handy to pull each section together and drill them along the adjoining studs. It rained a bit on Sunday evening after the liner went in, which was fortuitous because even though the liner is super heavy, I want to make sure it doesn't take flight in a gusty wind. Here's an image of the finished wall before the plumbing was installed.

 

[btoby203]

The flex pipes and risers for the bubble pumps and skimmer are all installed. Now the long process of filling with lots and lots of gravel can begin!

 

[j.w]

The flex pipes and risers for the bubble pumps and skimmer are all installed. Now the long process of filling with lots and lots of gravel can begin!
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Can't wait to see this finished!