September 16, 2024 • 50 mins
In this episode of the Poolside Perspectives Podcast, hosts Mike and Trey Farley delve into the world of salt systems for swimming pools. They discuss the pros and cons of salt systems, their history, and the misconceptions surrounding them. The episode explores the impact of salt on different materials like concrete and stone, the maintenance required, and health concerns. They also discuss alternatives to salt systems, such as using ozone and mineral systems, and conclude with a segment on a creative and complex double pool design. Whether you're considering a new pool, a remodel, or simply curious about pool maintenance, this episode offers valuable insights and practical advice.
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00:00 Welcome to Poolside Perspectives 01:08 Exploring Saltwater Pools: Pros and Cons 02:12 The History and Evolution of Salt Systems 03:42 Challenges with Salt Systems in Pools 13:11 BBQ Bits Segment: Barbecue Tips and Tricks 16:59 Debunking Myths About Salt Systems 25:05 Equipment Deterioration Concerns 26:30 Chlorine's Role in Pool Maintenance 26:57 Design Concepts: The Double Pool Project 30:58 Challenges and Solutions in Pool Design 38:08 Exploring Alternatives to Saltwater Pools 43:57 Is Saltwater Pool Maintenance a Crime? 48:07 Final Thoughts and Viewer Engagement
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Intro (00:00):
Hello everybody.
Welcome to the poolsideperspectives podcast.
I am Kevin Woodhurst and with me is mygood friend, Mike Farley, and we're so
glad you found this podcast together.
We have been homeowner advocatesand outdoor living and the pool
industry for over 30 years.
So we understand the challenges youface creating your backyard paradise.
We know your curiosity is notenough to ensure your success.
(00:21):
So on this podcast, we're going to talkabout the design process and practical
steps to help you create that space.
We'll have some fun mixed in with it.
Some aha moments.
And this is no fluff.
No one has time for that.
So we're going to get serious and getvery particular about all of these topics.
Whether you are a new homeowner with yourfirst remodel or a seasoned homeowner
(00:41):
competing your last dream home, we arehere to help you end up with what you
dreamed of from pools to patios, pizza,ovens, to pergolas, porcelain to pumps.
Pool party to permits, ping pong tablesto the processes, to your paradise.
This is straight talk and action steps.
Let's get started.
Mike (01:08):
Good afternoon This is mike farley poolside perspective podcast and we have
a very interesting episode today for allyou true crime fans out there We are going
to explore pool true crime and you guyswill decide if this is a crime or not.
So what we're going to actually talkabout is salt systems And saltwater
pools and the pros and the cons of it.
(01:31):
And should you be using it orshould you not be using it?
And we'll help you get someinformation so you can make
an educated decision on that.
It's been a nice cool weather here in DFW.
we went to
Trey (01:47):
Colorado.
It was nice, cool weather there as well.
And then it followed us back.
And
Mike (01:51):
it followed us back.
So for all you that are appreciatedhere in DFW you have us to
thank cause we went up there.
I think it was because Treywent up there and had fun.
Trey (02:01):
Oh yeah, I popped the question and she said yes.
So that's a good thing.
awesome.
She's celebrating herbirthday actually tomorrow
Mike (02:08):
all good things for September.
Trey (02:10):
Oh, yeah.
September's been awesome.
Yeah.
Mike (02:12):
We're going to drive into this episode and talk about salt water.
So a little history.
I'm an old guy in the pool industry.
was in the late nineties.
This system came over from Australiaand they said, we're going to put
salt water in pools and it's goingto generate chlorine for you.
And this is a low maintenance system.
Trey (02:33):
Wow.
So it came from Australia.
Mike (02:35):
Came from Australia.
And I laughed hysterically.
I was like, that's the stupidestthing I've ever heard of.
Trey (02:42):
Oh, so this came in when you were in the industry.
Mike (02:44):
Oh yeah.
late nineties, I'd worked for,Jeremy of pools for about seven
years about the time this happened.
and the reason why is I was born inpoint pleasant, New Jersey point,
pleasant, Overlooks the ocean.
Trey (02:57):
Yeah.
Mike (02:58):
Okay.
So grew up in Seaside Heights beforethere was a Jersey Shore TV show.
That's where I grew up.
Trey (03:04):
Smells like salt in the air.
Mike (03:06):
Salt in the air all the time.
I lived all maybe a mileaway from the ocean.
So good smell and the pineys.
And so I know it's salt did everything.
Your cars were destroyed, your roadswere destroyed, all the things that
salt did to all kinds of metal and justeverything just deteriorated over time.
(03:26):
And I'm like, you're gonna voluntarily.
Put salt inside a swimming pool.
If you had to, I could understand, but tovolunteer, to put salt in your pool, I was
like, this is going to be a train wreck.
This isn't going to last two or threeyears and it's going to be off the market.
So I crow about five years laterbecause the salt industry was booming.
(03:48):
at that point I had relocated toTexas and I was familiar with using
a low chlorine supplemented system inNorthern California where I used a lot
of ozone and minerals in conjunctionwith a very low amount of chlorine.
And so tried selling that to everybodyand everybody was like, that sounds
like some kind of janky system.
(04:09):
That you're trying topush off on me, the little
Trey (04:10):
snake oil action.
Yeah.
Mike (04:12):
This is totally not legit.
And I've got 45 friends thathave a saltwater pool and by
gosh, I want a saltwater pool.
Trey (04:20):
Everybody's got it.
No issues at all.
No
Mike (04:22):
issues at all.
It was going great.
And so I was like, that's whateverybody's using, and I built my
pool at that point in time, and Iput a salt system on my pool, because
if I'm going to sell salt I might aswell have it on my own personal pool.
And about the next year,the summer rolled around.
And that summer it was extremelyhot and it did not rain at all.
(04:45):
We were in a severe drought situationand towards the end of the summer, we
started getting phone calls and the phonecall went something about like this.
You need to come out andlook at the stone on my pool.
wrong with your pool?
My stones rotting.
Trey (04:59):
This is about five years.
Into the craze of salt?
Mike (05:02):
No, this is probably about 10.
Okay.
Trey (05:04):
And so it was bone dry that summer.
So why of nowhere, everyone's calling you.
Mike (05:09):
didn't know.
And so went out on these pools and forthe first probably dozen, 20, we'd go
out and look at it and be like, Whatin the world did you do to this stone?
You're right.
It's rotting.
I mean, You could tap on thestone and it would crumble.
It was just falling apart.
Now we predominantly used inthis marketplace, a flagstone.
(05:31):
Okay.
So Oklahoma flagstone, who'sthe predominant stone, the
secondary stone that was used.
Was travertine, which wasbrought up from Mexico.
So those were the twopredominant stones used in the
Trey (05:44):
and we're in
Mike (05:45):
Texas.
Yeah.
Okay.
Dallas, Fort Worth area, Texas.
So we started trying to figure out whatcorrelates with all these pools because
we didn't just see it on the flagstone.
We saw some on the travertine andthere was a project that I went to
that had New England blue stone.
Now New England bluestone's really hard.
Trey (06:03):
Okay, and Oklahoma's flagstone's pretty soft.
Mike (06:05):
if you're a scale of stones across the board, yeah, it's a sandstone,
flagstone, so it's on the softer side,and there's some that are worse than that.
But travertine's pretty hard.
But travertine's, Durable.
It's fairly durable.
After doing some research, we finallyconnected that every single one
of these pools had a salt system.
Now we didn't know what that meant.
(06:26):
Yeah, it's just theyall had a salt system.
so someone then started thinking, and Idon't know who did it or what, but we were
trying to figure things out and someonemade a call to a predominant pool builder.
In Australia and said, have youever had problems with stone
deteriorating with a saltwater pool?
(06:49):
And they're like, Oh, yeah, Oh,
Trey (06:51):
wasn't Australia where this originated from?
Mike (06:53):
This is where it originated.
So they
Trey (06:55):
introduced it, but they're there.
Time clock is already ahead because theyhave so many projects that are already
Mike (07:00):
right.
And they were like, Oh,yeah, we don't ever use it.
Was stone
was like what do you mean?
And they're like saltwhen it dries expands.
Yeah.
And so what it'll do is causeyour stone doll fall apart.
And we're like, yeah, we're kindof experiencing that at the moment.
Trey (07:17):
Oh, and it was a bone dry summer.
So it was very dry.
So
Mike (07:22):
several things happened that made this such a catastrophe.
But anyway, what they said iswe use a lot of concrete on the
edge of our pools, not stone.
And so it doesn't affect the concrete.
Nearly at the rate thatit does on the stone.
Trey (07:39):
Okay.
Mike (07:39):
And if you're going to use it with stone, you need to seal it.
And we're like okay, that's a great idea.
I wish someone hadmentioned it 10 years ago.
Cause we had all these, and some of thesepools weren't old either, we're trying
to figure out why they deteriorated atdifferent rates and everything like that.
There were several things that cameinto play as we thought about it.
And we understood is one,we had a drought, it did
(08:00):
not rain at all that summer.
There was not one single storm.
So it's really
Trey (08:05):
hot.
Mike (08:06):
no, what happens is nothing rinsed the salt off the edge of the coping.
Trey (08:11):
So it doesn't wash the deck off.
Mike (08:12):
Okay.
So if you're in an area that hasregular rainfall and you have a salt
system, you don't have a problem.
Okay.
Because it's rinsing it off.
Okay.
because we had the drought,that was the first problem.
The second problem is it's based on theproblem comes up because of evaporation,
the salt dries and it expands.
(08:34):
So the more you get wet, dry, wet,dry, wet, dry, wet, dry, the faster
this deterioration is going to occur.
Okay.
So we're hot here.
Yes.
We get a lot of evaporation.
Oh, yeah.
Okay.
So that occurring, especially onthe top of a spa where people are
getting in and out all the time.
And the entries steps of the pool.
(08:55):
Those are the two areas thatwent to, complete disaster areas.
And.
the other thing that came intoplay is what materials we used now,
some other parts of the country,when we first came across this, we
were one of the first companies tosay, this is a saltwater problem.
And there were people all in DFWgoing, you guys are full of garbage.
Trey (09:18):
And also every customer at the time wants a saltwater pool.
So it's like the most popular thing.
You are going to pretty muchsay this is the problem.
So what does that do?
So that turns away so many clients atthat time, because now it's a little
bit more, I don't mind chlorine aslong as the water's not as harsh.
at that time, it's like pretty muchsaying, Hey, we're not going to do
this because it's going to deteriorate.
(09:38):
And so
Mike (09:39):
there were a lot of, we're just going to walk away.
There are a lot of pool companiesare like, this is a sales gimmick.
Trey (09:43):
Yeah, exactly.
Mike (09:44):
You guys are saying this because you're going to sell this other thing.
And, try to paint us all that wewere using salt systems as bad guys.
Okay.
And it was just, that's what we found.
And so at that point we startedsealing off our stone that got salt.
Trey (10:02):
wouldn't salt still get through the sealers?
Mike (10:04):
Uh, Okay.
the first thing is when people say,I'm going to put a sealer on and
it's a, makes it a salt friendlyto my stone that does not exist.
That doesn't make sense in my mind at all.
Okay.
It will slow the process down.
Okay.
But it is not stopping that process.
Trey (10:23):
And you're going to have more areas that get more exposure to salt.
So those parts are going to wearoff quicker with the sealer.
That
Mike (10:28):
recommendation is that you reseal it.
Trey (10:31):
Clicker
Mike (10:32):
every year to situation with those stones.
Now, again, other parts of thecountry, as basically people got
information, people realized, okay, acommon comment was, it's not the salt.
I got bad stone.
Trey (10:48):
I've heard that multiple times before, actually.
Mike (10:50):
Okay.
I got bad stone.
And because I got bad stonemy stones falling apart.
It's not my salt system.
And here's the thing.
People love their salt systems.
Trey (11:00):
Yeah.
Mike (11:00):
get into what salt does and everything here in a second after
I finished my long winded story.
People loved it and so theydidn't want to get rid of it.
So a lot of people werelike no, it's bad stone.
And so everybody's like,oh yeah, it's bad stone.
Bad stone's the problem.
Now here's the challenge.
We've been using thatsame stone for decades.
Yeah.
It wasn't bad before.
(11:21):
No.
Yeah.
It worked fine.
Okay.
There wasn't any problems with it.
And all of a sudden it startsfalling apart with everybody that
has salt water associated with it.
that gave us a basis of informationthat could understand because there are
people in California are like, we don'tknow what you're talking about, but
Trey (11:40):
they're probably using concrete instead of stone.
Mike (11:42):
They're using predominantly precast stone.
Trey (11:45):
Yeah.
Mike (11:45):
Or they're using cantilevered concrete.
Okay.
On their projects.
I can count on one hand, how many jobsI use stone on in Northern California,
the first five years I was in the
Trey (11:56):
business.
But in Texas, our neighbors Oklahoma,Flagstone, we pulled out of the ground.
Mike (12:01):
Well, And you got Millsap Austin stone, all those stones, the reason
they're called that is because they'repulled out of quarries in Texas.
Yeah, exactly.
That's the name of the town.
Yeah.
And so, we have apredominantly stone market.
the other thing is, we havea very high evaporation rate.
Yeah.
We also have times that we don't get alot of rainfall, especially in the summer.
(12:23):
Yeah.
Where you have your predominantissues with salt being put on the
deck because people are gettingin and out of the swimming pool.
Trey (12:30):
Yeah.
Mike (12:31):
So we have the perfect trifecta for our salt system not to work.
Trey (12:36):
I could just imagine.
During the summer when it's adrought, people get out of the pool,
the water gets all over the coping,the decks and everything, and then
it dries, and it never washes offbecause there's no water, no rainfall.
And that happens over and over andover throughout the whole time, the
main time people are using their pools.
Mike (12:52):
Especially we have got people, family with kids, they're getting in
and out of the pool 50 times in a day.
Trey (12:58):
Easy.
Doing cannonballs, jumpingin the pool, everything.
Mike (13:01):
Okay.
Okay.
The whole story there is to givea premise of where we started.
And what the challengeswere from that situation.
BBQ Intro (13:13):
We're going to take a break here for a second
and get into outdoor living.
So with outdoor living, we liketo go to barbecue bits here.
We're going to share some informationof everything that you may want to
consider in your outdoor living space.
As far as features,especially for the kitchen.
Hope you enjoy this.
Mike (13:33):
Morning Bobby.
Morning.
So we've got questions about smokeand with smoke and cooking, a lot of
people were like, do I need a vent hood?
And when do I need one?
And what do we have that would work?
Bobby (13:47):
So we're bringing a lot of the indoor to outdoors now.
What we've seen is anincrease in vent hood sales.
Yes, if you're in an interior wall,not an exterior wall, you're probably
going to specify a vent hood.
For an outdoor rated venthood, we need minimum 1200 CFM.
We're going to go outsideof the grill span.
So if it's a 36 inch grill, preferablya 42 to a 48 inch vena hood.
(14:10):
One dynamic that a lot of people don't,that forget is that, when I run a
vena hood, how am I going to vent it?
Is it going to be directelbow out the back?
If so, then I'm going toneed a cover for the top.
Do I have a crawl space above that area?
Because there will be a duct thatwill run through the ceiling.
And also you want to take inconsideration if you're a designer
or a specifier, the duct cover.
(14:31):
These bigger grills need more airvolume to move out that smoke.
And are we going to get 100 percent outof that backyard or that back porch?
Probably not.
About 80 to 85, 90%.
So the winds in Texas whenyou have a downburst, A lot of
people think it's like interior.
It will take everything out ofthat back porch more than likely.
(14:53):
It's going to take most of it.
But generally it take,it'll take almost all of it.
Not completely.
Mike (14:58):
So you'll be, you'll have a little smoke smell on yourself when you will.
Bobby (15:01):
that's a gift from the grill God.
But yeah that's part of that, butit will take most of that that
smoke out and through the roof.
Mike (15:07):
So is there a height?
You want to be off thecounter with the grill?
Bobby (15:10):
There is, a lot of companies will go 32 to 36 off the finished top.
That's going to be, what's theheight that you're going to be?
We have 39 inch tops in here.
Are we 36?
But yes, are you going to wanta stainless steel backsplash?
from that manufacturer, and then alsoour outdoor depths are 30 inches.
Remember, a standard 24 inch depth.
(15:32):
Then it will not work.
Usually there's a stainless steelplenum on the backside that brings
out the Vena hood that would overlapthe front or hang over the front.
So all that smoke wouldgo up into the vent hood.
Mike (15:44):
And do most Vena hoods come with lights?
And so it can help from,
Bobby (15:48):
they do a lot of the outdoor rated hoods now do not have
just a charcoal screen in here.
They all have lights.
Some of them have dual CFM motors or600 each side, or a full 1200 CFM.
When you build these in, of courseyou know you'll y into a 10 inch.
that would go out the top of theroof and you're going to use that
(16:09):
weather collar and air cap for that.
Mike (16:11):
So do people use these with a big green egg or a primo as well?
Bobby (16:16):
That's a great question.
So yes, we see a lot of that.
A lot of people will try tosandwich a grill and a big
green egg into one Vena hood.
It's not going to work for you.
You would really need todo what's called a liner.
So it's different than this.
The liner, you would have a furdown cabinet that's outdoor rated,
maybe hardy backer, and then put theliner up inside of it to cover more
(16:37):
area or do dedicated vent hoods foreach appliance and charcoal grill.
So,
Mike (16:43):
awesome.
Well, thank you for that information.
Yeah.
BBQ Outro (16:45):
So I hope you enjoyed the barbecue bits that we just featured today
and we'll have more coming up next week.
If there's something in particular thatyou're interested for, let us know and
we'll get back into the episode now.
Mike (16:59):
There's some myths with salt systems.
Okay.
So let's discuss some myths withsalt systems to get those cleared up.
First of all, so the first thing is.
A lot of people say it's a salt system.
It doesn't have any chlorine in the pool.
Trey (17:13):
I've heard that actually multiple times because I was
a certified pool operator.
I did punch out items on jobs.
So I dealt with customers when we werehanding over the pool to them, pretty much
giving them the reins to take care of it.
And there was multiple times, I thinkonly twice actually, but where a
homeowner was allergic to chlorine.
At some kind of level, and so theysaid that they didn't have a chlorine
(17:36):
system they had a salt system instead.
so we would have to explain to them thatthere's still chlorine in the water, that
the salt cell actually creates chlorine.
It's a low dosage of chlorine,but it's still in there.
Mike (17:49):
Old school, going back again to when I was a kid, you put granular
chlorine in the swimming pool.
Yep, shock.
put it in typically on Saturdaymorning because that's when
dad dealt with the pool.
Yeah.
When did you go get to go swimming?
Saturday afternoon.
So you came out of the pool, you hadbloodshot eyes looking like ching
chong, your skin felt horrible.
(18:11):
Your hair was brittle.
And you know, if you were a girl andyou had, a lot of times that turned
weird colors and all this kind ofstuff, because that's what Corrine
did for you now smell like chlorine.
So it went to a really high level, butthen he didn't put chlorine in for a
week, so it dissipates all week long.
So Friday night, when you went swimming.
The water was great.
(18:31):
Oh yeah.
Okay.
No problems whatsoever.
it was this peak valley, and then peoplewould mess up and they'd forget because
they went to a wedding on Saturday.
So they didn't put anychlorine in the pool.
And then the, on Tuesday,the pool was green.
Okay.
And now we've got to dosomething to fix the green.
So we've got to add these chemicals.
One of that messes up this balance.
(18:51):
And so we got to add this over here.
And so there was this whole thing.
with chemicals that people hated.
Trey (18:58):
Yeah.
Once it gets out of balance, there'sso many ways that could go wrong.
Mike (19:00):
Yeah.
And so when the salt system came out,what it was is sodium chloride salt
going through electricity made coring.
Okay.
that's what it does inthe simplest of terms.
but there were countless peoplethat used to argue with me.
I want these.
No chlorine salt system, and I'm likethat doesn't exist And I would try
(19:23):
to explain to them go look up whatsalt is made of sodium chloride Okay,
Trey (19:27):
you don't have to add chlorine, but the chlorine is made
for you You add salt you add acidthey lower the pH levels right
Mike (19:34):
lots of chlorine Yes, a lot of bags and bags of chlorine.
Yes, and bags of salt yes.
Bags of salt.
Yes.
And then you have to gallons of acidbecause the alkalinity is so high in this.
Trey (19:48):
like the Dead Sea, you don't have anything living in there because
it's the Dead Sea has such a high.
Salt count.
Mike (19:53):
So it's a super chlorinated.
Yeah, the Dead Sea is asuper chlorinated pool.
Oh, interesting.
That's what so super chlorinated thatyou float in the water That's wild.
a salt system is not a no chlorineIt is still a chlorinated pool, but
what it does is it flatlines yourchlorine level instead of peak valley,
like it did with the old school,Saturday morning, Friday night,
(20:16):
Saturday morning, Friday night, it'sbasically flatlining you all week long.
So you don't have a real high, you don'thave a real low and it was automatic.
Trey (20:25):
And so people loved it.
Mike (20:27):
That's the first myth.
second myth is, is it azero maintenance system?
there's no such thing.
No, there is no such thing.
That's 100 percent right.
But there's a lot of people thatare like I heard assault system
is, there's no maintenance.
I put that on it and I just walk awayand my pool takes care of itself.
that was another misconception.
A lot of people still
Trey (20:47):
have.
You could argue less maintenance,but in reality, it all
balances out, I think, honestly.
Mike (20:53):
So your chemical balancing is a little bit trickier with a salt system
than it is with a chlorine system becauseyou're dealing with the pH movement.
And so you got to makesure there's enough acid.
You keep your pH levelsat the right levels.
Otherwise, you're going to end up withscaling and you're going to end up with
Trey (21:12):
I'm saying someone could argue technically that salt might be easier
because they just have to deal withacid versus getting shock and Okay.
Other components.
Mike (21:21):
Let me throw another thing that a lot of times people don't think about.
Okay.
It does rain.
Okay.
And now we've diluted yoursalt level on the pool.
So we used to have people that comehome and they'd say I thought salt
was low maintenance and I went onvacation and my pool was perfect and
I came back and my pool was green.
But what in the world happened?
Well, It rained for six days.
(21:42):
And so what happened is it dilutedthe salt level in the pool because
it was going out the overflow.
Yeah.
there wasn't enough salt in thepool to generate the chlorine.
So now he comes back andhe has algae in his pool.
Trey (21:53):
And your pH levels and alkalinity levels are higher.
Mike (21:56):
one thing that also, in this part of the country isn't an issue, but from what
I understand in some parts of the country,it's illegal to drain a saltwater pool.
Oh, wow.
Trey (22:07):
So how would you switch over?
Mike (22:09):
because in L.
A.
You can't drain your poolinto the public sewer system.
that's illegal
My guess is the salt is going toimpact the sewer system in some way.
Oh, interesting.
And that's something that I don't knowabout, but there are certain parts
of the country that don't allow youto drain a salt water pool because
(22:31):
they consider it not to be good forthe environment that it's going into.
And so you have to pump your pool out likewith a water truck or something like that.
that's another thing that I ran into.
The other thing is you have toreplace this cell That generates
the chlorine and that has to bedone over a certain period of time.
(22:53):
And a lot of that has to do with howwell you maintain your water quality and
how well you maintain the cell itself.
Okay.
But some people say you're going toreplace a cell every two to three years.
Some people claim that it's a year.
Some people complain sayit's seven or eight years.
And usually the person that's sayingit's really low is someone that's trying
(23:16):
to sell something as an alternative tosalt and the person that's really high,
they're trying to sell salt water pools.
So you have to take theinformation that you get with a.
A grain of salt.
it also depends on what partof the country you're in.
Again, yeah, going to see differentimpacts in different areas because
of the demand on the system.
But that's a cost.
And again, I saw costs all over the place.
(23:38):
And are we just looking at thecost of the cell and you're going
to DUI this, or is this a cost ofhiring someone to come out, but.
Usually I saw somewhere 700 to 1,000 in cost to replace the salt cell.
So that's one thing you have tofactor in when you're factoring
in what the cost of this overallsituation is to consider that.
(23:59):
One thing also that, I was surprised that,as there were some people that pointed out
that salt was not good for your health.
Trey (24:06):
Oh, so you're telling me the waffle fries from Chick fil A aren't healthy?
Mike (24:10):
Well, If you took a bath in them, that's what their concern is.
Trey (24:13):
Oh, okay.
Mike (24:14):
There's people that have high blood pressure.
Yeah.
That they do not want them to usetheir water softener because there's
salt in that at a much lower ratethan their salt in the swimming pool.
Now, I don't know how many people goaround drinking the water in their
swimming pool, but they're talking aboutimmersion in it causing a health risk.
I don't know how much that issomething, you have high blood
(24:36):
pressure you might want to considerlooking into, swimming in your salt.
At a lower level, I don't know,I'm just bringing up everything.
Trey (24:45):
My two boys, they drink the water a lot in the pool.
Mike (24:48):
They do, so I guess they don't have high blood pressure.
Guess not.
but his two boys are big whitefurry things called dogs.
Uh, do believe that the poolis a water bowl, although
there's no salt in that pool.
Trey (25:01):
No, thankfully.
Yeah, I'd be worried ifthere was salt in there.
Okay.
Mike (25:05):
Now, one thing also that it's talked a lot about is.
The salt is going to cause myequipment to deteriorate.
Trey (25:13):
Yeah,
Mike (25:13):
that's the word, deteriorate, yes.
Trey (25:15):
honestly I think that might be plausible.
Because it definitelydeteriorates metal it rusts and
Mike (25:21):
there's several places that you'll see deterioration generally.
Your pumps, probably.
Your pumps, your heater isdefinitely an issue with it.
When you have metal in the pool, likea ring around the light if you have a
ladder in your pool, if you have a divingboard the diving board jig and platform.
Now there's a lot of things that havecome out in the industry because people
(25:45):
use salt a lot that have actuallyplastic parts for those things.
And so with that, then you'regoing to not see a problem.
But a lot of the older pools, it's metal.
And in some pools, newer pools,they're still putting in metal.
It just depends on, if you put a saltsystem in, you'd probably want a salt
friendly diving board, which thereis one that exists that I know of you
(26:09):
can look at things to work around theequipment deterioration, although.
Your life expectancy of your equipment,I've told by many people that do remodels
is that they see about a 25 percentreduction of the lifespan of the product.
That makes sense.
So that's another thing to consider whenyou're looking at a saltwater system.
(26:30):
Now, what is chlorine do?
Okay.
Chlorine does three things.
Chlorine kills bacteria.
It kills algae and it provides a residual.
So when the system is off,it still does the first two.
So there is nothing elsethat does all three of those.
anytime somebody says, I'm going to takechlorine away and replace it with this.
(26:56):
It's not going to work.
Design Concept (26:59):
We're going to take a break for design concepts now.
So design concepts, what we're goingto do is talk about why we did the
Trey (27:13):
I don't know why this popped in my head, but one of the earliest jobs I
remember When I interned for you rightafter high school was the double pool.
I think it was in Louisville area.
I'm not going to get into specifics.
I don't want to say exactly theirlocation or anything like that.
But can you tell me more about thatdesign and what was going through
your mind as you worked on that job?
Mike (27:32):
that pool was a lot of fun.
I drove by this.
Particular piece of property all the timeyou could see it the prior owner that
had this house would decorate the back ofthe house with lights and it was on the
highest point overlooking the lake and youwould drive by and it would be beautiful
and it was funny because I was sitting intheir house in the very first appointment.
I'm like, I'm in the houseand they were like, what?
(27:54):
And I was like, yeah, I alwaysthought this house was really cool.
And so we walked out into thebackyard and the house dropped off.
About a hundred feet to the lake goodness.
No hundred foot drop not ahundred feet to the lake.
Yeah hundred foot drop Yeah,
Trey (28:09):
I remember seeing this as a kid.
This is like one of the first times I waslike, wow My dad does some crazy stuff.
Mike (28:14):
So this is the first drone
job that we did.
Trey (28:17):
Oh, that's cool.
Mike (28:18):
Yeah.
So your mom was flying the drone and shewas trying to learn how to fly the drone.
So she brought out her cheap drone firstand she flew it into a tree and I had
to climb up into the tree and get it.
And I was like, let's just leave it there.
mean, Who cares?
You bought a new one.
And she's like, no, Ineed to practice with my.
Drone that she would fly aroundin the house and chase the
dogs and all kinds of crazy
Trey (28:39):
stuff.
You left it there to be likea little fancy ornament.
Mike (28:41):
Yes.
It was a fancy Christmas ornament.
So this yard we worked out we sat andtalked to the clients and the clients
are like, I want to design the pool that.
This is where everybodywants to come and hang out.
And so if everybody wants to comeand hang out, we have to have
multiple uses of this swimming pool.
So we want an area that we can relax.
(29:02):
We want an area that we canplay volleyball and basketball.
We want a big ledge for chairs.
We want a really cool hottub by our master bedroom.
We want a slide.
We want a diving board.
We want it all.
Sounds like a great
Trey (29:18):
kind of vibe.
Yeah,
Mike (29:19):
it was a great situation.
The only thing they didn'twant was a lazy river.
Which was good because it's hardto put a lazy river on a cliff.
Okay.
That's the only river thatneeds to be in a flat spot.
I said, we want to design all thisand we have a beautiful lake view.
And so we're thinking wewant to do a vanishing edge.
I talked to him a little bit about it.
And I said, there's aconcept at that time.
(29:41):
I had only done, I want tosay once or twice before.
Trey (29:44):
This is like 2016, right?
Ish.
Mike (29:46):
Yeah, somewhere back in that time period.
the concept was, what if we madethe vanishing edge basin big and
we make the vanishing edge basininstead of just the vanishing edge
basin, let's make it a second pool.
And so it's what we call the double pool,
Trey (30:03):
double decker.
Mike (30:04):
the concept is the upper pool is all about the relaxation.
So there's a big tanning ledge.
We've got this big, shallow areawhere, people can play games and
stuff like that, but if they want,they can just hang out there.
And so it was all about thehanging out and looking cool.
And then it dropped down.
(30:26):
And so the transition from theupper pool to the lower pool hid.
The six foot tall slide.
Oh, that's
Trey (30:32):
perfect.
Mike (30:32):
And so you could walk up basically to the slide at the upper level, and
you're at the very top of the slide,and you slid down to the lower level.
So on one end of the pool we had theslide coming in, and the other end of the
pool we had the diving board coming in.
So the kids could, go down there androck the pool and splash and, go up
and down the slide and everybody can bereally active down there and everybody
(30:53):
can be up in the top pool chilling.
It sounds like a perfect activity pool.
Yes, so we had both.
with this, one of the concernsis we've got this big drop.
We don't want people walkingon the coping and then falling
off down to a lower level.
Cause the pool was down sixfeet, but there was a transition
area that was four feet down.
And so one of the things that we did.
(31:14):
Is on the coping we put fire bowlsthe fire bowls were bigger than the
coping so you couldn't step overa bowl because they were 30 inch
bowls so it would be real hard totransition and walk down this coping.
Yeah.
And so it kept the kids fromwalking on that and jumping
from one level to the next.
Trey (31:33):
And provides awesome aesthetic.
Mike (31:34):
Oh it was an awesome view.
I think there were four, maybe fivefire bowls on the edge of this pool.
And so at night.
You've got the upper pool lit up, yougot the fire bowls going, you've got
the sunset going out on the lake andthe water vanishing into the lake.
And you can hear lots of laughterand lots of fun because they're all
down below having a good old time.
(31:55):
this was a freeform pool.
This was back in the daysbefore things were real modern.
The house also wasn't very modern.
And also the setting wasdefinitely not modern.
So with all those things coming intoplay, it was something that worked
really well with the free form.
The original deck that wasthere was all flagstone.
(32:15):
So we did all flagstonedecks all around the pool.
So we could match up the aestheticand make everything blend together.
So it looked like it was allone piece all done together.
It was really nice downat the lower level.
We had a big, So people could hang outthere and enjoy that space and look out
(32:35):
over the lake and enjoy and watch all thekids playing down, coming down the slide.
We did a lot of lighting on the wall,so it looked really cool from the lake.
Trey (32:45):
So the wall that's the water would go on and fall into the bottom pool.
Correct.
So
Mike (32:50):
as the water went over that, it was all lit up at night.
So it looked really cool.
And then one of the cool things was,their spa was literally about five
steps away from the master bedroom door.
So they could step out thereand it sat up really high.
So you could look out over the wholeupper pool and then to the lake.
And so it was a really fun project.
(33:11):
One of the weird things on itwas we had initially concept.
Wise is we were going tocome in after the lower pool.
we dropped off the porch, 24 inches.
And so basically the walls andthe steps gave a lot of places for
people to hang out, but this, allthe walls were, 24 inches tall.
So they're like a seat bench.
(33:31):
And so then we got done the poollevel and then it dropped from there,
six feet down to the lower level.
But we had about a 20 foot elevationto deal with in that space.
So that meant we still had 12 more feetof elevation to deal with in that space.
And so we were going to build a 12 foottall wall on the backside and basically
(33:51):
pier everything and support everything.
We went to the city and wegot it engineered and went to
the city to get the permit.
And they said, you can'tbuild a wall over four feet.
And I'm like, no, I understand you have toget engineering on a wall over four feet.
And they're like, no, we don't allowany walls in this town over four feet.
Trey (34:09):
What
Mike (34:09):
in the
Trey (34:10):
world?
Mike (34:11):
And I was like, okay, wait, I'm confused.
Cause I can drive around andshow you lots of walls that are
over four feet tall in this town.
What about fences?
Trey (34:18):
Like
Mike (34:18):
that.
And they had some problemswith some things that were
built that structurally failed.
And so the result was the city counciljust passed a law that you couldn't
have any walls over four feet tall.
I gotcha.
And so it took a while for thatto come off the books, but that
didn't happen during my project.
So I had to go in, instead ofbuilding a 12 foot wall, we had to
(34:41):
do a four foot wall and then a spaceand another four foot wall and a
space, and another four foot wall.
The problem is we now had traveledfarther out on the slopes.
We had to build another four foot wall.
Yep.
So it was crazy.
What we had to do to pass the city code.
But that was what was required.
And so that's what we did.
And we were able to make it all work.
Trey (35:01):
I'm just curious, were these walls at the base of the bottom pool going down?
there was, I think I rememberexactly what you're talking about.
It's like almost like a wedding cake.
Yes.
Yeah, it's exactly like going down.
Mike (35:11):
the initial design, we weren't going to have a drop beam on the bottom pool.
Oh, okay.
And so one of the things that we did iswe put a four foot drop beam on that part
of the pool, or maybe it was two foot.
think it's two foot actually.
I think it's a two foot drop beam.
And then the walls start right after that.
But it was nice in the factthat it wasn't like this.
Suddenly you walk up to thewall it drops off 12 feet.
(35:32):
Yeah.
So which would have, hadto have a safety rail.
So what they ended up doing was plantingin between all these 4 foot walls so there
wasn't any railing as you looked out.
Spectacular job, a lot of fun.
Like I said, it was the firstNo, it wasn't the first.
It was the second or thirddouble pool that I did.
But it was the one that had all the funstuff in it and it had a phenomenal view.
Trey (35:53):
The wild one that they built.
just imagining them building, diggingand tying steel and building those walls.
It's crazy.
Yeah.
Mike (36:00):
So a few YouTube videos on that project.
Because that was thefirst one we had a drone.
So my wife was like out therealmost every day flying the drone
around filming all this stuff.
The excavation was really funand all the different levels.
And but also changed how we photographedswimming pools because one of the
coolest views is looking back at thehouse from the lake and there was no
(36:23):
way in the world prior to having adrone that you could get that picture.
No.
There wasn't a ladder tallenough to even, basically because
of the four foot terraces.
If I set a ladder up, I couldbarely see the bottom pool.
If you were on the
Trey (36:36):
bridge with an amazing camera, do you think you could got that shot?
Mike (36:39):
No, because I'm too low.
Oh, okay.
And also the trees are too thick.
Yeah.
Especially on that
Trey (36:45):
side.
That's closer to the
Mike (36:46):
bridge.
Trey (36:47):
Yeah.
Mike (36:47):
That makes sense.
But you can see it occasionally inthe fall after the leaves fall, you
can see the pool barely, but it'sstill, you're too low from the bridge.
It's a cool project, but we do a lotof fun things, but there's reasons
behind almost everything we do.
lot of times people are like, Oh,this is just all about pretty.
But it's all about.
The views from inside the house.
(37:07):
It's all about the functions of theactivities that we want to have.
It's all about creatingsafety aspects as well.
So there's a lot of thoughtprocess that goes into something.
We just can't pull that typeof thing out of 3d model and
plop it in that's for sure.
Trey (37:24):
Yeah.
Thank you for answering that andwalking me through the whole process.
So this job, they have the time lapseand all that on YouTube already.
DFW area vanishing.
dot, dot, dot, dot, by Mike Farley.
There's a lot of cool YouTubevideos that already have up.
And also you can check out any otherepisodes of our podcast or specific
cutouts that we do for the shorts or thedesign concepts or anything like that.
(37:46):
Make sure you give us acomment like the video.
If you appreciate it let usknow what you think about this
topic certain design and yeah.
Mike (37:53):
If you got other questions, just please let us know.
We'll I had someone submit to me todaythat they were curious about indoor pools.
And so we'll try to put some informationtogether and get a guest in here that's
an expert at that because I am not.
you wanted to talk about alternatives.
Yes.
a salt water pool is generating chlorine.
(38:14):
It's not generating anything else.
Exactly.
Megan, you can Corrine.
So it's still a coronated pool.
It's just that a steady lower level.
So an alternative.
Would be something that we're going to putin and we're going to take chlorine away.
Okay.
So when I was in Northern California,when I heard about saltwater pools
(38:35):
for the first time, we were one of thetest companies, I want to say in 92 for
This piece of equipment was a cartridgewhich had copper and silver in it.
Okay.
Copper and silver, their claimwas they are a natural algaecide.
their claim was a 70 to 80percent reduction in chlorine
(38:57):
with this piece of equipment.
And this piece of equipment, we wereone of three companies that were
test companies in the United States.
We were in Northern California,there was one in Florida, there was
one I believe in Atlanta, Georgia.
Okay, so we tested this piece ofequipment out and we said, there is the
capability to use less chlorine withthis, but there's no way in the world
(39:21):
this is a 70 to 80 percent reduction inchlorine here in the Sacramento Valley.
Trey (39:26):
So what you're talking about is an H or two cartridge.
Mike (39:29):
that is what it was.
It was a nature two cartridge.
Yes.
Okay.
So
Trey (39:33):
putting minerals into the water.
Mike (39:35):
Correct.
Water runs through the minerals.
Yeah, exactly.
So we said we see the, You couldprobably reduce the chlorine
rate by about 30 percent becauseit's so hot here instead of 80%.
Well, This company was in Minnesotaor Michigan or something like that.
Cold weather.
So somewhere where it wasn't quiteas hot as we were in the summer.
Yeah.
And so their initial testingspercent may have worked there,
(39:59):
but it didn't work in the valley.
And it didn't work in Arizona that way.
But, we suggested to them, if youclaim 30%, you're going to be great.
They went to market and claimed 70 to 80%.
So everybody started using thispiece of equipment and then threw
it away because it didn't work.
They worked great at 30%.
Expectations just
Trey (40:19):
weren't set to the right bar.
Mike (40:21):
now what happened is they ended up getting bought out.
And when they were remarketed,they remarketed at a much
lower percentage rate.
That's smart.
Okay.
we were using that and we had tested.
that works only on oneof the three things.
Does not provide a residual, doesn'twork on bacteria, just working on algae.
Trey (40:40):
Yeah.
And when the system's running.
Mike (40:42):
Okay.
And the system has to be running ahundred percent back in those days,
There were very few, mostly it was a twospeed pump, which was a high and a low.
There wasn't a variablespeed as we know it today.
Yeah.
But most people use single speed pumps.
Trey (40:57):
Variable speeds literally just got popular in the last
couple of years, just because ofthe regulations that's going on.
Mike (41:03):
They've been out 20.
Yeah.
Okay, but that just worked on one thing.
You still had to havechlorine do the other two.
Yeah.
Okay.
So we reduced our chlorine loads by 30%.
But at that, it took theburn out of people's eyes.
And so people are like,this is a nice product.
Okay.
One of our service techs was like,Hey, We tried that ozone thing a couple
(41:26):
years ago and tried it and tried totake chlorine away and it didn't work.
What if we put it with this thing?
Combine the systems?
Combine the two systems.
And we're like sounds like a good idea.
So we tried it.
So we put the ozone.
With the minerals nowozone worked on bacteria.
Yes, it's been out for about a hundredyears It's in every water treatment plant
(41:49):
in the United States It works phenomenallyin that case, but as a standalone
system, it didn't work for a swimmingpool and that Time and application.
So we put ozone on and we put naturetoo on, and we were able to drop
our coring loads by 70%, not 70%.
I was just slightly higher than tap water.
(42:10):
Yes.
Okay.
So that was the system Iwas selling in the nineties.
Okay.
In Northern California, I relocate toDFW in 99 tried to sell that system.
Everybody was like, bah, that'sfunny snake oil, snake oil.
I want my salt system.
when this situation occurred in the mid,two thousands, I went and said, Hey, I
(42:35):
tried this system in Northern California.
It worked really well.
You're going to try sealers.
Try to continue using salt.
, can I try this with my clients?
They're like why don't you call and seeif there's the other shoes falling in
Northern California And the, some trainwreck now has happened with this system.
So I called 'em up and said,Hey, is this still working?
(42:55):
They're like, it's great.
I was like, okay, that'swhat I need to know.
So at that point, he startedusing minerals and ozone and
low chlorine on my pools.
And that went by for about a year.
They were trying all kinds of sealers.
I was suggesting this to clients.
Most of my clients are like if that'swhat you think, we'll sign off on it.
(43:16):
They were happy with it.
And so after a year at thatpoint, then other people started
trying that system as well.
today the system we still use.
Trey (43:27):
That makes sense.
Like much better option then.
Putting sealers on and tellingthe customer, Hey, after you
use the pool, make sure youwash off the deck with those or
Mike (43:35):
something.
Here.
The thing is there are a tonof mineral systems that exist.
Yeah.
There's a ton of ozone systems that exist.
Oh yeah.
They do not perform all the same.
It's all different.
Okay.
So what you have to understand is.
The combination that's going to be right.
the other thing is your demandsare going to be different
(43:55):
depending on where you live
So the question that we started within the beginning, is it a crime to
put a salt system on a swimming pool?
Trey (44:04):
And tell someone that it is no maintenance and
that be the expectation 100%.
I think from the logic we havediscussed, there's ways you could
have it seems very tedious to do it.
And not optimal in my opinion.
And if you can have something with thesystem that you're talking about, that
has the same water quality, If you'reswimming in a pool with your eyes
(44:27):
open underwater, that's pretty muchthe same quality as a saltwater pool.
That's the big, I could swim with my eyesopen and they don't sting afterwards.
Yeah, it might be a crime.
What do you think?
Mike (44:37):
There's a couple other little nuggets in here that
I'm just going to throw out.
So salt also, does it damage concrete?
Trey (44:46):
It does not as much as stone though.
Mike (44:49):
Correct.
So does salt damage the concreteat a faster rate than coring?
Trey (44:55):
I don't know.
Salt damaging concrete.
Mike (44:58):
Yeah so there's two concrete structures, three concrete
structures we're dealing with here.
Okay.
Okay, the first concrete structureI'm talking about would be the deck.
Trey (45:06):
Yeah, that's the first one I think of.
Mike (45:07):
Okay, the second concrete structure is the blaster.
That is a concrete because it had base.
Okay.
Okay.
am I going to damage that overtime and a third structure that
you have the shell of the pool.
Yeah.
That's concrete.
Yeah.
those are all different, butI just want to bring it up.
So there was some literaturethat I read that said that salt.
(45:30):
Versus Corrine.
Trey (45:31):
Oh my, I know where you're going with this now.
Mike (45:33):
We'll damage five times faster, a plaster finish.
if saltwater can penetrate your shellover time, will the steel deteriorate?
Well, So are we talking about maybe.
20, 30 more years down the road, orare we going to have more issues with
salt, more issues with salt possibly.
(45:54):
I don't know the answers to that.
Trey (45:55):
No, this is all theories.
Mike (45:57):
But my question is I know what saltwater did to everything as a kid.
it's just something to thinkabout over a period of time, how's
your plaster going to hold up?
How's your steel going to hold up?
And quite honestly, how's theconcrete deck going to hold
up over a period of time?
Now I know that, they say thatit's been out for a long time and
(46:17):
it hasn't caused any problems.
I know that growing up as a kid, there wasconcrete that was damaged by saltwater.
Now that was ocean water andthat's at a higher salt level.
Okay.
So that's different.
I understand that, but theseare all things to think about.
is it a true crime to put a saltwater system in a swimming pool?
(46:38):
Here's what I think is the crime.
Okay.
If.
You don't explain the options to a client.
Client comes to you and says,I want a saltwater pool.
Okay.
you just give them a saltwater pooland you don't say anything about it.
Now, some people say that'sgood for the remodel business.
That's true.
It is.
Trey (46:56):
Yeah.
25 percent more repairs.
Mike (46:58):
Yeah.
And more coping damageand all those things.
Joking aside my feeling is asa professional, it's to give
the homeowner information.
And so I'm not going to just automaticallysay, yes, I will give you a salt system.
I'm going to ask you whyyou want a salt system.
And I'm going to explainCorrine and how it works.
(47:21):
And I'm going to show you alternatives.
And I'm going to tell you the priceof this and the price of that and
the long term maintenance impacts.
And when I go through that here inNorth Texas to me, It's a crime to
put that in a swimming pool, given thetrifecta that we have here with minimal
rainfall, evaporation, and the stonesthat are readily used in this area.
(47:42):
Northern Florida using a concrete,precast or cantilevered concrete, and
it rains all the time in the summer.
And, think you don't have a trackrecord of problems, nor, Southern
California, the same thing.
So don't think that's aproblem to sell that system.
So I think you have to lookat all the factors to decide.
(48:03):
If it's a problem or not.
Okay.
Any questions?
Trey (48:05):
not at the moment.
No.
Mike (48:07):
Okay.
Well, That kind of completed all theinformation that we have on saltwater
pools and you'll have to decideif that's a crime to you or not.
Yeah.
We have other requests for otherpool true crimes that have been done.
Some of the suggestions haveto talk about hydraulics.
Another one, someone suggestedto me is should you buy a pool
(48:29):
without a three dimensional model?
Interesting.
Should you buy a poolwithout a proper grading plan
Trey (48:36):
or a maybe a construction document that's only one page long?
Mike (48:39):
Oh, yes, the one page contract.
Yes, that probably isdefinitely a true crime.
So Please if you have suggestionson some other crimes that we should
discuss, please let us know what thoseare And we enjoyed discussing this
and hopefully we gave you some goodinsight, but if you've got questions
and comments, let us know on eitherthe YouTube videos or on the website.
Trey (49:01):
use that comment section on the YouTube as a little form and keep
this conversation going and we'reeager to hear what y'all have to say.
Mike (49:08):
Thanks again.
Trey (49:08):
Have a good one.
Outro (49:10):
This show is all about helping you become a better
buyer, a better pool owner.
And hopefully you're going to find someinsights into how to enjoy your pool, even
more so how to help your friends, yourfamily, anybody looking to buy a pool in
the future or that want to remodel theirbackyard, add an outdoor fireplace, fire
pit, add an outdoor kitchen area, addsome shade cells or whatever else it is.
(49:33):
We want to be that resource for you.
And that's the end goal here.
And we promise.
That there's going tobe a ton of information.
We'll try to go through it, youknow, as relatively quickly, but
also slow so people can understand.
But the intent of the show, thereason Mike and I are doing this
is because we just got a lot inour heads and we want to share it.
So we hope to see youhere every single week.
Thanks for listening.
Hello everybody.
Welcome to the poolsideperspectives podcast.
I am Kevin Woodhurst and with me is mygood friend, Mike Farley, and we're so
glad you found this podcast together.
We have been homeowner advocatesand outdoor living and the pool
industry for over 30 years.
So we understand the challenges youface creating your backyard paradise.
We know your curiosity is notenough to ensure your success.
(00:21):
So on this podcast, we're going to talkabout the design process and practical
steps to help you create that space.
We'll have some fun mixed in with it.
Some aha moments.
And this is no fluff.
No one has time for that.
So we're going to get serious and getvery particular about all of these topics.
Whether you are a new homeowner with yourfirst remodel or a seasoned homeowner
(00:41):
competing your last dream home, we arehere to help you end up with what you
dreamed of from pools to patios, pizza,ovens, to pergolas, porcelain to pumps.
Pool party to permits, ping pong tablesto the processes, to your paradise.
This is straight talk and action steps.
Let's get started.
Mike (01:08):
Good afternoon This is mike farley poolside perspective podcast and we have
a very interesting episode today for allyou true crime fans out there We are going
to explore pool true crime and you guyswill decide if this is a crime or not.
So what we're going to actually talkabout is salt systems And saltwater
pools and the pros and the cons of it.
(01:31):
And should you be using it orshould you not be using it?
And we'll help you get someinformation so you can make
an educated decision on that.
It's been a nice cool weather here in DFW.
we went to
Trey (01:47):
Colorado.
It was nice, cool weather there as well.
And then it followed us back.
And
Mike (01:51):
it followed us back.
So for all you that are appreciatedhere in DFW you have us to
thank cause we went up there.
I think it was because Treywent up there and had fun.
Trey (02:01):
Oh yeah, I popped the question and she said yes.
So that's a good thing.
awesome.
She's celebrating herbirthday actually tomorrow
Mike (02:08):
all good things for September.
Trey (02:10):
Oh, yeah.
September's been awesome.
Yeah.
Mike (02:12):
We're going to drive into this episode and talk about salt water.
So a little history.
I'm an old guy in the pool industry.
was in the late nineties.
This system came over from Australiaand they said, we're going to put
salt water in pools and it's goingto generate chlorine for you.
And this is a low maintenance system.
Trey (02:33):
Wow.
So it came from Australia.
Mike (02:35):
Came from Australia.
And I laughed hysterically.
I was like, that's the stupidestthing I've ever heard of.
Trey (02:42):
Oh, so this came in when you were in the industry.
Mike (02:44):
Oh yeah.
late nineties, I'd worked for,Jeremy of pools for about seven
years about the time this happened.
and the reason why is I was born inpoint pleasant, New Jersey point,
pleasant, Overlooks the ocean.
Trey (02:57):
Yeah.
Mike (02:58):
Okay.
So grew up in Seaside Heights beforethere was a Jersey Shore TV show.
That's where I grew up.
Trey (03:04):
Smells like salt in the air.
Mike (03:06):
Salt in the air all the time.
I lived all maybe a mileaway from the ocean.
So good smell and the pineys.
And so I know it's salt did everything.
Your cars were destroyed, your roadswere destroyed, all the things that
salt did to all kinds of metal and justeverything just deteriorated over time.
(03:26):
And I'm like, you're gonna voluntarily.
Put salt inside a swimming pool.
If you had to, I could understand, but tovolunteer, to put salt in your pool, I was
like, this is going to be a train wreck.
This isn't going to last two or threeyears and it's going to be off the market.
So I crow about five years laterbecause the salt industry was booming.
(03:48):
at that point I had relocated toTexas and I was familiar with using
a low chlorine supplemented system inNorthern California where I used a lot
of ozone and minerals in conjunctionwith a very low amount of chlorine.
And so tried selling that to everybodyand everybody was like, that sounds
like some kind of janky system.
(04:09):
That you're trying topush off on me, the little
Trey (04:10):
snake oil action.
Yeah.
Mike (04:12):
This is totally not legit.
And I've got 45 friends thathave a saltwater pool and by
gosh, I want a saltwater pool.
Trey (04:20):
Everybody's got it.
No issues at all.
No
Mike (04:22):
issues at all.
It was going great.
And so I was like, that's whateverybody's using, and I built my
pool at that point in time, and Iput a salt system on my pool, because
if I'm going to sell salt I might aswell have it on my own personal pool.
And about the next year,the summer rolled around.
And that summer it was extremelyhot and it did not rain at all.
(04:45):
We were in a severe drought situationand towards the end of the summer, we
started getting phone calls and the phonecall went something about like this.
You need to come out andlook at the stone on my pool.
wrong with your pool?
My stones rotting.
Trey (04:59):
This is about five years.
Into the craze of salt?
Mike (05:02):
No, this is probably about 10.
Okay.
Trey (05:04):
And so it was bone dry that summer.
So why of nowhere, everyone's calling you.
Mike (05:09):
didn't know.
And so went out on these pools and forthe first probably dozen, 20, we'd go
out and look at it and be like, Whatin the world did you do to this stone?
You're right.
It's rotting.
I mean, You could tap on thestone and it would crumble.
It was just falling apart.
Now we predominantly used inthis marketplace, a flagstone.
(05:31):
Okay.
So Oklahoma flagstone, who'sthe predominant stone, the
secondary stone that was used.
Was travertine, which wasbrought up from Mexico.
So those were the twopredominant stones used in the
Trey (05:44):
and we're in
Mike (05:45):
Texas.
Yeah.
Okay.
Dallas, Fort Worth area, Texas.
So we started trying to figure out whatcorrelates with all these pools because
we didn't just see it on the flagstone.
We saw some on the travertine andthere was a project that I went to
that had New England blue stone.
Now New England bluestone's really hard.
Trey (06:03):
Okay, and Oklahoma's flagstone's pretty soft.
Mike (06:05):
if you're a scale of stones across the board, yeah, it's a sandstone,
flagstone, so it's on the softer side,and there's some that are worse than that.
But travertine's pretty hard.
But travertine's, Durable.
It's fairly durable.
After doing some research, we finallyconnected that every single one
of these pools had a salt system.
Now we didn't know what that meant.
(06:26):
Yeah, it's just theyall had a salt system.
so someone then started thinking, and Idon't know who did it or what, but we were
trying to figure things out and someonemade a call to a predominant pool builder.
In Australia and said, have youever had problems with stone
deteriorating with a saltwater pool?
(06:49):
And they're like, Oh, yeah, Oh,
Trey (06:51):
wasn't Australia where this originated from?
Mike (06:53):
This is where it originated.
So they
Trey (06:55):
introduced it, but they're there.
Time clock is already ahead because theyhave so many projects that are already
Mike (07:00):
right.
And they were like, Oh,yeah, we don't ever use it.
Was stone
was like what do you mean?
And they're like saltwhen it dries expands.
Yeah.
And so what it'll do is causeyour stone doll fall apart.
And we're like, yeah, we're kindof experiencing that at the moment.
Trey (07:17):
Oh, and it was a bone dry summer.
So it was very dry.
So
Mike (07:22):
several things happened that made this such a catastrophe.
But anyway, what they said iswe use a lot of concrete on the
edge of our pools, not stone.
And so it doesn't affect the concrete.
Nearly at the rate thatit does on the stone.
Trey (07:39):
Okay.
Mike (07:39):
And if you're going to use it with stone, you need to seal it.
And we're like okay, that's a great idea.
I wish someone hadmentioned it 10 years ago.
Cause we had all these, and some of thesepools weren't old either, we're trying
to figure out why they deteriorated atdifferent rates and everything like that.
There were several things that cameinto play as we thought about it.
And we understood is one,we had a drought, it did
(08:00):
not rain at all that summer.
There was not one single storm.
So it's really
Trey (08:05):
hot.
Mike (08:06):
no, what happens is nothing rinsed the salt off the edge of the coping.
Trey (08:11):
So it doesn't wash the deck off.
Mike (08:12):
Okay.
So if you're in an area that hasregular rainfall and you have a salt
system, you don't have a problem.
Okay.
Because it's rinsing it off.
Okay.
because we had the drought,that was the first problem.
The second problem is it's based on theproblem comes up because of evaporation,
the salt dries and it expands.
(08:34):
So the more you get wet, dry, wet,dry, wet, dry, wet, dry, the faster
this deterioration is going to occur.
Okay.
So we're hot here.
Yes.
We get a lot of evaporation.
Oh, yeah.
Okay.
So that occurring, especially onthe top of a spa where people are
getting in and out all the time.
And the entries steps of the pool.
(08:55):
Those are the two areas thatwent to, complete disaster areas.
And.
the other thing that came intoplay is what materials we used now,
some other parts of the country,when we first came across this, we
were one of the first companies tosay, this is a saltwater problem.
And there were people all in DFWgoing, you guys are full of garbage.
Trey (09:18):
And also every customer at the time wants a saltwater pool.
So it's like the most popular thing.
You are going to pretty muchsay this is the problem.
So what does that do?
So that turns away so many clients atthat time, because now it's a little
bit more, I don't mind chlorine aslong as the water's not as harsh.
at that time, it's like pretty muchsaying, Hey, we're not going to do
this because it's going to deteriorate.
(09:38):
And so
Mike (09:39):
there were a lot of, we're just going to walk away.
There are a lot of pool companiesare like, this is a sales gimmick.
Trey (09:43):
Yeah, exactly.
Mike (09:44):
You guys are saying this because you're going to sell this other thing.
And, try to paint us all that wewere using salt systems as bad guys.
Okay.
And it was just, that's what we found.
And so at that point we startedsealing off our stone that got salt.
Trey (10:02):
wouldn't salt still get through the sealers?
Mike (10:04):
Uh, Okay.
the first thing is when people say,I'm going to put a sealer on and
it's a, makes it a salt friendlyto my stone that does not exist.
That doesn't make sense in my mind at all.
Okay.
It will slow the process down.
Okay.
But it is not stopping that process.
Trey (10:23):
And you're going to have more areas that get more exposure to salt.
So those parts are going to wearoff quicker with the sealer.
That
Mike (10:28):
recommendation is that you reseal it.
Trey (10:31):
Clicker
Mike (10:32):
every year to situation with those stones.
Now, again, other parts of thecountry, as basically people got
information, people realized, okay, acommon comment was, it's not the salt.
I got bad stone.
Trey (10:48):
I've heard that multiple times before, actually.
Mike (10:50):
Okay.
I got bad stone.
And because I got bad stonemy stones falling apart.
It's not my salt system.
And here's the thing.
People love their salt systems.
Trey (11:00):
Yeah.
Mike (11:00):
get into what salt does and everything here in a second after
I finished my long winded story.
People loved it and so theydidn't want to get rid of it.
So a lot of people werelike no, it's bad stone.
And so everybody's like,oh yeah, it's bad stone.
Bad stone's the problem.
Now here's the challenge.
We've been using thatsame stone for decades.
Yeah.
It wasn't bad before.
(11:21):
No.
Yeah.
It worked fine.
Okay.
There wasn't any problems with it.
And all of a sudden it startsfalling apart with everybody that
has salt water associated with it.
that gave us a basis of informationthat could understand because there are
people in California are like, we don'tknow what you're talking about, but
Trey (11:40):
they're probably using concrete instead of stone.
Mike (11:42):
They're using predominantly precast stone.
Trey (11:45):
Yeah.
Mike (11:45):
Or they're using cantilevered concrete.
Okay.
On their projects.
I can count on one hand, how many jobsI use stone on in Northern California,
the first five years I was in the
Trey (11:56):
business.
But in Texas, our neighbors Oklahoma,Flagstone, we pulled out of the ground.
Mike (12:01):
Well, And you got Millsap Austin stone, all those stones, the reason
they're called that is because they'repulled out of quarries in Texas.
Yeah, exactly.
That's the name of the town.
Yeah.
And so, we have apredominantly stone market.
the other thing is, we havea very high evaporation rate.
Yeah.
We also have times that we don't get alot of rainfall, especially in the summer.
(12:23):
Yeah.
Where you have your predominantissues with salt being put on the
deck because people are gettingin and out of the swimming pool.
Trey (12:30):
Yeah.
Mike (12:31):
So we have the perfect trifecta for our salt system not to work.
Trey (12:36):
I could just imagine.
During the summer when it's adrought, people get out of the pool,
the water gets all over the coping,the decks and everything, and then
it dries, and it never washes offbecause there's no water, no rainfall.
And that happens over and over andover throughout the whole time, the
main time people are using their pools.
Mike (12:52):
Especially we have got people, family with kids, they're getting in
and out of the pool 50 times in a day.
Trey (12:58):
Easy.
Doing cannonballs, jumpingin the pool, everything.
Mike (13:01):
Okay.
Okay.
The whole story there is to givea premise of where we started.
And what the challengeswere from that situation.
BBQ Intro (13:13):
We're going to take a break here for a second
and get into outdoor living.
So with outdoor living, we liketo go to barbecue bits here.
We're going to share some informationof everything that you may want to
consider in your outdoor living space.
As far as features,especially for the kitchen.
Hope you enjoy this.
Mike (13:33):
Morning Bobby.
Morning.
So we've got questions about smokeand with smoke and cooking, a lot of
people were like, do I need a vent hood?
And when do I need one?
And what do we have that would work?
Bobby (13:47):
So we're bringing a lot of the indoor to outdoors now.
What we've seen is anincrease in vent hood sales.
Yes, if you're in an interior wall,not an exterior wall, you're probably
going to specify a vent hood.
For an outdoor rated venthood, we need minimum 1200 CFM.
We're going to go outsideof the grill span.
So if it's a 36 inch grill, preferablya 42 to a 48 inch vena hood.
(14:10):
One dynamic that a lot of people don't,that forget is that, when I run a
vena hood, how am I going to vent it?
Is it going to be directelbow out the back?
If so, then I'm going toneed a cover for the top.
Do I have a crawl space above that area?
Because there will be a duct thatwill run through the ceiling.
And also you want to take inconsideration if you're a designer
or a specifier, the duct cover.
(14:31):
These bigger grills need more airvolume to move out that smoke.
And are we going to get 100 percent outof that backyard or that back porch?
Probably not.
About 80 to 85, 90%.
So the winds in Texas whenyou have a downburst, A lot of
people think it's like interior.
It will take everything out ofthat back porch more than likely.
(14:53):
It's going to take most of it.
But generally it take,it'll take almost all of it.
Not completely.
Mike (14:58):
So you'll be, you'll have a little smoke smell on yourself when you will.
Bobby (15:01):
that's a gift from the grill God.
But yeah that's part of that, butit will take most of that that
smoke out and through the roof.
Mike (15:07):
So is there a height?
You want to be off thecounter with the grill?
Bobby (15:10):
There is, a lot of companies will go 32 to 36 off the finished top.
That's going to be, what's theheight that you're going to be?
We have 39 inch tops in here.
Are we 36?
But yes, are you going to wanta stainless steel backsplash?
from that manufacturer, and then alsoour outdoor depths are 30 inches.
Remember, a standard 24 inch depth.
(15:32):
Then it will not work.
Usually there's a stainless steelplenum on the backside that brings
out the Vena hood that would overlapthe front or hang over the front.
So all that smoke wouldgo up into the vent hood.
Mike (15:44):
And do most Vena hoods come with lights?
And so it can help from,
Bobby (15:48):
they do a lot of the outdoor rated hoods now do not have
just a charcoal screen in here.
They all have lights.
Some of them have dual CFM motors or600 each side, or a full 1200 CFM.
When you build these in, of courseyou know you'll y into a 10 inch.
that would go out the top of theroof and you're going to use that
(16:09):
weather collar and air cap for that.
Mike (16:11):
So do people use these with a big green egg or a primo as well?
Bobby (16:16):
That's a great question.
So yes, we see a lot of that.
A lot of people will try tosandwich a grill and a big
green egg into one Vena hood.
It's not going to work for you.
You would really need todo what's called a liner.
So it's different than this.
The liner, you would have a furdown cabinet that's outdoor rated,
maybe hardy backer, and then put theliner up inside of it to cover more
(16:37):
area or do dedicated vent hoods foreach appliance and charcoal grill.
So,
Mike (16:43):
awesome.
Well, thank you for that information.
Yeah.
BBQ Outro (16:45):
So I hope you enjoyed the barbecue bits that we just featured today
and we'll have more coming up next week.
If there's something in particular thatyou're interested for, let us know and
we'll get back into the episode now.
Mike (16:59):
There's some myths with salt systems.
Okay.
So let's discuss some myths withsalt systems to get those cleared up.
First of all, so the first thing is.
A lot of people say it's a salt system.
It doesn't have any chlorine in the pool.
Trey (17:13):
I've heard that actually multiple times because I was
a certified pool operator.
I did punch out items on jobs.
So I dealt with customers when we werehanding over the pool to them, pretty much
giving them the reins to take care of it.
And there was multiple times, I thinkonly twice actually, but where a
homeowner was allergic to chlorine.
At some kind of level, and so theysaid that they didn't have a chlorine
(17:36):
system they had a salt system instead.
so we would have to explain to them thatthere's still chlorine in the water, that
the salt cell actually creates chlorine.
It's a low dosage of chlorine,but it's still in there.
Mike (17:49):
Old school, going back again to when I was a kid, you put granular
chlorine in the swimming pool.
Yep, shock.
put it in typically on Saturdaymorning because that's when
dad dealt with the pool.
Yeah.
When did you go get to go swimming?
Saturday afternoon.
So you came out of the pool, you hadbloodshot eyes looking like ching
chong, your skin felt horrible.
(18:11):
Your hair was brittle.
And you know, if you were a girl andyou had, a lot of times that turned
weird colors and all this kind ofstuff, because that's what Corrine
did for you now smell like chlorine.
So it went to a really high level, butthen he didn't put chlorine in for a
week, so it dissipates all week long.
So Friday night, when you went swimming.
The water was great.
(18:31):
Oh yeah.
Okay.
No problems whatsoever.
it was this peak valley, and then peoplewould mess up and they'd forget because
they went to a wedding on Saturday.
So they didn't put anychlorine in the pool.
And then the, on Tuesday,the pool was green.
Okay.
And now we've got to dosomething to fix the green.
So we've got to add these chemicals.
One of that messes up this balance.
(18:51):
And so we got to add this over here.
And so there was this whole thing.
with chemicals that people hated.
Trey (18:58):
Yeah.
Once it gets out of balance, there'sso many ways that could go wrong.
Mike (19:00):
Yeah.
And so when the salt system came out,what it was is sodium chloride salt
going through electricity made coring.
Okay.
that's what it does inthe simplest of terms.
but there were countless peoplethat used to argue with me.
I want these.
No chlorine salt system, and I'm likethat doesn't exist And I would try
(19:23):
to explain to them go look up whatsalt is made of sodium chloride Okay,
Trey (19:27):
you don't have to add chlorine, but the chlorine is made
for you You add salt you add acidthey lower the pH levels right
Mike (19:34):
lots of chlorine Yes, a lot of bags and bags of chlorine.
Yes, and bags of salt yes.
Bags of salt.
Yes.
And then you have to gallons of acidbecause the alkalinity is so high in this.
Trey (19:48):
like the Dead Sea, you don't have anything living in there because
it's the Dead Sea has such a high.
Salt count.
Mike (19:53):
So it's a super chlorinated.
Yeah, the Dead Sea is asuper chlorinated pool.
Oh, interesting.
That's what so super chlorinated thatyou float in the water That's wild.
a salt system is not a no chlorineIt is still a chlorinated pool, but
what it does is it flatlines yourchlorine level instead of peak valley,
like it did with the old school,Saturday morning, Friday night,
(20:16):
Saturday morning, Friday night, it'sbasically flatlining you all week long.
So you don't have a real high, you don'thave a real low and it was automatic.
Trey (20:25):
And so people loved it.
Mike (20:27):
That's the first myth.
second myth is, is it azero maintenance system?
there's no such thing.
No, there is no such thing.
That's 100 percent right.
But there's a lot of people thatare like I heard assault system
is, there's no maintenance.
I put that on it and I just walk awayand my pool takes care of itself.
that was another misconception.
A lot of people still
Trey (20:47):
have.
You could argue less maintenance,but in reality, it all
balances out, I think, honestly.
Mike (20:53):
So your chemical balancing is a little bit trickier with a salt system
than it is with a chlorine system becauseyou're dealing with the pH movement.
And so you got to makesure there's enough acid.
You keep your pH levelsat the right levels.
Otherwise, you're going to end up withscaling and you're going to end up with
Trey (21:12):
I'm saying someone could argue technically that salt might be easier
because they just have to deal withacid versus getting shock and Okay.
Other components.
Mike (21:21):
Let me throw another thing that a lot of times people don't think about.
Okay.
It does rain.
Okay.
And now we've diluted yoursalt level on the pool.
So we used to have people that comehome and they'd say I thought salt
was low maintenance and I went onvacation and my pool was perfect and
I came back and my pool was green.
But what in the world happened?
Well, It rained for six days.
(21:42):
And so what happened is it dilutedthe salt level in the pool because
it was going out the overflow.
Yeah.
there wasn't enough salt in thepool to generate the chlorine.
So now he comes back andhe has algae in his pool.
Trey (21:53):
And your pH levels and alkalinity levels are higher.
Mike (21:56):
one thing that also, in this part of the country isn't an issue, but from what
I understand in some parts of the country,it's illegal to drain a saltwater pool.
Oh, wow.
Trey (22:07):
So how would you switch over?
Mike (22:09):
because in L.
A.
You can't drain your poolinto the public sewer system.
that's illegal
My guess is the salt is going toimpact the sewer system in some way.
Oh, interesting.
And that's something that I don't knowabout, but there are certain parts
of the country that don't allow youto drain a salt water pool because
(22:31):
they consider it not to be good forthe environment that it's going into.
And so you have to pump your pool out likewith a water truck or something like that.
that's another thing that I ran into.
The other thing is you have toreplace this cell That generates
the chlorine and that has to bedone over a certain period of time.
(22:53):
And a lot of that has to do with howwell you maintain your water quality and
how well you maintain the cell itself.
Okay.
But some people say you're going toreplace a cell every two to three years.
Some people claim that it's a year.
Some people complain sayit's seven or eight years.
And usually the person that's sayingit's really low is someone that's trying
(23:16):
to sell something as an alternative tosalt and the person that's really high,
they're trying to sell salt water pools.
So you have to take theinformation that you get with a.
A grain of salt.
it also depends on what partof the country you're in.
Again, yeah, going to see differentimpacts in different areas because
of the demand on the system.
But that's a cost.
And again, I saw costs all over the place.
(23:38):
And are we just looking at thecost of the cell and you're going
to DUI this, or is this a cost ofhiring someone to come out, but.
Usually I saw somewhere 700 to 1,000 in cost to replace the salt cell.
So that's one thing you have tofactor in when you're factoring
in what the cost of this overallsituation is to consider that.
(23:59):
One thing also that, I was surprised that,as there were some people that pointed out
that salt was not good for your health.
Trey (24:06):
Oh, so you're telling me the waffle fries from Chick fil A aren't healthy?
Mike (24:10):
Well, If you took a bath in them, that's what their concern is.
Trey (24:13):
Oh, okay.
Mike (24:14):
There's people that have high blood pressure.
Yeah.
That they do not want them to usetheir water softener because there's
salt in that at a much lower ratethan their salt in the swimming pool.
Now, I don't know how many people goaround drinking the water in their
swimming pool, but they're talking aboutimmersion in it causing a health risk.
I don't know how much that issomething, you have high blood
(24:36):
pressure you might want to considerlooking into, swimming in your salt.
At a lower level, I don't know,I'm just bringing up everything.
Trey (24:45):
My two boys, they drink the water a lot in the pool.
Mike (24:48):
They do, so I guess they don't have high blood pressure.
Guess not.
but his two boys are big whitefurry things called dogs.
Uh, do believe that the poolis a water bowl, although
there's no salt in that pool.
Trey (25:01):
No, thankfully.
Yeah, I'd be worried ifthere was salt in there.
Okay.
Mike (25:05):
Now, one thing also that it's talked a lot about is.
The salt is going to cause myequipment to deteriorate.
Trey (25:13):
Yeah,
Mike (25:13):
that's the word, deteriorate, yes.
Trey (25:15):
honestly I think that might be plausible.
Because it definitelydeteriorates metal it rusts and
Mike (25:21):
there's several places that you'll see deterioration generally.
Your pumps, probably.
Your pumps, your heater isdefinitely an issue with it.
When you have metal in the pool, likea ring around the light if you have a
ladder in your pool, if you have a divingboard the diving board jig and platform.
Now there's a lot of things that havecome out in the industry because people
(25:45):
use salt a lot that have actuallyplastic parts for those things.
And so with that, then you'regoing to not see a problem.
But a lot of the older pools, it's metal.
And in some pools, newer pools,they're still putting in metal.
It just depends on, if you put a saltsystem in, you'd probably want a salt
friendly diving board, which thereis one that exists that I know of you
(26:09):
can look at things to work around theequipment deterioration, although.
Your life expectancy of your equipment,I've told by many people that do remodels
is that they see about a 25 percentreduction of the lifespan of the product.
That makes sense.
So that's another thing to consider whenyou're looking at a saltwater system.
(26:30):
Now, what is chlorine do?
Okay.
Chlorine does three things.
Chlorine kills bacteria.
It kills algae and it provides a residual.
So when the system is off,it still does the first two.
So there is nothing elsethat does all three of those.
anytime somebody says, I'm going to takechlorine away and replace it with this.
(26:56):
It's not going to work.
Design Concept (26:59):
We're going to take a break for design concepts now.
So design concepts, what we're goingto do is talk about why we did the
Trey (27:13):
I don't know why this popped in my head, but one of the earliest jobs I
remember When I interned for you rightafter high school was the double pool.
I think it was in Louisville area.
I'm not going to get into specifics.
I don't want to say exactly theirlocation or anything like that.
But can you tell me more about thatdesign and what was going through
your mind as you worked on that job?
Mike (27:32):
that pool was a lot of fun.
I drove by this.
Particular piece of property all the timeyou could see it the prior owner that
had this house would decorate the back ofthe house with lights and it was on the
highest point overlooking the lake and youwould drive by and it would be beautiful
and it was funny because I was sitting intheir house in the very first appointment.
I'm like, I'm in the houseand they were like, what?
(27:54):
And I was like, yeah, I alwaysthought this house was really cool.
And so we walked out into thebackyard and the house dropped off.
About a hundred feet to the lake goodness.
No hundred foot drop not ahundred feet to the lake.
Yeah hundred foot drop Yeah,
Trey (28:09):
I remember seeing this as a kid.
This is like one of the first times I waslike, wow My dad does some crazy stuff.
Mike (28:14):
So this is the first drone
job that we did.
Trey (28:17):
Oh, that's cool.
Mike (28:18):
Yeah.
So your mom was flying the drone and shewas trying to learn how to fly the drone.
So she brought out her cheap drone firstand she flew it into a tree and I had
to climb up into the tree and get it.
And I was like, let's just leave it there.
mean, Who cares?
You bought a new one.
And she's like, no, Ineed to practice with my.
Drone that she would fly aroundin the house and chase the
dogs and all kinds of crazy
Trey (28:39):
stuff.
You left it there to be likea little fancy ornament.
Mike (28:41):
Yes.
It was a fancy Christmas ornament.
So this yard we worked out we sat andtalked to the clients and the clients
are like, I want to design the pool that.
This is where everybodywants to come and hang out.
And so if everybody wants to comeand hang out, we have to have
multiple uses of this swimming pool.
So we want an area that we can relax.
(29:02):
We want an area that we canplay volleyball and basketball.
We want a big ledge for chairs.
We want a really cool hottub by our master bedroom.
We want a slide.
We want a diving board.
We want it all.
Sounds like a great
Trey (29:18):
kind of vibe.
Yeah,
Mike (29:19):
it was a great situation.
The only thing they didn'twant was a lazy river.
Which was good because it's hardto put a lazy river on a cliff.
Okay.
That's the only river thatneeds to be in a flat spot.
I said, we want to design all thisand we have a beautiful lake view.
And so we're thinking wewant to do a vanishing edge.
I talked to him a little bit about it.
And I said, there's aconcept at that time.
(29:41):
I had only done, I want tosay once or twice before.
Trey (29:44):
This is like 2016, right?
Ish.
Mike (29:46):
Yeah, somewhere back in that time period.
the concept was, what if we madethe vanishing edge basin big and
we make the vanishing edge basininstead of just the vanishing edge
basin, let's make it a second pool.
And so it's what we call the double pool,
Trey (30:03):
double decker.
Mike (30:04):
the concept is the upper pool is all about the relaxation.
So there's a big tanning ledge.
We've got this big, shallow areawhere, people can play games and
stuff like that, but if they want,they can just hang out there.
And so it was all about thehanging out and looking cool.
And then it dropped down.
(30:26):
And so the transition from theupper pool to the lower pool hid.
The six foot tall slide.
Oh, that's
Trey (30:32):
perfect.
Mike (30:32):
And so you could walk up basically to the slide at the upper level, and
you're at the very top of the slide,and you slid down to the lower level.
So on one end of the pool we had theslide coming in, and the other end of the
pool we had the diving board coming in.
So the kids could, go down there androck the pool and splash and, go up
and down the slide and everybody can bereally active down there and everybody
(30:53):
can be up in the top pool chilling.
It sounds like a perfect activity pool.
Yes, so we had both.
with this, one of the concernsis we've got this big drop.
We don't want people walkingon the coping and then falling
off down to a lower level.
Cause the pool was down sixfeet, but there was a transition
area that was four feet down.
And so one of the things that we did.
(31:14):
Is on the coping we put fire bowlsthe fire bowls were bigger than the
coping so you couldn't step overa bowl because they were 30 inch
bowls so it would be real hard totransition and walk down this coping.
Yeah.
And so it kept the kids fromwalking on that and jumping
from one level to the next.
Trey (31:33):
And provides awesome aesthetic.
Mike (31:34):
Oh it was an awesome view.
I think there were four, maybe fivefire bowls on the edge of this pool.
And so at night.
You've got the upper pool lit up, yougot the fire bowls going, you've got
the sunset going out on the lake andthe water vanishing into the lake.
And you can hear lots of laughterand lots of fun because they're all
down below having a good old time.
(31:55):
this was a freeform pool.
This was back in the daysbefore things were real modern.
The house also wasn't very modern.
And also the setting wasdefinitely not modern.
So with all those things coming intoplay, it was something that worked
really well with the free form.
The original deck that wasthere was all flagstone.
(32:15):
So we did all flagstonedecks all around the pool.
So we could match up the aestheticand make everything blend together.
So it looked like it was allone piece all done together.
It was really nice downat the lower level.
We had a big, So people could hang outthere and enjoy that space and look out
(32:35):
over the lake and enjoy and watch all thekids playing down, coming down the slide.
We did a lot of lighting on the wall,so it looked really cool from the lake.
Trey (32:45):
So the wall that's the water would go on and fall into the bottom pool.
Correct.
So
Mike (32:50):
as the water went over that, it was all lit up at night.
So it looked really cool.
And then one of the cool things was,their spa was literally about five
steps away from the master bedroom door.
So they could step out thereand it sat up really high.
So you could look out over the wholeupper pool and then to the lake.
And so it was a really fun project.
(33:11):
One of the weird things on itwas we had initially concept.
Wise is we were going tocome in after the lower pool.
we dropped off the porch, 24 inches.
And so basically the walls andthe steps gave a lot of places for
people to hang out, but this, allthe walls were, 24 inches tall.
So they're like a seat bench.
(33:31):
And so then we got done the poollevel and then it dropped from there,
six feet down to the lower level.
But we had about a 20 foot elevationto deal with in that space.
So that meant we still had 12 more feetof elevation to deal with in that space.
And so we were going to build a 12 foottall wall on the backside and basically
(33:51):
pier everything and support everything.
We went to the city and wegot it engineered and went to
the city to get the permit.
And they said, you can'tbuild a wall over four feet.
And I'm like, no, I understand you have toget engineering on a wall over four feet.
And they're like, no, we don't allowany walls in this town over four feet.
Trey (34:09):
What
Mike (34:09):
in the
Trey (34:10):
world?
Mike (34:11):
And I was like, okay, wait, I'm confused.
Cause I can drive around andshow you lots of walls that are
over four feet tall in this town.
What about fences?
Trey (34:18):
Like
Mike (34:18):
that.
And they had some problemswith some things that were
built that structurally failed.
And so the result was the city counciljust passed a law that you couldn't
have any walls over four feet tall.
I gotcha.
And so it took a while for thatto come off the books, but that
didn't happen during my project.
So I had to go in, instead ofbuilding a 12 foot wall, we had to
(34:41):
do a four foot wall and then a spaceand another four foot wall and a
space, and another four foot wall.
The problem is we now had traveledfarther out on the slopes.
We had to build another four foot wall.
Yep.
So it was crazy.
What we had to do to pass the city code.
But that was what was required.
And so that's what we did.
And we were able to make it all work.
Trey (35:01):
I'm just curious, were these walls at the base of the bottom pool going down?
there was, I think I rememberexactly what you're talking about.
It's like almost like a wedding cake.
Yes.
Yeah, it's exactly like going down.
Mike (35:11):
the initial design, we weren't going to have a drop beam on the bottom pool.
Oh, okay.
And so one of the things that we did iswe put a four foot drop beam on that part
of the pool, or maybe it was two foot.
think it's two foot actually.
I think it's a two foot drop beam.
And then the walls start right after that.
But it was nice in the factthat it wasn't like this.
Suddenly you walk up to thewall it drops off 12 feet.
(35:32):
Yeah.
So which would have, hadto have a safety rail.
So what they ended up doing was plantingin between all these 4 foot walls so there
wasn't any railing as you looked out.
Spectacular job, a lot of fun.
Like I said, it was the firstNo, it wasn't the first.
It was the second or thirddouble pool that I did.
But it was the one that had all the funstuff in it and it had a phenomenal view.
Trey (35:53):
The wild one that they built.
just imagining them building, diggingand tying steel and building those walls.
It's crazy.
Yeah.
Mike (36:00):
So a few YouTube videos on that project.
Because that was thefirst one we had a drone.
So my wife was like out therealmost every day flying the drone
around filming all this stuff.
The excavation was really funand all the different levels.
And but also changed how we photographedswimming pools because one of the
coolest views is looking back at thehouse from the lake and there was no
(36:23):
way in the world prior to having adrone that you could get that picture.
No.
There wasn't a ladder tallenough to even, basically because
of the four foot terraces.
If I set a ladder up, I couldbarely see the bottom pool.
If you were on the
Trey (36:36):
bridge with an amazing camera, do you think you could got that shot?
Mike (36:39):
No, because I'm too low.
Oh, okay.
And also the trees are too thick.
Yeah.
Especially on that
Trey (36:45):
side.
That's closer to the
Mike (36:46):
bridge.
Trey (36:47):
Yeah.
Mike (36:47):
That makes sense.
But you can see it occasionally inthe fall after the leaves fall, you
can see the pool barely, but it'sstill, you're too low from the bridge.
It's a cool project, but we do a lotof fun things, but there's reasons
behind almost everything we do.
lot of times people are like, Oh,this is just all about pretty.
But it's all about.
The views from inside the house.
(37:07):
It's all about the functions of theactivities that we want to have.
It's all about creatingsafety aspects as well.
So there's a lot of thoughtprocess that goes into something.
We just can't pull that typeof thing out of 3d model and
plop it in that's for sure.
Trey (37:24):
Yeah.
Thank you for answering that andwalking me through the whole process.
So this job, they have the time lapseand all that on YouTube already.
DFW area vanishing.
dot, dot, dot, dot, by Mike Farley.
There's a lot of cool YouTubevideos that already have up.
And also you can check out any otherepisodes of our podcast or specific
cutouts that we do for the shorts or thedesign concepts or anything like that.
(37:46):
Make sure you give us acomment like the video.
If you appreciate it let usknow what you think about this
topic certain design and yeah.
Mike (37:53):
If you got other questions, just please let us know.
We'll I had someone submit to me todaythat they were curious about indoor pools.
And so we'll try to put some informationtogether and get a guest in here that's
an expert at that because I am not.
you wanted to talk about alternatives.
Yes.
a salt water pool is generating chlorine.
(38:14):
It's not generating anything else.
Exactly.
Megan, you can Corrine.
So it's still a coronated pool.
It's just that a steady lower level.
So an alternative.
Would be something that we're going to putin and we're going to take chlorine away.
Okay.
So when I was in Northern California,when I heard about saltwater pools
(38:35):
for the first time, we were one of thetest companies, I want to say in 92 for
This piece of equipment was a cartridgewhich had copper and silver in it.
Okay.
Copper and silver, their claimwas they are a natural algaecide.
their claim was a 70 to 80percent reduction in chlorine
(38:57):
with this piece of equipment.
And this piece of equipment, we wereone of three companies that were
test companies in the United States.
We were in Northern California,there was one in Florida, there was
one I believe in Atlanta, Georgia.
Okay, so we tested this piece ofequipment out and we said, there is the
capability to use less chlorine withthis, but there's no way in the world
(39:21):
this is a 70 to 80 percent reduction inchlorine here in the Sacramento Valley.
Trey (39:26):
So what you're talking about is an H or two cartridge.
Mike (39:29):
that is what it was.
It was a nature two cartridge.
Yes.
Okay.
So
Trey (39:33):
putting minerals into the water.
Mike (39:35):
Correct.
Water runs through the minerals.
Yeah, exactly.
So we said we see the, You couldprobably reduce the chlorine
rate by about 30 percent becauseit's so hot here instead of 80%.
Well, This company was in Minnesotaor Michigan or something like that.
Cold weather.
So somewhere where it wasn't quiteas hot as we were in the summer.
Yeah.
And so their initial testingspercent may have worked there,
(39:59):
but it didn't work in the valley.
And it didn't work in Arizona that way.
But, we suggested to them, if youclaim 30%, you're going to be great.
They went to market and claimed 70 to 80%.
So everybody started using thispiece of equipment and then threw
it away because it didn't work.
They worked great at 30%.
Expectations just
Trey (40:19):
weren't set to the right bar.
Mike (40:21):
now what happened is they ended up getting bought out.
And when they were remarketed,they remarketed at a much
lower percentage rate.
That's smart.
Okay.
we were using that and we had tested.
that works only on oneof the three things.
Does not provide a residual, doesn'twork on bacteria, just working on algae.
Trey (40:40):
Yeah.
And when the system's running.
Mike (40:42):
Okay.
And the system has to be running ahundred percent back in those days,
There were very few, mostly it was a twospeed pump, which was a high and a low.
There wasn't a variablespeed as we know it today.
Yeah.
But most people use single speed pumps.
Trey (40:57):
Variable speeds literally just got popular in the last
couple of years, just because ofthe regulations that's going on.
Mike (41:03):
They've been out 20.
Yeah.
Okay, but that just worked on one thing.
You still had to havechlorine do the other two.
Yeah.
Okay.
So we reduced our chlorine loads by 30%.
But at that, it took theburn out of people's eyes.
And so people are like,this is a nice product.
Okay.
One of our service techs was like,Hey, We tried that ozone thing a couple
(41:26):
years ago and tried it and tried totake chlorine away and it didn't work.
What if we put it with this thing?
Combine the systems?
Combine the two systems.
And we're like sounds like a good idea.
So we tried it.
So we put the ozone.
With the minerals nowozone worked on bacteria.
Yes, it's been out for about a hundredyears It's in every water treatment plant
(41:49):
in the United States It works phenomenallyin that case, but as a standalone
system, it didn't work for a swimmingpool and that Time and application.
So we put ozone on and we put naturetoo on, and we were able to drop
our coring loads by 70%, not 70%.
I was just slightly higher than tap water.
(42:10):
Yes.
Okay.
So that was the system Iwas selling in the nineties.
Okay.
In Northern California, I relocate toDFW in 99 tried to sell that system.
Everybody was like, bah, that'sfunny snake oil, snake oil.
I want my salt system.
when this situation occurred in the mid,two thousands, I went and said, Hey, I
(42:35):
tried this system in Northern California.
It worked really well.
You're going to try sealers.
Try to continue using salt.
, can I try this with my clients?
They're like why don't you call and seeif there's the other shoes falling in
Northern California And the, some trainwreck now has happened with this system.
So I called 'em up and said,Hey, is this still working?
(42:55):
They're like, it's great.
I was like, okay, that'swhat I need to know.
So at that point, he startedusing minerals and ozone and
low chlorine on my pools.
And that went by for about a year.
They were trying all kinds of sealers.
I was suggesting this to clients.
Most of my clients are like if that'swhat you think, we'll sign off on it.
(43:16):
They were happy with it.
And so after a year at thatpoint, then other people started
trying that system as well.
today the system we still use.
Trey (43:27):
That makes sense.
Like much better option then.
Putting sealers on and tellingthe customer, Hey, after you
use the pool, make sure youwash off the deck with those or
Mike (43:35):
something.
Here.
The thing is there are a tonof mineral systems that exist.
Yeah.
There's a ton of ozone systems that exist.
Oh yeah.
They do not perform all the same.
It's all different.
Okay.
So what you have to understand is.
The combination that's going to be right.
the other thing is your demandsare going to be different
(43:55):
depending on where you live
So the question that we started within the beginning, is it a crime to
put a salt system on a swimming pool?
Trey (44:04):
And tell someone that it is no maintenance and
that be the expectation 100%.
I think from the logic we havediscussed, there's ways you could
have it seems very tedious to do it.
And not optimal in my opinion.
And if you can have something with thesystem that you're talking about, that
has the same water quality, If you'reswimming in a pool with your eyes
(44:27):
open underwater, that's pretty muchthe same quality as a saltwater pool.
That's the big, I could swim with my eyesopen and they don't sting afterwards.
Yeah, it might be a crime.
What do you think?
Mike (44:37):
There's a couple other little nuggets in here that
I'm just going to throw out.
So salt also, does it damage concrete?
Trey (44:46):
It does not as much as stone though.
Mike (44:49):
Correct.
So does salt damage the concreteat a faster rate than coring?
Trey (44:55):
I don't know.
Salt damaging concrete.
Mike (44:58):
Yeah so there's two concrete structures, three concrete
structures we're dealing with here.
Okay.
Okay, the first concrete structureI'm talking about would be the deck.
Trey (45:06):
Yeah, that's the first one I think of.
Mike (45:07):
Okay, the second concrete structure is the blaster.
That is a concrete because it had base.
Okay.
Okay.
am I going to damage that overtime and a third structure that
you have the shell of the pool.
Yeah.
That's concrete.
Yeah.
those are all different, butI just want to bring it up.
So there was some literaturethat I read that said that salt.
(45:30):
Versus Corrine.
Trey (45:31):
Oh my, I know where you're going with this now.
Mike (45:33):
We'll damage five times faster, a plaster finish.
if saltwater can penetrate your shellover time, will the steel deteriorate?
Well, So are we talking about maybe.
20, 30 more years down the road, orare we going to have more issues with
salt, more issues with salt possibly.
(45:54):
I don't know the answers to that.
Trey (45:55):
No, this is all theories.
Mike (45:57):
But my question is I know what saltwater did to everything as a kid.
it's just something to thinkabout over a period of time, how's
your plaster going to hold up?
How's your steel going to hold up?
And quite honestly, how's theconcrete deck going to hold
up over a period of time?
Now I know that, they say thatit's been out for a long time and
(46:17):
it hasn't caused any problems.
I know that growing up as a kid, there wasconcrete that was damaged by saltwater.
Now that was ocean water andthat's at a higher salt level.
Okay.
So that's different.
I understand that, but theseare all things to think about.
is it a true crime to put a saltwater system in a swimming pool?
(46:38):
Here's what I think is the crime.
Okay.
If.
You don't explain the options to a client.
Client comes to you and says,I want a saltwater pool.
Okay.
you just give them a saltwater pooland you don't say anything about it.
Now, some people say that'sgood for the remodel business.
That's true.
It is.
Trey (46:56):
Yeah.
25 percent more repairs.
Mike (46:58):
Yeah.
And more coping damageand all those things.
Joking aside my feeling is asa professional, it's to give
the homeowner information.
And so I'm not going to just automaticallysay, yes, I will give you a salt system.
I'm going to ask you whyyou want a salt system.
And I'm going to explainCorrine and how it works.
(47:21):
And I'm going to show you alternatives.
And I'm going to tell you the priceof this and the price of that and
the long term maintenance impacts.
And when I go through that here inNorth Texas to me, It's a crime to
put that in a swimming pool, given thetrifecta that we have here with minimal
rainfall, evaporation, and the stonesthat are readily used in this area.
(47:42):
Northern Florida using a concrete,precast or cantilevered concrete, and
it rains all the time in the summer.
And, think you don't have a trackrecord of problems, nor, Southern
California, the same thing.
So don't think that's aproblem to sell that system.
So I think you have to lookat all the factors to decide.
(48:03):
If it's a problem or not.
Okay.
Any questions?
Trey (48:05):
not at the moment.
No.
Mike (48:07):
Okay.
Well, That kind of completed all theinformation that we have on saltwater
pools and you'll have to decideif that's a crime to you or not.
Yeah.
We have other requests for otherpool true crimes that have been done.
Some of the suggestions haveto talk about hydraulics.
Another one, someone suggestedto me is should you buy a pool
(48:29):
without a three dimensional model?
Interesting.
Should you buy a poolwithout a proper grading plan
Trey (48:36):
or a maybe a construction document that's only one page long?
Mike (48:39):
Oh, yes, the one page contract.
Yes, that probably isdefinitely a true crime.
So Please if you have suggestionson some other crimes that we should
discuss, please let us know what thoseare And we enjoyed discussing this
and hopefully we gave you some goodinsight, but if you've got questions
and comments, let us know on eitherthe YouTube videos or on the website.
Trey (49:01):
use that comment section on the YouTube as a little form and keep
this conversation going and we'reeager to hear what y'all have to say.
Mike (49:08):
Thanks again.
Trey (49:08):
Have a good one.
Outro (49:10):
This show is all about helping you become a better
buyer, a better pool owner.
And hopefully you're going to find someinsights into how to enjoy your pool, even
more so how to help your friends, yourfamily, anybody looking to buy a pool in
the future or that want to remodel theirbackyard, add an outdoor fireplace, fire
pit, add an outdoor kitchen area, addsome shade cells or whatever else it is.
(49:33):
We want to be that resource for you.
And that's the end goal here.
And we promise.
That there's going tobe a ton of information.
We'll try to go through it, youknow, as relatively quickly, but
also slow so people can understand.
But the intent of the show, thereason Mike and I are doing this
is because we just got a lot inour heads and we want to share it.
So we hope to see youhere every single week.
Thanks for listening.
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On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!