Coping And Water Fill

by Kim
(PA)

We just replaced our pool liner. It is a 12X18 oval pool! With overlapped liner. When do you put coping & top pieces back on your pool? When pool is being filled with water or when pool is full? Is it a good idea to leave shop vac on while pool is filling? Could you please get back to me ASAP as we our doing all of this now? THANK YOU!!

Hi Kim

I install the coping when the water is a few inches from the side. I pull the liner up snug and let the little bit of stretching the liner needs to do pull the sides flat. It just takes a little bit of sunlight for the liner to have plenty of stretch.

In your situation it is probably a different story because you probably already have water coming up the sides and you are using a vac. Anytime the liner has been sucked flat against the wall you are OK to install the coping. If there is a bubble in the liner and you can not pull it tight enough to get rid of it you should wait. Continue to fill and let the vac run.

The coping can be installed at anytime while the pool is filling, as long as it is done before the water gets as high as the skimmer. The liner should be set and the pool finished before the skimmer is installed. The skimmer needs to be installed before the water enters that area.

When you are happy with the way the pool looks, finish it. If you are completely unhappy, don't finish and don't cut the skimmer opening, you can always redo it and hope for better results.