Pool leaks
A pool that loses 3 cm a week is not evaporating. It is leaking.
Pretoria East has a pool in most estate backyards, and a leaking one quietly undermines the paving, the boundary wall and, in a cluster, the neighbour’s patio. We test the shell and the plumbing separately, then repair only what has failed.
REYDS field instrumentationSymptoms
Six signs the pool is the leak, not the summer.
Highveld evaporation in October is real — roughly 5 to 10 mm a day on an exposed pool. If you are topping up more than that, week after week, something is escaping.
- The level drops more than 3 cm a week with the pool not in use
- Wet or unusually green patches beside the pool or along the boundary wall
- Chemical consumption climbing without extra bathers
- The pump loses prime or the system pulls air
- Paving or decking beside the pool settling or lifting
- Persistent algae in one corner despite correct chemical balance
Detection method
Four tests, in sequence, so we never excavate a sound pipe.
Bucket test & level log
A marked bucket beside the pool separates evaporation from loss. We log the level over 24 hours with the pool off, and again with it running, to tell a shell leak from a plumbing leak.
Dye testing
Dye drawn into a crack, a light fitting, a skimmer throat or a hydrostatic valve shows immediately whether the shell is losing water at that point.
Return-line pressure testing
Each return line is isolated and plugged, then pressure-tested. A dropping gauge confirms a buried line failure and tells us which run to follow.
Acoustic tracing on buried lines
For lines under paving or lawn, we listen on the pipe and correlate the signal to pinpoint the break before lifting anything.
What we repair, and how
Shell cracks
Epoxy injection and structural sealing, then re-finish to match the existing surface.
Return and suction lines
Excavate the pinpointed break only, replace the section, pressure-test and reinstate paving or lawn.
Skimmer and weir
Cracked throats re-sealed and re-set; a common leak point on older Marbelite pools.
Light niches and fittings
Re-gasketed and sealed — often the source of a slow, persistent loss.
Hydrostatic valves
Tested and replaced so the pool does not drain itself into the surrounding ground.
Automatic top-up systems
Ball valve and solenoid checked, because a stuck top-up hides a leak and inflates the bill.
Estate pools on shared boundary walls get special attention: water travelling under a wall into a neighbour’s paving is a dispute waiting to happen, and the repair needs to stop it at the source, not at the fence line.
Direct line
Losing water faster than the weather explains?
Send us the pool volume, the daily top-up and the suburb. We will tell you which test applies before we book.