Cowichan Aquatic Centre today

Good afternoon everyone,
I hope that you have all had a pleasant and productive week. I have, although I'm still looking forward to the weekend. Maybe it won't snow and I can get the lawn cut!
This week on the construction site more concrete was poured around the swirl pool and tots pool. The photo below shows the freshly poured deck in front of the swirl pool.

The next photo shows the same area from a different angle. Here you can see where the sauna & steam room will be with the swirl pool on the extreme left of the photo. The next step will be to start constructing the sauna & swirl pool rooms.

The last photograph (below) is of the lower meeting rooms which will be used for birthday parties, aquatic courses, meetings, and more. At the far right side of the photo will be the cafe area on the inside and ondeck viewing on the outside.

The final photo today is one part of the ducting on the air handling units that will treat 1/2 of the pool area. This part of the duct that comes out of the top of the one of the units is about 4 feet in diameter! this unit will treat the wave pool side of the building and an identical one will treat the lap pool side. That's a lot of hot air!

Have a good weekend and don't forget about the grass!(change the oil in your lawn mower before using it for the first time, or at least check the level and top it up).

friday update

Good morning folks,
Welcome to another day in paradise. Here is another batch of photos for you to look at to bring you up to date on the construction of the Cowichan Aquatic Centre.
First photo shows the swirl pool being prepared for benches on the inside and the deck on the outside. We should be ready to pour by the end of next week.

In the second photo you can see the progress on the painting of the ceiling over the lap pool. The blue colour that you see will be the final colour for the ceiling in the pool area.

Next photo shows progress for the plumbing. The plumbers are starting to get down to installing the showers in the changerooms. These showers will be controlled by an electronics that will be timed to open a solenoid. This will make it easier to set a cosistent time on the showers, easier from my end to adjust and control.

The final photo this week shows the windows in the fitness area that border on the hallway in the upper floor of the complex.

I hope you enjoyed this weeks blog. Come back next week for more progress reports on the construction of the Cowichan Aquatic Centre.

April 11/08

Welcome to another edition of the construction blog for the Cowichan Aquatic Centre.
This week the plastic that covered the change room entrances, control room, and first aid room to keep those areas heated have been removed. This first photo is taken from the slide tower.

In the next photo you can see the ceiling over the lap pool where the whole area has been pressure washed and is now receiving an under coat. In the next week or so the ceiling will also have the final coats of paint applied. Once this is finished we can move ahead with tiling in the lap pool.

This last photo shows the fitness area & changerooms from the deep end of the lap pool. You can notice the green row of wall board along the roofline, this is part of the finishing of fitness area which is almost completely drywalled now.

Other notable progress is being made in electrical, plumbing, ducting, HVAC, sprinkler systems, exterior finishing at the entrance, forming and preparing the swirl pool area for the decks, finishing the in walls on the inside of the slide tower, and more...
Have a good weekend, don't forget to wear your sunblock if the sun does actually make an appearance as promised by the weather gurus!

Progress Report

Good afternoon,
I hope everyone is enjoying their week so far, I know I am (only 4 hrs & 23m to go!). As always one of the fun parts of the week for me is doing this blog. We don't have a theme per se, but we do have some inside photos for your enjoyment. A quick update on state of things... The railings for the slide tower stairs are pretty much complete, swirl pool plumbing is being completed to allow the final deck to be poured, drywall is going up in the fitness area, electrical is being routed in all areas, ducting for HVAC (heating,ventillation & air conditioning) and heaters and heat pumps are being installed, lighting is starting to go in in all areas, the lines for the main air handling units in the pool area are being installed, plumbing is being roughed in on the dry side, and more.
The photo below shows the swirl pool being filled for a leak test, the same as the lap pool and wave pool have done.


The next photo shows the railings for the slide tower going up to the top level.


The next two shots are of the fitness area. The first photo shows the glass overlooking the pools and the bottom photo shows the windows along the hallway. The hallway section doesn't have windows yet, but they are coming soon.

Well that's all for now. I hope everyone has a good weekend.

Pool side progress report

Good morning,
A short, quick, snowy week! Isn't it spring yet? What's with the snow! Hopefully this is the last hurrah before the weather changes. Well the building is sealed off and we have some heat inside to allow construction to progress. This is especially necessary for the tilers and plumbers who need the heat to do their jobs.
Today the focus is on the wet side of the building. The first photo is the Lap pool full of water. The pool was filled for a leak test at the end of last week. The test completed wednesday and there were no leaks.


This next photo is the wave pool being prepared for a leak test also. The inlets are being installed, the forms are being removed, and the basin cleaned up in preparation for the test.

This photo was taken on thursday. The first water in the wave pool. We are filling from the lap pool and leaving the water in for the weekend. For a nanosecond I considered jumping in, but I put my hand in and realized that I wasn't that brave today. Maybe later....

The final photo today is a ceiling shot. No those aren't bats hanging from he ceiling, they are the lighting fixtures covered to protect them when the ceiling area is painted. Once the ducting, sprinkler system and electrical are completed up there the painters will be in.

Have a good week and stay between the ditches.

Wave Pool

Good Morning folks,
Another week of ... where do I start? ... There are walls going up for activtiy rooms on the main floor, plumbing, electrical, ducting, sprinkler piping, being installed in change rooms and staff areas, roof work being completed and filters and pumps being installed, and tiling on floors and shower areas on the main floor.
The big story this week is the concrete pour that we had on tuesday. This is shown in the photos that you see below.
The first photo below shows the concrete being poured into the forms for the swirl pool walls. These walls were very complicated to make forms for due to the amount of plumbing and the shape of the walls.

The next photo below is pouring the concrete for the ramp that goes into the wave pool. This is essential for people who need to access the pool with wheel chairs or have difficulty using stair or ladders.

The final shot is of the main stairs going into the wave pool just to the right of the ramp above.

I hope you enjoyed our tour this week, I'll be back next week with more. Have a good Easter Weekend.

Chlorination System

One of the side questions that we have been receiving from a variety of persons revolves around a question phrased a variety of ways...

Are you using chlorine in this pool?
What kind of chlorine are you using?
Is this a salt water pool, I understand that there isn't any chlorine in those?
Is this an ozone pool?

And so on...

So, we thought it would be worthwhile to spend a little bit of time go through some of the basics of the disinfection system that we will be using.

First off yes we will be using Chlorine. This is because it is one of the few elements out there that is approved for use in pools (the other is bromine) which actively disinfects (kills) other stuff in the water. So, when little Johnny (or Jane) pees in the pool a molecule of chlorine is there to take care of the nasty stuff to ensure that it is disinfected (killed) quickly.

So, even if a pool is salt water or disinfected through gas, liquid or granular (powder) they all have chlorine in the water they just put it into the water in different ways. The way we will be introducing it is through an erosion feeder - the system we are purchasing is called Pulsar and their website is here.

Now, when a pool has an Ozone system, what they are actually doing is taking a portion of the pool water and putting it into a separate disinfection chamber which kills everything in its path at that point (including the Chlorine molecule). The killing of the molecules / organisms / whatever only occurs at that distinct point in the system where the Ozone exists.

For our pool, we are using Ultraviolet (UV) light in a similar set-up as Ozone. It will only take a portion of the pool water and at one point it will kill everything that is exposed to the UV light. So, just like Ozone, only at the point where the UV light is generated is where the killing of stuff actually occurs. The UV system that we will be installing is developed by a company call Hanovia, to learn more their website is here.

So, when you are sitting in the hot tub, we have Chlorine around to take care of the stuff (for lack of a better term) floating around and in the pool but when the water heads back into the filter room a portion of it is exposed to UV to kill all of the bad stuff in the pool. With these two systems working hand in hand, we will have some very clean water for everyone to enjoy - which, by the way, also improves the air quality at the same time!

Now, this only skims the surface - pun intended :-) - as far as the disinfection system goes. If you would like more info or have questions please click on the comment link below and toss some words at us - alternatively you can email us at aquatics@northcowichan.bc.ca as well.

Thanks!