We went with Ultra Poz because we wanted a more traditional looking pool. I don't like the pebble finishes. The water looks good but I don't like how it looks when you are looking at the actual finish. Ultra-Poz is made by Applied Materials Technologies. The address and phone # I have for them is in Phoenix. They have "a 7 yr. warranty on the entire composition" not just the quartz (taken from their brochure). I was told different information that houseful was though. The brochure I have only has 3 colors: white, sapphire, and emerald. I asked if we could add more of the sapphire crystals so there was more blue and we were told no, that Ultra-Poz is not like 3M, it is pre-mixed so no changes could be made. We were told about Ultra Poz by Blue Wave Pools. When we decided to do o/b we looked into other finishes. From everything I could find to read, Ultra Poz seemed to have more stuff in it to make it last longer than other quartz surfaces so that is why we picked it over 3M. I know 3 other people who have it and they all like it. My pool seems to be a different color than theirs though, a little more aqua and theirs a little more blue. I like it though. I like to look at it when their is a slight breeze and it is nice and sunny out. The water just seems to sparkle. Another thing that helped in our decision making was that we found it to be less splotchy than 3M, at least in the pools we looked at. If you have any more questions just ask. Like I said, we used Swimming Pool Service and Repair. I never would have thought to get a bid from them because of their name, but they were recommended to us. They were great to work with. They do do other finishes too. A close up. Ignore the dirt. Our in-floor cleaning system wasn't working at the time.

I too have debated this issue. At original meeting w/PB, we had him quote the overall master plan. PB quoted with white plaster but gave us a price sheet with the upgrade-should we want to go with a differnt finish, SAM lights etc. When we got the quote back, we were surprised that the whole plan was in our budget to do as is. Now that sticker shock has worn off, what is another $1600 for quartz added to plaster, or $$3161 for sunstone colored plaster, or $4578 for aggregate finish? Unfortunately, we have other expenses, about 10k already not in the pool bid (fence, electric reroute, paver deck). Where does one stop spending when money is an object? Of coarse, my DH put it to me like this. If none of these other finishes existed, would I still love my pool? Both my neighbors have white plaster finishes (built by the PB I am using)and they are beautiful. My PB showed me photos of 14 different pools all with differnt "colors" to them. Come to find out, they were all white plaster. Depending on surrounding vegitation, cloud cover (or not) shadow/shade, sun location, can effect the color of a pool dramatically. We are going with white plaster afterall. If somewhere down the road I really hate it, I'll save up for it and get it re-done. If it is in your budget, go for it. If not, your pool will still be beautiful.

Quote: "but as soon as we talked with the first builder he tried to steer us to Ozone with Chlorine" Are you talking about an ozone system in conjunction with an inline chlorinator? If so, the dirty little secret of inline chlorinators is that you have to use trichlor pucks and they put stablizer, PH reducer and chlorine in your pool all at once. Sounds OK, but everything gets used up by the pool EXCEPT the stabilizer. So you keep putting more and more stabilizer in as the months go by and the stabilizer level keeps climbing until the pool is so saturated that your chlorine becomes ineffective. At that point you have to drain your pool and fill it all over again. Some pools can go a couple of years, some not even one season. We started with an inline chlorinator and kept an eye on the stabilizer level. I was shocked at how quickly it climbed, within 2 months we were already exceeding the recommended level. We ended up switching to an SWG after that. I've heard that ozonators can help reduce your chlorine needs, so you may be able to go years before replacing your water. But I've also heard that ozonators are ineffective, so I'm not sure what to believe on those. Anyway, don't believe it when pool shops tell you that your water goes "bad" and needs to be replaced now and then. It's BS concocted to hide the fact that inline chlorinators cannot control stabilizer levels. If the stabilizer level is kept in check (easy with an SWG) and the chemicals kept balanced the water will last indefinitely.

Hi Racket - I think it's unfortunate because having a SWG and swimming in a salt pool are wonderful! I think it's a great benefit to have chlorine being generated steadily and being able to maintain a steady chlorine level. Moreoever, at least for me, I have never had any combined chlorine which means I have never needed to shock. On the other hand, I do hate dealing with acid and having to dump some into my water over 5-6 days or so. I think it's unfortunate that some pool builders are starting to move away from SWG because it keeps potential pool owners from being able to experience this way of chlorinating a pool. With all due respect, I think it's much too simplistic to say that because one notices a certain type of corrosion or damage only on salt pools that the salt itself is to blame. How can one say that it is NOT because the pool owner was running their pump too long, or setting their chlorinator at too high a level which caused their chlorine level to rise much too high becoming a much more active corrosive agent? (I personally know of people that run their pumps 24 hours a day, for example.) Here's a personal story. I have my SWG set at 35% which allows me to keep my chlorine level at 5-6ppm. I was away on a trip for about a week. When I came back, I was shocked to find out when I checked my water that my chlorine level was up to 11ppm! Well, up until a couple weeks ago, we had about 3 straight weeks of rainy weather here in the Dallas-area. I concluded that it was the lack of sun exposure that caused my chlorine to creep up that much (not as much chlorine burn off from the sun.) I happen to check my water very regularly. Can you imagine the typical pool owner that doesn't, or just takes their water to Leslie's once a month? Or how about pool owners that allow their stabilizer levels to get so low that they aren't able to hold a good chlorine residual and they think the solution is to increase their chlorinator setting to compensate, not realizing that the chlorine they're generating has now become 30x more corrosive because of the low CYA level? I have read stories of salt pools being blamed for corrosion on structures made out of 316L Marine-grade stainless steel. If these stories are true, then salt pools with salt content at 3000ppm is somehow more corrosive than ocean water with salt content 35000ppm? Perhaps. But chlorine at high levels is easily corrosive enough to eat through 316L stainless steel. I'm not ready to blame salt quite yet. Mind you, I'm watching my pool very closely to see if I start to see any ill-effects, but so far, nothing yet. Having said all of this, I do think that SWG manufacturers need to be more upfront with the true care and maintenance aspects of owning a salt pool. It isn't as "care and maintenance free" as they would like the consumers to think!