bestyears, I read Loving Frank a while back. There wasn't much that totally new in it. I studied architectural history in college everyone knew FLW was not what you'd call a nice guy. Loving Frank just fleshed out the gruesome details. The Taliesin guide glossed over all of that. Wait. There was no glossing. The script was unadulterated by any mention of the man's shortcomings. It was genius this and genius that. For example, there is a cabaret room with a stage and the explanation given was that Wright fell in love with cabarets while he was in Europe touring with one of his clients' wives. This made it sound like a harmless association, as if W. and the wife were just gathering ideas for a commission when in fact she had abandoned her husband and children and run off with him to Europe. W. had a thing for client's wives -- if you wanted to rid yourself of a wife you could do it in no time if you commissioned a new project with FLW! This is among the many things that not directly mentioned or even presented in any balanced way. I didn't like the Sainted FLW spiel at Taliesin. The man was a genius, the fact that his ideas are now so widely embraced is proof of it. But he was a very flawed human being and by the way, his engineering skills were pretty poor. Many of his buildings are deteriorating beyond normal standards because of it. Taliesin is definitely worth seeing, maybe other tour guides are better than the dopey one we had. By the way, it isn't a cheap attraction -- the admission price is $50+ per adult and $32 per child. For that money I did expect better curation and scholarship.

Really like this thread. Wish i found it sooner. I'm an OB in NYC suburb. We are near the plaster phase of our project. Meeting with a sub Saturday. I have no clue on price. And we haven't picked a plaster yet. We have about 1500 SF surface area. Anyone have a clue on what this should cost? Here are some of the prices we paid for major items: Dig: $900 for excavation (local one-man show, took 5 hours). $950 for two tri-ax dumps to truck out fill. I did the layout. I also did the finish scraping and shaping. This was hard work. Next time I'll get labor. Gunite: $185 yd (shot), 58 yards. Tri-State Gunite, they were great, but not one guy wore a mask, which I found very disturbing. Plus my wife got them KFC for lunch and I tipped them 20 each. Electric: Best Quote $6,600, 110 ft buried conduit run, no. 6 wire, 4 lights connect only. (no equipment except Intermatic Timer). I ended up paying a licensed electrician $1,000 to coordinate with the underwriter and am doing it myself with 100 amp service to a subpanel and intellitouch i9+3. Pentair has GREAT tech support, very friendly people with lots of time. If you have electrical aptitude, do not be afraid to try this. Gas: 100' buried run with 2" HDPE. Then 40' inside with 1.5" black. Best price 7,500. Did it myself for 1,600 in pipe and sand. Bought a 400K pentair mastertemp online for $1,800. If you are handy you can do this. Rebar: Grade 60 about $0.75/lb. ($5.70 for 20 foot #3 bar). Delivered about 60 miles, I unloaded. I would leave install to a sub, it took me 2 weeks working 7 PM to midnight, and it was not fun and my hands took a week to stop bleeding. Tile: We paid $6/SF from MSI Stone for quartzite mosaic. We're DIY install this weekend weather permitting. I see a lot of "upgrade" cost on plaster, but we would like to get insight on total plaster cost. if anyone can help with some insight on 1500 sf of plaster, thanks.

Caveat: I'm not a builder, so this is just a consumer opinion. I believe the typical pool should draw more water from the skimmer than the main drain - useful for circulation and cleaning of surface debris. There are even some who claim drains are "old school" thinking and can be eliminated. Makes a 2-1/2" drain line coupled with a 2" skimmer line not make sense to me. I would suggest both at 2-1/2" but bow to Scott's more extensive experience if he revisits this thread. In my area the cost difference between a 10' stick of 2" and 1-1/2" is about 50 cents. Since there is no practical cost difference when compared against the larger pool construction costs, there is no reason not to have both in-floor and wall returns to be 2" except at the fitting itself. I have in-floor (but not cleaning) and wall returns and they are both 2" right up until the pipe penetrates the pool shell. In general flow/pump terms, to prevent cavitation noise and pump wear, the suction side flow capability should be the same or greater than the pressure (in-floor wall return) side. Hence something like 2-1/2" on suction, 2" on return. Note: two 2" pipes together flow about the same as one 2-1/2" pipe, so a 2" drain and a 2" skimmer all the way back to the pad is about like a single 2-1/2" from pool to pad. Rebar requirements depend on a lot of variables that are local to soil, etc. In my area (virtually 100% sand - Florida barrier island) 12" on center is sort of standard until depths exceed 6 feet.

Well, plumbing has been over the last two days, fighting with the monsoons off and on. As you can see, the nice clean porch is no longer. Not too excited about the pool equipment being so close to the pool, but we didn't really have many other options. Some creative landscaping should take care of it. For those in the know, the city of Gilbert wouldn't allow us to put it on the side of the house because it would block the fire access... A big muddy mess... Now I can see why there's caution tape.