Training: Deluxe Slides

Hello. This is Chuck from Advanced Waterfall Systems. Welcome to this training video, which is about the installation of a Deluxe Slide with your AWS system. Okay. This particular video is going to focus on installing a slide and systemizing the installation of a slide on a swimming pool utilizing prepoured concrete custom concrete pads along with the AWS system.

This does not replace the manual that you will receive from the manufacturer of the slide. Okay? That will cover how to build and assemble the slide. We will not cover that in this video. What this video is focused on is speed and efficiency and standardization of installing a deluxe slide.

We're gonna do that with customized pre poured concrete pads, concrete pads, with a template that allows you to simply and easily lay out the slide on the pool and the slide panel that is gonna get integrated into the front of the slide. Now this process is designed to create a standard for an installation of a finished slide that will integrate with the AWS waterfall system that will create consistency in a product process and profitability of installing one of these systems. Alright. So we're gonna get started. Right here is our training facility.

We built a full training facility here on, developing videos, on education on how to install our systems, along with training contractors and different ones of our partners on how to build and install these systems. Alright. So right here, this is a a pool. Okay? And we're gonna start the first step is the template.

Okay? We developed a templating system that allows you to lay it out in the pool. So the first step is we're gonna build the template, and we're gonna lay it out in the pool. Alright. So what we did is we took this particular slide as a 15 foot garden ride slide by SR Smith.

Okay. So we built the slide, and we created a template for the slide. Now that template is made out of coroplast, and it's cut to follow the exact radius of the slide. And what you're gonna see here is the template's in three pieces. So the first step is we're gonna assemble the template.

Okay? It was all it's gonna put a couple of these plastic screws in and it creates the template that it'll lay out perfect. K. What else you're gonna see here is that we designed these three pieces of the template. There is also custom designed and poured pre poured concrete footings that you're going to anchor the slide to.

Now they are all pre poured concrete and cured, so they follow the same dimensions as the three ten the three pieces of the template. So each one of those concrete pads you're gonna see mimics the exact shape of those three pieces of the of the slide template. The only difference is the front pad, the concrete pad is actually shorter than the template because the template overlays the pool, and of course, the slide pad can't do that. So you're gonna see what I'm talking about. But again, we made it very simple, and one of the advantages of this is that these concrete pads are all pre poured in concrete and cured.

Right? So once you set them in place, you could drill right into them. The concrete's already poured. There's no waiting for concrete to pour or cure or anything like that. So, again, it creates speed on the installation.

So as you can see what the guys are doing, this template is already predesigned and laid out. Then we've got these little plastic screws with these little quarter glass plates. As you can see, there's a plate on each side, and all the holes are predrilled, and everything's predone. So all you gotta do is put this together, put the, screws through the little holes on the, the templates, and everything fits together. Everything's numbered.

You got marks here and alignment points. Everything's very simple. Everything's numbered. Everything's lettered, and you got these plastic screws with plates on both sides. You put it all together, put them together, screw them down, and it's a lightweight, simple, corrosion free way to put this template together.

Right? Just wanna be careful not to step on these. They are plastic, and if you got work bullets on, you'll probably be fine, but, you know so the idea is real quick and easy. You put this together in two minutes. It's very lightweight, and you're gonna see the next step is we're gonna lay this out on the pool.

Alright. So you could see what the boys did. Right? We laid this template out on the pool. What I have learned over twenty five years of designing, selling, and building waterfalls and installing slides is laying out the slide is is critical.

Okay? In some situations, it's critical. In some situations, it's less critical. If you're on a job and you got a big open yard and there's no restrictions and the pool's deep and everything's wonderful, then you could lay it out. It's, like, moderately important.

But when you have a tight space and tight footprint and tight layout, it becomes more critical. Either way, adds a lot of value and efficiency and accuracy when you have a template of the slide when you're doing one these projects, especially when there's gonna be a boulder waterfall and steps and all kinds of other things. So you could see the first thing we did here is we laid it out. Two important things. One is you wanna lay it out so that, okay, it follows your design so that you know that, you know, the distance from the pool to the slide is what you want.

It's going into the pool in the right spot. Now there's a safety envelope that every manufacturer of slide has. Okay. When this would this is like the pool edge in in in reality, but this is just a a test pool. So, obviously, in in real life, the slide's gotta follow a, a safety envelope, which would not clear on this test pool because it's only five foot wide.

But when you put this on a pool, you gotta follow the safety envelope, which is, in this case, it's, from the center point of the slide, it's three and a half feet to the left, three and a half feet to the right, and 13 foot six out. You gotta create a clear area envelope, and it's gotta be four and a half foot deep. Right? So that's another reason. You lay out the slide on the pool, and you make sure that it clears the slide envelope.

That's number one. Number two, it gives you a sense of, okay. This is how the slide's gonna lay out. It's got a lot of value on the installation, but it's got a it also has a lot of value on the layout. For example, this slide is gonna be six foot tall.

Right? It's gonna be up here. Well, you gotta you gotta put steps in. Right? So this adds a lot of value knowing where this slide is because you could go, okay.

Well, now I know my steps are gonna go this way, you know, depending on what the steps are, the rise, the run. You can kinda lay out your steps. And you might decide after putting this here that the steps aren't gonna fit or they're gonna be too far off the pool or too close to the pool or whatever. And then you can move the template. Move the template.

Get the template perp. Perfect. Get your tape measure out. Measure everything, make sure that the distance from the pool to the slide is right, make sure you got enough room for your steps. You know what mean?

It gives you a real, easy way to lay this thing out. And then in a lot of cases, especially with AWS, you'll have a plan. Right? You'll have a plan in, in scale on your pool so you'll be able to follow Right? So again, this is about systemizing the process, making it simple and fast and creating a good quality end result.

Right? So first step is after we lay out the template. Now we're gonna argue that, that this is a good layout. Right? We're gonna say this right here.

Yeah. Okay. That works. Like, if this was a waterfall system, you would wanna make sure that this distance follows the plan from a layout perspective. Right?

So alright. So after you do that, the next step is once you know that slide's in the right spot okay. You you see what the guys did? They painted out one foot on either side of the slide, they made a paint mark. Right?

And they marked where the slide's gonna go with paint. They're gonna dig this out a little bit, and then they're gonna set the top of those concrete pads, the top of the pad level with this concrete footing. Now this is a little bit bigger than that would be on most pools, but this is what we poured on our, our training pool. Okay. But depending on the thickness of this pad, okay, this will either be a concrete wall on a gunite pool, or if it's a vinyl liner, you might have to pour a little footing up against the edge of the pool.

If it's a vinyl liner or fiberglass. But in in any case, this is a two foot kind of footing that we're using. So you're gonna see. We're gonna set that pad, but the top of the pad is gonna get set level with the top of this footing. And what that's gonna do, you're gonna see when we install the legs, the legs are standard heights.

They create a standard pitch, which creates a standard height, which creates a standard gap between the pool and the slide. And we have a standard slide panel that you're gonna see that that goes in. So we're setting the base at a certain elevation. It systemizes the rest of the install. So when it's in, the heights are what you want, the the the height off the pool is what you want, and the height of the top is what you want.

Now that would also tie into the height of the waterfall system that you buy. Right? So you see what we're doing? We're creating a simple, easy, systemized process that ties all this together to make this entire thing simple, fast, quick to install. Alright.

So these are the, prepoured concrete pads that come with the system. Okay? These are on a radius, and these are the exact same layout as the templates. Okay? So each one of those template pieces follows this shape is the same.

Right? So you could see here, number one, these are five inches thick. Okay? So the goal is to set the top of this pad to the top of that concrete footing. Okay?

So you gotta get down five inches to get to the bottom, and then you may wanna dig out a couple more inches, maybe three or four inches, get down to nine inches, and level it, and then compact it and put in a couple inches of crushed stone, okay, to give yourself a base to set these on. Okay. Now in our case, we're not gonna do that so much. We might do it a little bit because that's we've got a crushed stone base there now. But, again, it's general hardscape installation instructions.

You know what mean? Set these in a crush stone base. Right? So the goal is we're gonna pick these up, and they're gonna level them with the top of the footing. And you're gonna see right here, this is the lifting point that is built into the pour.

So they're gonna just screw that I hook into there and pick that piece up real nice and simple, bring it over, and drop it in place and level it. Alright. So you can see we dug it out. Now, like I said, the pads are five inches thick. We're digging down a little bit more than five inches.

Okay. And then we're gonna put a little stone dust down to kinda make it easy to level the pieces, either stone dust or sand. But if you had dirt see, we've got a crushed stone base here now. But if you had dirt, you might wanna go down another four inches, make it deeper, and go down, like, nine inches and put four inches of crushed stone to sit these pads on. Right?

So we got the string line set up or the pin set up. They're gonna go down five inches, put a little stone dust in here, level it, and then you're gonna see. The next thing you're gonna do is they're gonna put the template back, and they're gonna mark exactly where the slide's gonna go, and then they're gonna use that to lay out the pads. So you can see what the guys are doing. Right?

We set some pins in the outline where the slide's gonna go, and then we set some zip ties at the pins. We leveled the the the, we took a level point from the concrete pad over to the pin and then leveled it. So those zip ties are level with the beam of the pool. Right? And that's our top height, and then we're gonna measure down.

We're gonna run some string lines across, measure down five inches, and get our stone dust kinda at five inches. So when we set the pads, it's nice and easy. So you can see what the boys did, ran some string lines. Like I said, the string lines are all level, and they put in some stone dust, raked it all out. And like I said, we're going for five inches because the pad's five inches thick.

So they're measuring down from the string line five inches. Detail in the the stone dust, they they tamped it to make it kinda nice and tight. So you'll see. The next step is they'll detail this all up, and that'll make it really easy to install the pad. You know, you'll install them real Boom.

Boom. Boom. Like, three big pavers. But once we get these, this thing dialed in, then we'll remove the string lines. And then the next step is we're gonna put the template back.

We're gonna put the template back in place, and then we're gonna mark on the template where the concrete pads go. And then we're gonna remove the template, and then we put the concrete pads in. It'll be easy peasy. They'll be exactly located on where they go, and we'll show you how that's done next. Alright.

So the next step is we're gonna lay out the slide. Now the base is prepped. It's leveled. It's ready to go. We put the slide template back, and we start to lay out the slide, really dial in the exact location of the slide.

Right? So as part of this standardized installation process, okay, what we have is we have this slide panel right here. Okay? And what this does, this simplifies a process which can be challenging. And what that is is when you put a slide on a pool, okay, to get a rock under the slide, it's challenging.

Well, why? Number one, you gotta lift it by hand because you can't lower it because the slide is covering the area. So you gotta take a rock. Number one, it's gotta be long and low, and it's hard to find. It's hard to lift.

So you gotta find that rock number one that fits under the slide. In this case, 12 inches by 36 inches. You gotta find one rock or two rocks or three rocks to fit in that space. And that's a pain in the ass. Right?

So to get it in, to find the rock, all of the above takes time. And, so what we did was we made this slide panel, which is part of our AWS system. It's natural stone. It's concrete reinforced. This slide panel fits underneath that slide perfectly.

Right? Based on us laying out these footings at a certain elevation, it creates a certain height, which creates a certain panel. Alright? So that is gonna get installed on the beam before the slide gets installed. So the idea is you lay it out, get it all figured out, move this out of the way, set the panel in place, and then put the slide on top.

Much faster, much quicker, much easier, and you don't to go try to find a rock to fit. Alright. So this slide panel, right, is around nine or 10 inches, thick, and it's ice and it's, three foot long, and it's 12 inches high. Perfect fit. So this is custom designed to fit underneath.

Right? So on the template, you're gonna have marks. This mark is the depth of the panel here. So that's where it goes. Now these are the brackets for the slide that I just showed you.

You got five sets of brackets that are marked on the template of where the brackets will go. Alright? So there's two pieces of criteria. When you lay out this slide, number one, this is the front of the panel. This can't be too far over the edge of the pool.

So it's gotta be far enough back where it's close to the edge of the pool. It could overhang a little bit, but you don't want it to overhang too much. So that front of that panel right there, okay, has gotta be around where the edge of the pool is. Okay? And this side of the template, I'm gonna call this the tight side.

You measure from here to here, it's a much smaller distance from here to here. Right? So on the tight side of the slide, you gotta be a minimum of three inch overhang. That's what the installation guide says. Right?

So when you lay this out, you gotta make sure that the front of this panel is inside the the wall of the pool and that there's three inches or more from here to here. Must be more than three inches. If you do that, okay, and you check your slide envelope, okay, in the manual, it shows you. There's a slide envelope, 13 foot six out off the center line and three and a half foot to the left and the right with a four and a half foot of depth. Okay?

But you double check the manual. It shows you that. If you clear that slide envelope, you clear the three inches here. You make sure that the panel is level with the beam. You're good.

Right? Now you've located the the slide location in the template. Alright. Now the next step is we're gonna show you how to mark the rest of the template and how to install the slide pads. So as I mentioned, those three custom concrete pads over there are the exact same shape as these three templates.

Okay? So the joint on the template is right here. That's also gonna be the joint on the concrete pad. Alright? So what we're doing next is now that we got our location, we're just gonna mark this.

Right? We're gonna mark it like that here and here. Right? And then the next thing we're gonna do is we're gonna mark where the end of this footing is on the template. Right here, where the end of the concrete is and the we're gonna mark it.

Right? From there and there. So now we're gonna do is next we're gonna disconnect this piece of the template from the rest of them, and we're gonna take this, and we're gonna put it right over top of the pad. And then we're gonna mark it, and then we're gonna cut the concrete pad. This template will go over top of the pad, and then we're gonna cut the one so you're gonna have to cut one pad.

Okay? The front one based on where the footing ends. Right? Because every job's different. You're gonna have foot you're gonna have tighter footings.

You might have no footing. Okay? If you have no footing, then, you're gonna cut it probably much longer. If you have a 12 inch footing, you're gonna cut it. So the idea is you want this pad to sit behind your concrete footing for the slide.

Alright? So that's what we're gonna do next. We did that. We got it marked. Now the guys are gonna take this apart, and we're gonna mark the concrete pad and cut it.

And then we're gonna bring that concrete pad back over here, and we're gonna set it right in place. You get this one right, then the other two just fall in fall in line because they're all custom cut to follow they're all custom built to follow this radius. So what we're gonna do just to be, as an extra precaution is Eric's marking the inside edge of the template. Now he's using a pencil to just mark where the inside edge of the template is. Okay.

Just to give us an additional guide. And then what we're gonna do is then we're gonna pull the, we're gonna pull the template out and then paint that line. This way when you put your second and third pad in, you have some kind of guide to follow even though it should work out fine because once the first one's in, everything else should follow behind it. Alright. So we marked we marked on the footing where the, the slide panel's gonna go.

So what we're gonna do next is we marked the concrete footing here and here where the slide is. We're gonna set the the slide panel right in between those lines right here. Boom. Now we're gonna dry lay it, okay, because this is training. But if this was a real install, you would, you'd put cement down, and then you would set the slide panel in the cement.

Okay? And the reason, like I said, the reason you do that is because now it's done. Then when you put the slide in, it's much easier because you're just putting it right on top of the rock. Like you guys just saw, this panel has lifting points. Right?

The two screwed in lifting points, easy in, screw it in, screw it out, so it's easy to set. And like I said, the front of this is rock. Right? So as long as it's overhanging the pool a little bit, you're fine. Right?

And, for all you brain surgeons out there that didn't go to college, when you set this, the rock side goes out. Alright. So now that this is in place, like I said, if this was a real install, it'd be mortared in. You'd wanna level it, get it in place, and level it. And now you're gonna see the guys are gonna set these concrete pads.

And then once they're in and leveled, then you're gonna see installing the slide is gonna be very easy. You're gonna have to put the slide together and attach the plates and the brackets. Okay? That process is thoroughly explained in the manufacturer's, assembly manual that shows you exactly how to put the slide together. That's not part of this video.

This video is a supplement to that manual that shows you how to assemble the slide. Right? So assuming you get all the slide together, get all the brackets in, there's three feet there's the slide's two pieces. Right? One, two, and then you got these landing feet, one, two, three, that get assembled to the slide, and then the feet get, the supports get anchored in.

So you want to assemble it like this. This is on dirt, but you want to protect it if it's on a patio that can get scratched up or you want to protect that. Right? So you want to have it built like this, and you'll see so we install it. It gets placed right on top of the the concrete pads that it gets anchored in.

Yep. Alright. So we move the concrete pad over to here. Like I said, this is the template. It's got a number three on it.

There's three pieces to the template. So this concrete pad has a number three on it too. So you know that's number three. That's number three. Alright.

So we marked the template over here. Now we're gonna lay this on top. Right? And you're gonna line it up, and then we got the marks right here. Right here and right there.

We're gonna mark the concrete on both sides, take off the template, mark it, and then we're gonna cut it. We're gonna cut the concrete right there, and then we're gonna pick that piece up, and it's gonna fit right in there. So you can see what we did. We cut the pad. Okay.

And then we fit it right in place. Right? They set it in place. It came in a little bit high on the one side. So we lifted it back up, took out a little bit of stone dust, put it back down, and then it'll come in nice and level.

Right? So now it's level. You got a nice cured pad, and you'll see next, we'll set the next two in following the paint, following the curve, and, should go in pretty smooth. And then we'll be ready to set the, the slide on top of the pad. Okay.

So you could see we just installed the three concrete pads. This is the footings for the slide. You see they went in real smooth, real easy, followed the layout and template of the slide. Everything's level. The concrete's cured, and we are ready for the next step, which is taking the slide, putting it in place, adjusting it, making sure it's all good, and then anchoring it down.

And then you connect the plumbing, and we're done. Alright. So the slide is set in, but it's only dry fit. It's not anchored yet. But you see right here, this is what we were talking about when we were laying out the template.

Right? We were talking about a minimum three inch overhang from here to here, which, again, this is like five or six inches. Right? So you wanna make sure you have a minimum three inch overhang. And the like I say, the slide panel is like, nine inches thick.

But then you got these brackets. Right? So this is why the layout I was talking about earlier, where I had the lines on the template are important. Because when you set this in place, if this thing's laying on the edge of the pool, then the anchors will clear the back of it. That's why that's why this is a tricky rock to find.

Right? Because they need to be thin, but wide, can't be too tall, heavy, all that stuff. Right? So this gives you a sense. Now, in this case, we have a two foot collar around the pool.

But if you didn't have it, you know, and you, you didn't have any collar at all and you had a poor one, you can leave this concrete pad all the way up and just fill the rest with concrete with a footing, you know, or you could pour a foot. You might wanna if you're gonna have a waterfall, like a a system, you're gonna have have a concrete footing around the waterfall that's gonna have to sustain the weight. So you would pour that all the way across. So there would be a beefy footing here just because the rest of it's gonna have a beefy footing because you're gonna have an AWS rock system. Right?

That's what this is designed for. This is designed to work around an AWS system. So when we design you a system, okay, when the slide's installed like this properly, the system's gonna fit properly. If you start having variables in the slide installation, then when you go to install the system, it might not all jive up. Like I say, it's about creating a process to create consistency in the product, the process, and the profitability.

Right? So now this is dry fit. The guys will double check it, and then they'll kinda dial in the legs. You're gonna see them anchor everything in. With the anchors, they'll drill them in and secure it real good.

So you can see what the boys are doing. Right? They took that first foot and they leveled it. They plumbed it up. Then they drilled in an anchor and anchored it.

Now, you know, for training purposes, we're gonna do one anchor per foot. There's actually three holes per foot. We're not gonna drill all three in, but on a real installation, you would drill in all three. Okay? Like you say, you plumb up the leg, put in the anchor, and you do that on the front, and you do that for each set going all the way back so that the legs are nice and plumb when you get them in.

But like I said, we're only gonna do one hole, but on a real install, would do all three holes per foot. Alright. So you can see the boys got everything anchored in. All the supports are plumb, and they're all anchored in. Okay.

Like I said, we only put one bolt in because it's, training. But if this was a real install, you would put three bolts per foot. Right? So there'd be three, six, nine, twelve, fifteen, eighteen. There'd be 30 bolts.

Alright. So this thing's in. All the legs are plumb. Pretty sturdy. It's not going anywhere.

Now this is designed to be backfilled. Okay? This is not this setup is not designed to be standalone, meaning just like this, where you put a ladder up and jump down it. Because even though it's sturdy, you know what I mean, these pads weigh about a thousand pounds apiece. They're not a 20 by 20 concrete pad.

Right? So, again, this is designed to be built with an AWS system. What that means is there's gonna be a big waterfall here. This whole area is gonna get backfilled with crushed stone, which is gonna put 50 tons of crushed stone on top of these pads, which means this could never go anywhere. And then there'll be stone steps going down.

So you'll have a lot of crushed stone covering this entire thing so that there is no way that this slide can move. Okay? So this is done. The next step will be you wanna bond it. Okay?

If you got a a bonding wire going around the pool. Okay? You wanna bond it to the metal just like you would normally bond any kind of metal, component. There's a bonding wire coming out of this slide panel. You could bond to that if you want to.

Otherwise, you're ready to roll. You got plumbing line here, and you would tie in the plumbing line, and then it would go back to the system and get control to the system. But, again, if this is part of a system, there'd be an AWS waterfall here of some sort, and then you would have to divert the waters. You know, you can split the water any way you want. You could have one line coming from the equipment.

You could split it over here. One go to the slide, one go to the waterfall, or you can split it back at the equipment. Every job's different. It's total preference. Alright.

So I think we are wrapped up here on the, Deluxe Slide installation. It is it is 03:16PM. We started this at around 01:30. So you're a little hour and forty five minutes, three guys. So what's that?

Five man hours to install this slide.