I installed a pond this summer aprox size 50 foot x 40 ft. I had never installed before and was very pleased with result. Skimmer box and waterfall all are fully operational. In past week a major problem has sufaced.

I am getting significant water under the liner causing the liner to float to surface. I thought it possibly was a leak in the waterfall however with waterfall off the problem persists. Actual water level does not change since water under liner is pushing up liner and maintains overall water level.

Last weekend I pumped the pond dry and inserted pump hose with care under the liner and pumped out water. Filled pond again and problem has reoccurred. I live on a lake that is at bottom of steep slope so water table is not the issue. I do have a sprinkler system fed from lake and possibly overwatered inpast weeks which could have caused water build-up. Soil is clay with slow water loss when suface water stands. I have not sprinkled for 10 days now.

Any thoughts, ideas, suggestions to assist in diagnosing problem.

I live in Michigan. We have had a lot of rain today which raised pond level to max; I have a pump in skimmer to pump excess water when this happens. Liner lifted even more today!!

Could I have a porous liner?

Top posting, as OP is long.

Did you leave the hose under the liner after refilling? Sometimes that will
keep the water from building up. I know others have mentioned this problem
and what they have done about it. Hopefully they will check in. ~ jan


On Fri, 23 Sep 2005 00:38:53 +0000, Xspect wrote:


I installed a pond this summer aprox size 50 foot x 40 ft. I had never
installed before and was very pleased with result. Skimmer box and
waterfall all are fully operational. In past week a major problem has
sufaced.

I am getting significant water under the liner causing the liner to
float to surface. I thought it possibly was a leak in the waterfall
however with waterfall off the problem persists. Actual water level
does not change since water under liner is pushing up liner and
maintains overall water level.

Last weekend I pumped the pond dry and inserted pump hose with care
under the liner and pumped out water. Filled pond again and problem has
reoccurred. I live on a lake that is at bottom of steep slope so water
table is not the issue. I do have a sprinkler system fed from lake and
possibly overwatered inpast weeks which could have caused water
build-up. Soil is clay with slow water loss when suface water stands. I
have not sprinkled for 10 days now.

Any thoughts, ideas, suggestions to assist in diagnosing problem.

I live in Michigan. We have had a lot of rain today which raised pond
level to max; I have a pump in skimmer to pump excess water when this
happens. Liner lifted even more today!!

Could I have a porous liner?

On Thu, 22 Sep 2005 20:55:03 -0700, ~ jan jjspond wrote:

Top posting, as OP is long.

Did you leave the hose under the liner after refilling? Sometimes that will
keep the water from building up. I know others have mentioned this problem
and what they have done about it. Hopefully they will check in. ~ jan

I suspect not since the pump hose was used. I could just be the water
table and the water finds it easier to come up under the liner than
drain through a clay soil.

If this is the case putting a permanent soakaway in with the outlet
below the level of the pond should help, it does depend on what the
slope is like though. If it's possible to put a bed of gravel below the
liner underlay and pipe it to the lake it should sort it, don't use
sharp edged gravel :-)

We had to build our pond up above ground because of the high water
table but we are not on clay so didn't have to build a soakaway.

--
Regards - Rodney Pont
The from address exists but is mostly dumped,
please send any emails to the address below
e-mail ngpsm4 (at) infohitsystems (dot) ltd (dot) uk

Re floating liner in a pond by a lake, when you were digging did the hole fill with water and was the lake lower than now?
You may have a leak but the other common causes of liner ballooning are a high water table and run off getting under the liner, there are two methods of addressing those causes,
1) make the pond semi raised so that the pond level is above the local surrounding ground
2) improve the drainage around the pond.

Both of these have the same effect, which is to raise the pond level above the 'water table', meaning, that at any depth the pressure of the water inside the liner is greater that than the pressure of the water outside the liner at the same level. That in turn means the liner is always pushed outwards against the soil. If you did this and it is a leak you would see the water level in the pond drop.
Did you leave a hose under the liner? If not can you put one under, say 1/2" garden hose, and set up a slow syphon to remove the water under the liner, it needs to be slow otherwise it may 'suck' too quickly and cause the liner around the hose to temporarily seal to the soil thus starving and breaking the syphon. As you syphon out the water from under the liner the pond level will drop until the liner is fully 'inflated' and against the soil so I would suggest you simultaneously fill the pond to keep the level up.