I have Tahoe Blue w/Pentair SWG and plaster went on April 23, water April 25, and my boys went swimming on May 3. I don't have any waterline tile as the pebbletec goes all the way to the coping. I received a little conflicting information on the same questions you have and here is what my PB and the pebbletec company owner told me (and I did).
1.)Filled pool 2 days after pebbletec.
2.)Have run my filter 24/7 since day 1 and will continue to do so.
3.)I have never brushed the pool with the exception to remove the loose pebbles after installation. I have yet to see any kind of a scum line (remember..no waterline tile) and my pebbletec looks GREAT!!
4.)Started my SWG immediately.
5.)Haven't hooked my heater up yet..don't need it now as the watwe is 81.
6.)My PH has stayed near 7.8 since start up but in the last few days I have been able to get it down to 7.6 and hold it.
7.)Would have started sooner than 10 days but water was too cold.
I am sure there might be problems with the balancing act down the road but I couldn't have asked for an easier start up.

Wow your pool looks great, beautiful color. Hope ours turns out as well. Thanks for the info, one question, did they tell you not to use your heater or did you just not have it online. Thanks again and enjoy that gorgeous pool!

I haven't brought the propane tank in yet for the heater (no natural gas here)...good luck on your build and I hope your startup goes as easy as ours...with the pebbletec and swg it should be a piece of cake

Post some pics when its ready, would love to see the midnight blue
summersatthelake, your pool turned out great!! if mine turns out a fraction as nice as yours I will be very very happy

I have a chlorine pool, but I was told not to run the heater for the first week, due to the Pebble Tec and its cure time.

I have Tahoe Blue as well, but I do love Midnight Blue! It's gorgeous. :-)

Thanks everyone, well we had the stone coping and water fall done today, should have the pavers in by the end of the week or early next week. Then the pebble tec.....and finally fill. Will post pics on my pool build thread.

So my builder says after the fill, they will let things sit for a day or two until they can get out here and start up. Once we start up he says we might be able to use the heater once the water is balanced. Since we are having the water trucked in and it is pre-treated...we may be close to balance according to him. He said pumps will run 24/7 for first two weeks. He definitely said no salt for one month. He also said brushing is not a big deal with pebble tec as compared to plaster. So has anyone else heard of just letting it sit for a day or two after fill?

Thanks again everyone
David

I have Pebble Fina Bella Blue

Pool was filled right away.
No salt for 30 days. It interferes with the curing of the pebbletec.
We had to run our filter for one week straight to get all of the plaster and junk from the pipes cleaned out.
We cleaned our filter after that because it really filled the cartridges.
No heater or Pool vaccuum for 1 week due to the curing process.
I had to brush 2-3x per day for 10 days.
PH 7.2-7.6 to prevent scale deposits
chlorine 1.5-3
We were able to swim after 48 hours. Our pool builder had us wait at least 48 hours to allow the chemicals to settle in and also for some of the sediment from pipes etc. to be filtered out.

At this point we have had our salt up and running for 3 weeks. No real problems. I get scaling and deposits if I don't keep my PH down so I check my chemicals every day at this point. I go through about a gallon of acid a week because my alkalinity keeps wanting to go up to 140.

I brush my pool once per week and run my filter with pool vac for 5 hours a night on low speed and 3 hours in the morning on high.

So far, so good. No real problems.

Thanks that seems to be the most common startup procedure, although with the variability out there...i sometimes wonder if they just make this all up. Your pool looks awesome, I love the raised spa on the beam. Is pebble fina similar to plaster or is there some component of aggregate?

We've had our pool finished about 1 month now. Here was our startup:

1. Started filling with water immediately
2. Filters did not run until second day after water fill.
3. Instructed to brush twice daily for two weeks. Managed at least once per day.
4. Salt system started about 3 weeks after fill.
5. No instruction about not using the heater.
6. No special instructions on chem levels other than to keep them in normal ranges.
7. Swam immediately (couldn't keep the kids out :-) )

I'm not exactly sure. It's a nice finish though. It's from Pebbletec, it's just a very smooth finish. We didn't want the pebbletec or pebblesheen because my daughter has sensitive skin and feet. We went with the smoother pebblefina and I'm glad we did.

In both my Pebbletec pool and my stonescape pool, I was told to do an acid startup. Thats 4 gallons of acid into the pool with a pH of less than 6 with brushing. The pH will gradually rise and be up to its normal level in about 2 weeks and you will have to continue to add more acid for the next month to keep it from going out of control.

We were told to brush daily for the first couple weeks, no cleaner and salt system for a month (we don't have a heater so no help on those instructions).

I was in the pool as it filled. The most amazing, surreal feeling was sitting on a raft in the bottom of the pool as it was filling. You'll never again see your yard from that angle and doing so while feeling the exhiliration of FINALLY getting water in the pool (we had a long tough build) was fantastic. I spent the entire day in the pool as it filled. A highly recommended experience if it won't damage your surface (as it could with plaster).

Now that sounds like a nice way to spend the day....cool Jennifer!

I'm not sure. Our pool builder did the first 30 days of maintenance. We took over after they did the initial salt start-up and programming of our salt cell system. I believe i remember their guy putting chlorine in but its been a while so I'm not positive.

Probably get the needed chlorine from floating tablets.

Here is what PT gave me at install. I documented my entire build - down to the smallest detail because of the frustration in trying to find solid information! My detailed build is on another site. I'm not sure I'm allowed to post the link here.

No salt for 30 days for sure with any new cement based interior surface. The heating is actually more of a concern for your heater since pH fluctuations will be crazy for the first month in a concrete pool. A pH of 6, as recommended by someone here, is 10 times more acidic than a pH of 7 and 100 times more acidic than a pH of 8. Since a heater is so expensive and the internals are quite sensitive to pH imbalance it would be in your best interest to have the heater bypassed until you have the pH controlled. If you do not have a heater bypass built in then you can not avoid sending water through the heater unfortunately. Water temp is one of the factors in calculating the saturation index of the pool water - which is to say the potential for a scaling state in the water. This is why you can not just use soft water to fill with - it needs to have calcium hardness high enough to not damage new concrete but also not develop a scaling state from high temps and too much calcium hardness.

For the first 30 days simply watch your pH and alkalinity, as well as maintain around 1ppm free chlorine. If you heat it then don't boil it - 80 degrees. New pool owners tend to like 90 degrees until they get the first gas bill.

Question about proper pebble tec (our builder used "Wet Edge tech") installation: They installed it yesterday and finished less than 20 minutes before a very strong thunderstorm with heavy hard rain. The pool company told me on the phone that morning as long as it didn't rain hard until late that afternoon it would be fine, but the installer said it would be fine in "10 minutes" after they were done. Today after they acid washed the pool, the area that was done first, shallow end, is nice and smooth. But as you go further away and down to the deep end, the part that was done last, the texture is rougher and I found many small divots (like size of pencil head to dime). Of course the pool company man came out and said that was all normal for all pools. I'm concerned these divots will be rough and collect dirt such that the polaris will not be able to clean. How do I get a "third party" to check my concerns?