Faux rock is an arearated light weight concrete product and is not compatable with chlorine. It is fine on the sides of buildings but is not designed for water imersion. It does absorb water. Real rock is much denser and generally impervious to water. On the side of a pool house is OK- On the walls of a pool No. I used to sell the stuff and though no one ever asked about using it in a pool I knew enough to know it would be a problem down the road.

There is nothing better than real rock. As far as pricing goes. Here in my neck of the woods it is less expensive to use real rock than faux. If they are using faux rock like they do here. It is just gunite that is shaped to look like a rock and yes you do have to refinish the faux rock but not every ten years more like every 3 to 4 years.

Good Luck

kaseyray2....good question and I think it will depend largely on the look that you prefer and budget.

We went with a faux product called Rico Rock that is made from concrete using molds from rock in the western region of the US. They sell many different boulder styles and shapes as well as a large variety of waterfalls including those with grottos and slides.

We chose them because we preferred their look over real boulders...I know this sounds weird...but we could not find any real boulder pool jobs that we liked...the end result looked contrived when placed by hand.

On the other hand, Rico Rock looked more natural in my opinion. Faux rock constructed on site, if done properly, also looks real but to your point, will have to be refurbished regularly.

We've had ours for 4 years now without any problems of wear or color loss. The colors are mixed with the concrete. Before deciding, we talked with several of their customers around the nation and none have had to refurbish their rocks and some actually commented that they preferred the aged look of the rock over time. That has been our experience also.

You also know what your getting when installing their boulders because they look just like advertised and their dimensions are know ahead of time for planning and designing....this was another reason for our decision.

Below is a link to our pool with Rico Rock products to help with your decision.

Hope this helps.

Here is a link that might be useful: Faux Rock Around Pool

kaseyray2.....just looked at their website and they now have a few slide options for the waterfalls.

These slide options were not available when we were deciding a few years ago or else we may have gone with one of these to save money.....our 72' waterslide blew our budget but we have no regrets!

Here's a link to those slide options.

Hope this helps with your decision.

Here is a link that might be useful: Waterslide With Waterfall/Grotto Options

trhought, your pool has completely changed my opinion on faux vs. real. I was 100% convinced that I wanted to go real, but the look of yours is better IMO than real, I agree with your thought process.

If you don't mind me asking, how does the price compare to real rock?

Also, who did the masonry work for that?

eriky....Thanks for sharing your thoughts on our faux rock.

Our PB said the costs are roughtly about the same, but I think it depends on how much rock and how labor intensive the rock kit from Rico Rock is. They have modular kits, hybrid kits and also entirely custom jobs with onsite trained labor to use a combination of their products to create the design intent.

They sell only through local PB's who have prior installation experience or attended training courses. The modular kits can be installed by handy DIY'ers and only require mortar. The hybrid kits require trained labor as these kits require rebar, concrete and some forming prior to concrete pouring.

The custom jobs are done by trained folks who have expertise in using combinations of boulders and rock panels to create large rock formations...there's some impressive structures on their website...including a pool house that is made entirely of Rico Rock product and looks like a massive rock structure from the outside but has televisions, wet bar and hot tub inside!

Ours was a combination of modular and hybrid kits and we had someone from their headquarters in Orlando, FL on site for a few days to help the PB hands with installation. I was also there the entire time to makes sure the boulders were placed as specified and make any last minute changes in boulder placement to create the look we wanted.

For this part of the country, the labor was about the same as the actual product costs...example, if the boulder/kit costs were $10K total, the labor to install would be $10K for a total cost of $20K for the entire rock job.

This will likely vary depending on region of the country and local labor costs.

Hope this helps!

We have faux (concrete) rock and love it so far. Not sure about the maintenance down the road, but you can be very creative with concrete. The rock where the kids stand is very rough so they don't slip, and the slide is very slick. I guess with real rock you would need to insert a pre-fab slide. Ours is a huge hit with the kids.

Disregard my earlier comments- I thought you were inquiring about faux STONE. I don't know anything about the concrete boulders, but I would suspect if they are constructed with a high tensil concrete they are good. Zoo's construct their water habitats that way.

Varies depending on where you are located based on the skill level of contractors in your area. Get a quote from faux rock and real rock contractors. If it is a bigger project, ask if you can visit the actual locations of their previous customers. You can get a pretty good idea of how yours will look as well. Cost-wise, faux rock should cost less but it depends on the contractor as well.

It's been 5 years since the last post on this post. Curious to know how your project ended up turning out.

grumpy dave: Where in Orlando did you find someone to rebuild your rico rock waterfall?