Structural design for pool builders, shed, carport and verandah builders and landscapers: pool shells, tie-down for sites the kit details don't cover, and retaining walls designed for what sits behind them.
What Pool, Shed and Landscape Builders Need From an Engineer
Pool, shed and landscape builders need engineering that is quick, specific to the site and clear enough to build from without a phone call. These jobs are smaller than a house, but they are the ones most affected by what is around them: a footing next door, a slope, a driveway, a boundary or a wind exposure the standard details never assumed. The engineering is mostly about those neighbours.
Swimming Pool Structural Design
A pool shell is designed for the ground it sits in and for everything close enough to load it or be undermined by it. The excavation for a pool near a house, a boundary wall or a retaining wall can remove the ground that structure relies on, and a structure above the pool can push on the shell wall. Reactive clay, which swells when wet and shrinks when dry, adds seasonal movement, and an empty shell in wet ground can be pushed upward. The soil test decides how much of this applies to a given site, not the suburb.
We design concrete pool shells, including the wall and floor reinforcement and any thickening or piers needed where the shell is close to a footing or a wall.
Sheds, Carports and Verandahs
A shed, carport or verandah needs engineering when the site falls outside what the kit or standard details were designed for, and wind is usually the reason. Every site has a wind classification, the design wind rating set by its region, terrain, shielding and slope. Kit details assume a classification; on a more exposed site, the frame, the connections and the footings all have to be checked for higher uplift. We check the tie-down chain from roof sheeting through purlins, rafters and columns down to the footing, and design footings that actually hold the structure down. Structures attached to a house need the connection to the existing building checked as well.
For the full picture, read when a shed or carport needs an engineer.
Retaining Walls: Sleeper, Blockwork and Concrete
A retaining wall is designed for the height of soil it holds back, plus anything sitting on that soil, plus the water behind it. That extra load on the retained soil is called surcharge: a driveway, a parked car, a house footing, a pool, a shed slab or a slope rising above the wall. We design sleeper walls (steel posts with concrete or timber sleepers), reinforced blockwork walls and concrete walls to AS 4678, the Australian Standard for earth-retaining structures.
Drainage is part of the design, not an extra. Water trapped behind a wall can add more load than the soil itself, so the drawing specifies the drainage behind the wall, the free-draining backfill and where the water goes. For what drives the footing size, see retaining wall design in Adelaide. Whether a particular wall needs approval is a question for the council or a private certifier, so confirm it with them.
How We Handle Your Jobs
Every job gets a date when we accept it. When a pool or retaining job has to start sooner, paid priority is available, with the surcharge shown and agreed before booking, and the shorter times in brackets are that lane. Questions from site go to the engineer who designed the job, and every request for information (RFI) is logged against the address.
We keep one file per address. If we designed the house footings, the pool or the retaining wall is checked against them from the same file, and a soil test or survey already held is not re-tested or re-charged. The portal shows every one of your jobs, its stage and its issued drawings. Request portal access, or see how the client portal works and what it gives you.
Soil tests and surveys, where a job needs them, are carried out by specialist contractors that we brief and coordinate.
What to Send for a Quote
To quote a pool, shed or retaining job, send the address, a site plan showing the work and what is near it, and any soil report or survey you hold. It also helps to include:
- for a pool: the pool layout, depths, and the distance to the house, boundary walls and any retaining
- for a shed, carport or verandah: the supplier's drawings and the wind classification the kit was designed for
- for a retaining wall: the wall length and retained height, the wall type you want to build, and what sits above it
- photos of the site, including any slope, existing walls and neighbouring structures
Related Pages for Builders
These pages cover the other kinds of builder work we take on:
- Volume and project home builders
- Renovation, extension and custom builders
- Steel frame certification for suppliers and fabricators
- How we work with builders and the full list of services
- Reactive soil risks in Adelaide
This page is general information about structural engineering in South Australia, not advice for a specific site. Every job is priced for its own site and scope, and you get a fixed fee in writing before any work starts.