Find the leak first. Repair it properly.

Both. We locate it, document what was found, and repair it. Call (818) 740-6099 first, and the testing decides what the repair is quoted against.

A written record of what was tested and what was found gives the quote a reliable starting point. It also separates shell repair from plumbing and equipment work, which are different jobs at different prices.

Dye helps around a suspected crack or fitting when the water is completely still, but it is a narrow tool. It confirms a place you already suspect; it does not replace proper testing.

Yes, and older pools often do — particularly where the shell, the equipment and the plumbing are all the same age. Finding one source is not a reason to stop testing.

Whenever a leak is suspected, yes. Finding and fixing it before resurfacing, painting or tiling protects the new work. Paying for a finish over an unresolved leak means paying for it twice.

More loss with the pump running usually points at the pressure side: return lines, fittings, the equipment pad or a separate solar circuit. Loss with the equipment switched off points at the shell or a fitting — the light niche, the skimmer throat, the main drain or the hydrostatic valve.

Yes, though a proper leak dye is denser and holds together in a ribbon where food coloring disperses. The method is the same either way: pump off, wait fifteen to twenty minutes until the water is completely still, then release a little right at the point you suspect — the skimmer throat, a return fitting, the light niche, the end of a crack — and watch whether it gets drawn in. Do it on a calm day. Wind on the surface moves dye around enough to read as a leak that is not there.

The skimmer box, where it meets the shell. A plastic part cast into concrete, the two moving at different rates, and the joint opening between them — which is why a level that drops to the bottom of the skimmer mouth and then holds is the most familiar pattern of all. Light niches and the conduit behind them come next, then the penetrations where the return pipes pass through the shell. Older pools frequently have two of these at once, so finding the first is not a reason to stop testing.

The bucket test costs nothing and you can start it tonight. A standard diagnosis at the equipment pad is free in our service area, which rules out the cheapest thing to be wrong before anyone charges for anything. Full detection — isolating and pressure testing lines, locating acoustically, dye work in the shell — runs at $175 an hour with a one-hour minimum, and that visit becomes part of the job if you go on to the repair.