Big pond landscapers and koi pond builders should go on the Firestone pond liner training course

Calling all landscapers that tackle big ponds and complex koi ponds: if you are unsure that you are lining the pond in the right way and using the right techniques, you need some training, there is noThe course covers all you need to know from the vary basics of liner splicing to the sealing of quite complex details doubt about it. The best place to get that training is on the Firestone training course. It is such good value for money that you will wonder how they can ‘wine and dine’ you, put you up at a very comfortable hotel for the night, teach you for a full day how to install and splice up pond liner, whilst providing as much food and drink as you can consume during the day, all at such a rock bottom price of just over £200. Even if you forget all that, you come away with a certificate, all the tools you need for joining liners, instruction manual and even the ‘T’ shirt! Just the cost of materials you use up in the course of the ‘hands on’ practice must amount to more than the cost of the course.

First of all what is the Firestone Pond liner and why is it so good?

From the Firestone website: the liner must be labeled as Firestone pond liner and be stamped with a unique code.As well as the course, Firestone offer onsite support.The liner is EPDM rubber and was initially marketed exclusively as a roofing material. It was no good for ponds since a leaching of chemicals from the liner into the water killed fish in particular. A new formulation devised for ponds released in 1987 was an instant success since it was cheaper to produce than the best quality liners on the market made of butyl rubber because it used less of the expensive raw materials. It just had to live down the reputation that a few roofing material ponds had set alight, that EPDM kills fish.
Over 20 years on, the people at Firestone are totally confident in the superiority of their product over the competing materials used as pond liners. One seeming disadvantage that EPDM has compared to the old butyl is that it does not seem as stretchy or conforms to the substrate mainly because it is a much thicker material (1.02mm thick compared to the butyl 0.75mm). However in all but the smallest ponds this is not a major issue. In fact it is just as flexible and stretchy with weight and strength behind it, stretching by just about 300% and that extra thickness inspires more confidence in the product. Taking into account that less of the petro-chemicals are used in its manufacture means that on an environmental basis it wins hands down against butyl and similarly so with PVC. But also it is much more supple than all but the thinnest PVC and is malleable to ridiculously low temperatures of -45C, when PVC starts cracking when its moved even around zero centigrade. In normal conditions EPDM has an unrivalled lifetime expectancy of over 30years due to its resistence to ultra violet radiation and ozone.

So why do you need to go on the course? And why does Firestone, the world’s largest manufacturer of EPDM liners, want to treat you to a ‘free lunch’?

For projects this large, you need to have totoal confidence in the material you are using.
The sales of the pond liner made of EPDM from Firestone have taken over the butyl market almost completely and they are increasingly making inroads into the market previously dominated by PVC. Whilst the sales of EPDM are on the up, the best investment the company can make in the reputation of their product is to ensure that the people that install it know exactly what they are doing. To encourage as many of those people as possible, they make the learning process as enjoyable and as worthwhile as possible, which includes giving them food and drink and a bag of tools to go away with.
Once-upon-a-time it seemed that EPDM rubber pond liners of almost any size within reason could be delivered to a site. It turned out that the maximum size that could be delivered was 15mtres by 60metres. But increasingly there is a more and more demand for bigger and bigger ponds and lined lakes. Therefore installation of ponds on big projects often demands skills in splicing rolls of the material together.
Not only that, if EPDM rubber has any disadvantage compared to competing materials it is its weight. It weighs a kilo for every square metre, which even if you are having the maximum size liner of 15metre by 60metre liner delivered to a site, it is not always possible or even desirable to get it to the pond side. That’s 900 kilos you are going to have to shift.
Would it not be better to have the rolls of EPDM delivered separately and use the technology available to join them together? Yes it would and this is what the course does. It gives to landscapers the knowledge and skills to do this reliably.

Know-how with EPDM rubber liners

It’s easy if you know how. You can see how it is done on the Firestone website www.firestonebpe.com , but seeing is not doing. It is not quite as easy as it looks. But if you go on the Firestone course you can get the sort of hands-on experience that will equip you for most of the problems you would face, even in a complex koi pond project with filtration or one of the new popular swimponds. There are courses run all over the US for Firestone liner installation certification by companies like Aquarius Irrigation supply. In Europe, every major outlet will be organising courses. In Britain we are lucky enough to have the team headed by James Cave. His main technical guy is Carl Bailey who is ably abetted by John Turner in the field.

John Turner, tutor and trouble-shooter, moves so fast it is difficult to get a decent candid shot of him.
John is trouble-shooter and installation consultant extraordinaire. He is also the tutor in the practical part of the course. He makes everything look easy, with a calm slight of hand that seemsLads from Kingcombe Aquacare are given a turn to demonstrate what they have learnt.: After this everyone else was given their own personal 'pond corner' and 'pipe fitting' to try out their newly acquired spilicing and sealing skills. to ‘magic’ liners together. He is keen to pass on his skills, but with unending patience, he will accept no mediocrity or compromise. He never says, “That’ll do”. It has to be perfect to get his genuine seal of approval. So as everyone makes the same mistakes he has seen thousands of times before, he knows that those mistakes are lessons usefully learnt.
“You are here to make mistakes.” He says, “So you wont make them when you are out doing a job.”

On top of the all the textbook methods, you have a lifetime’s worth of familiarity with the product on show and you pick up little tips that can save hours of heartache in the field. Methods of trimming patches, drawing out the template for flashing around a pipe, ‘tacking together’ the sheets before they are glued to prevent them sliding or blowing apart. Also what to look for: where ‘capillaries’ can form; making sure the splice tap is always visible on the join; the look of bonding adhesive when it is on too thick; how to avoid bubbles when ‘Form flashing’ a pipe, and so on and so on.
You come away from the course knowing that you have seen how it is done properly. You may not have learnt all the skills as well as you might, but at least you will be able to see when you have made a mistake and be able to rectify it. You have been in good hands. It’s a good course and a must for all serious landscapers.

Coming up soon: you will be able to click here if you want to see some of John’s pond liner splicing techniques.