San Antonio Pool Plastering, Resurfacing & Renovation

H&H Tile and Plaster is San Antonio’s certified pool interior renovation contractor, founded in 2004 by Billy Johns and Joseph Johns and headquartered in Dripping Springs, TX. H&H specializes in pool plastering, replastering, resurfacing, tile installation, coping repair and replacement, pool renovation, and leak detection — serving homeowners across Bexar County, Kendall County, Comal County, and the Hill Country corridor. With more than 10,000 pools completed across Texas, H&H is a certified applicator for Pebble Tec and Pebble Sheen, BBB A+ accredited since 2007, and licensed through the Texas Department of Licensing & Regulation (TDLR).

In San Antonio, standard white plaster typically lasts 7–12 years before requiring replastering. Quartz aggregate finishes (Diamond Brite, Pebble Sheen Quartz) last 12–18 years, and Pebble Tec or Pebble Sheen aggregate finishes can last 20+ years with proper water chemistry maintenance. San Antonio’s Edwards Aquifer water supply — which runs 300–500+ ppm calcium hardness — is among the most aggressive of any major Texas city for pool surface wear, making finish selection and startup chemistry particularly important decisions here.

Coping failure in San Antonio is almost always driven by Bexar County’s expansive Blackland Prairie clay soils. These soils — particularly prevalent across Stone Oak, Helotes, Northwest San Antonio, and the Dominion corridor — swell significantly when wet and contract hard during dry periods. This cyclic movement exerts stress on the mortar bed under coping stones that no standard installation can absorb indefinitely. Over years of seasonal cycles, mortar bonds break, coping units lift, crack, or begin to pitch forward. H&H addresses this by evaluating the full coping mortar bed and reinstalling with preparation methods appropriate for expansive soil conditions.

For San Antonio’s Edwards Aquifer hard water, quartz aggregate and pebble aggregate finishes substantially outperform standard white plaster in durability and stain resistance. White plaster is a porous calcium carbonate surface chemically susceptible to both etching (when water goes undersaturated) and scale embedding (when oversaturated). Quartz aggregate finishes like Diamond Brite are denser and more chemically resistant. Pebble Tec and Pebble Sheen — which H&H is certified to apply — offer the best hard water resistance available in a residential pool finish, with 20+ year lifespans in properly maintained San Antonio pools.

In most cases, yes — but the answer depends on the shell’s structural integrity. San Antonio’s older pools (1970s through 1990s) were built to last and many have concrete shells that remain structurally sound after 40+ years. What typically fails is the finish, the tile, the coping, and plumbing fittings — all of which are renewable. H&H’s on-site estimate for an older San Antonio pool includes a full structural assessment. Most of the time, a complete interior renovation is significantly more cost-effective than pool replacement and delivers a functionally new pool with a 15–20+ year horizon.

The active work phase — drain, surface prep, plaster application, and initial fill — typically takes 3–7 days for a standard residential replastering project in San Antonio. For full renovation projects that include tile and coping work, the active phase may run 1–2 weeks. After filling, new plaster enters a 28-day chemical startup and cure period. H&H provides detailed, San Antonio-specific startup instructions calibrated for the Edwards Aquifer’s hard water chemistry — the startup protocol here is different from softer-water markets, and getting it right is critical for protecting your new finish from day one.

Fall and early winter — October through February — produce the best plaster cure conditions in San Antonio. Cooler ambient temperatures during the cure period support a stronger, more uniform surface bond, and lower evaporation rates make water chemistry management more predictable during the critical 28-day startup window. This timing also avoids disrupting the primary swimming season, which in San Antonio runs roughly March through November. H&H performs pool replastering year-round with established summer protocols, but fall is the optimal window for quality outcomes.

Yes. H&H Tile and Plaster is a certified applicator for Pebble Tec and Pebble Sheen serving the San Antonio market. Certified applicator status means our crews apply these products to manufacturer specifications, our installations are subject to manufacturer quality oversight, and we are authorized to provide the manufacturer’s product warranty to our customers. This warranty is only available through certified applicators — a homeowner who has Pebble Tec installed by an uncertified contractor has no manufacturer warranty regardless of what was represented at the time of sale.

Yes. H&H services pools throughout Greater San Antonio and the surrounding Hill Country corridor. Our regular service area includes Stone Oak, Alamo Heights, Terrell Hills, Castle Hills, Helotes, Shavano Park, Boerne, Fair Oaks Ranch, Bulverde, Converse, Universal City, Schertz, Cibolo, New Braunfels, and Leon Valley — covering Bexar, Kendall, Comal, and Guadalupe counties. If your pool is in the greater San Antonio metro or Hill Country corridor, call us.

Yes — and for San Antonio’s older pool stock, single-contractor renovation coordination is particularly valuable. H&H handles the complete interior scope: surface prep and replastering, waterline tile removal and replacement, coping repair or full replacement, structural crack repair, and leak detection and repair — all in a single drain cycle with one project manager. For full renovation projects, H&H provides a comprehensive written estimate that itemizes each scope before any work begins.