Liner has "come loose" after heavy rain. What gives?

[SinistrV6]

Seems as if this painful hole-in-the-ground just never runs out of problems to throw at me. I finally got the chemistry problems sorted out at the end of the summer and now have a leak. It appears to be in the underground piping (I haven't dug it up yet). I blocked the skimmers in and allowed the level to fall a bit (about 4" below the skimmers). We had heavy rain for the last 24 hours or so (about 5"). I didn't even look at the pool today other than noticing the higher water level. My daughter came to me this evening and said "There's something wrong with the pool." When I go to investigate, the liner is "ballooned out" from the walls almost all the way around the pool! What gives? On top of all that, the pump motor is whining so loud that I turned it off yesterday, sounds like a bearing/bushing going out. Dandy.

 

[PoolGuyNJ]

Water table rose higher than the water level in the pool or near enough and flowed. This made the liner lift away from it's position.

Do you have a dry well? Get a pump on it to suck the water from behind/under the pool and send it as far as you can away from the pool.

If the liner is less than 2 years, it may be resettable. This will require draining, setting up a liner vac and refilling.

Darn sight lot harder than when new.

Scott
PoolGuyNJ

 

[SinistrV6]

I thought that's probably what happened. I had a LOT of wrinkles in the shallow end and was planning to try to "refloat" the liner with water and pump it back out while getting the wrinkles out. Pool is about 3 years old.

Did I read your post right in that it requires a FULL drain and resetting of the liner? I'll have to rent/buy some sort of pump to get the water out.

It just never ends. I HATE this pool.

 

[waste]

Please don't hate the pool! We can help you!

You have 'ground/ surface water' issues and we can help :-D

If you'd do a little research on this, you can probably find the answers to your issue.

This will require lowering the water, but not a full draining

The more info (pics are best) you can give, the better advice we can provide

 

[SinistrV6]

Guess it's time to don the wetsuit. I'm gonna freeze!

 

[PoolGuyNJ]

If the wrinkles are only in the shallow end, only drain to within 1-2" of the break so a little water is in the shallow end. Sometimes a plunger and a wide/soft bristled broom will allow you to bush/pull the vinyl as needed to remove the wrinkles or at least lessen them sufficiently. If it''s colder than 60 outside, you'll need a liner. The existing liner at 3 years will not restretch properly in cold weather. Still try, liners aren't cheap.

Scott
PoolGuyNJ

 

[SinistrV6]

My pool is heated. Should I crank up the heat prior to attempting any of this? I can't afford a liner right now.

 

[PoolGuyNJ]

Find/fix the leak, if possible.

A floated liner can get a leak anywhere, especially where it meets the skimmer, returns, drain, steps, or light niche.

Then heat the pool to 75 or more. drop the water level to near the deep end break. Use a plunger and soft bristled broom to adjust the liner in the shallow end.

Do you have a dry well? Waiting for the water table to drop may take a while to occur naturally.

Scott
PoolGuyNJ

 

[SinistrV6]

I had a leak before the liner floated. I see your point, though. I could have another one (or more) now. At the risk of sounding completely ignorant; what is a "dry well"?

Since I don't know what it is, chances are, I don't have one. Is it a pipe/access point that would've been installed during construction to get to the water behind the pool walls?

 

[PoolGuyNJ]

That's exactly what it is. The bottom is usually a bed and small pit of course gravel set the end of the pipe.

Scott
PoolGuyNJ

 

[SinistrV6]

My pool doesn't have a dry well. A little bit of good news, though. When I went out to the pool this morning, the liner had reset itself almost entirely. I still need to work on the wrinkle problem but all but one corner was flat against the walls again. I'm gonna have to rebuild my pump motor before I do anything else. I'll tackle that on Monday.