Pentair Valve Leak

[tomzo]

Greetings,

I installed a brand new Pentair 3 port valve and it is leaking from the top cover. One of the screws was left off from an earlier test fitting of the valve actuator when I installed it. I am using it in manual mode now and when I used my screw gun to put the screw back in I apparently over torqued it and now the screw does not get snug. The valve seeps water out from under the cover at a rate of about 1/10 gallon per minute.

Does anyone have any ideas on how best to attack this? Do to space constraints I have fittings too close to the valve to allow me to simply cut it out conveniently - it would be a major rework if I had to install a new one. I was thinking of whutting everything down and injecting some epoxy into the hole and then insert the screw before it sets up all the way and then torque it down after the epoxy cures. I was going to couple that with a bead of silicone sealant around the edge of the cover to help the seal.

Any advice is truly appreciated!

Thanks

Tom

 

[Bama Rambler]

You have a pretty good plan. The epoxy should work, but I wouldn't worry about the silicone.

You could always use a larger screw if there's room.

 

[racket]

You could always use a larger screw if there's room.

I'd avoid this, since the torque of the screw split it in the first place.

Id try filling sealing the valve with silicone, then fill the screw hole with silicone first, before using epoxy.

 

[tomzo]

I bought a slightly larger screw but when I went to install it I found that it was clearly too large and worried about splitting the whole body. Silicone is next for tomorrow!

Thanks

Tom

 

[tomzo]

Update - decided on a combo approach. I ran a bead of silicone sealant around the rim of the valve and then partially filled the stripped screw hole with a 2 part epoxy designed for plastics and pushed the screw in to make sure I did not overfill. I then secured the top plate back into place using all the other screws and just pushed the one with the epoxy all the way in. After it set up for a couple hours I tightened it down and it is now leak free!

Thanks for the advice!

Tom