Pool plumbing

[kombiguy]

Hi! I have a question about holes in my pool. It's about 11000 gallons or so, more info in my sig. As far as I can determine, I have 3 suction ports in my pool. One in the spa area, a rectangular area about 3x5 inches or so. One is the skimmer, and there is one more in the wall of the pool, a couple of inches down from waterline. The last one is a plastic fitting, threaded on the inside, embedded into the wall.
I have 6 returns into the main pool area, and 4 into the spa area.
There are two grate covered holes in the bottom of the pool; one in the spa area, and one in the main pool area. These have no suction. I can feel suction in each of the 3 suction ports I mentioned above, but not in the floor holes.
Is this normal? Are the floor hole just gravity drains?
Please pardon my choice of words, I'm really new at this, and I'm not quite sure of all the terminology!
Thanks!

 

[JohnT]

You normally won't feel suction in the drains. They are designed to spread the flow to prevent entrapment.

The hole on the side of the pool is for a cleaner. plug/cap it if you aren't using it.

 

[jblizzle]

Welcome to TFP!!!

Do you have separate valves at the equipment pad to select each suction line? You must have a pool vs. spa valve. And there is likely a valve on the wall (cleaner) suction line. Is there also a valve to select between the floor and the skimmer?

Look in the bottom of the skimmer under the basket. Is there a spacehip or twinkie looking diverter valve covering 2 holes in the bottom? Do you have 2 holes or is one of them obviously plugged? It is not uncommon for the floor drain to be plumbed to the skimmer and then a diverter/float valve in the skimmer to adjust how much flow is pulled from the floor and how much from the skimmer.

Maybe you could add a picture of your equipment pad so we can see your setup.

 

[kombiguy]

The big problem I have is that nothing is labelled. There are 2 pumps, 4 valves, and one unvalved line. I'm not quite sure how the plumbing is laid out; it's a bit confusing so far.

I believe that the spa/pool valve is merely one of the ball valves, but I'm not sure.

And there is likely a valve on the wall (cleaner) suction line. The wall suction valve and the skimmer valve are the same valve, I believe.

Is there also a valve to select between the floor and the skimmer? Not that I can tell. I have always left all the valves open, except when I try to figure out which valve controls what.

Look in the bottom of the skimmer under the basket. 2 holes, one plugged.

here's 2 pictures. I hope it's clear where the equipment lines up. I couldn't get it all into one picture with my phone!

 

[jblizzle]

I am not really sure what is going on there. What are the 2 pumps for? I am guessing the one in the back is the filter pump and the one in the front is for the spa? Hard to tell where the blower ties in. Is there no heater for the spa?

So, here are my guesses based on the info provided:

The one in the back has 3 suctions lines and then goes into the filter. Since you only have 1 hole in the skimmer, I would guess that the 3 suction lines are (1) the skimmer (2) the pool floor (3) the wall cleaner. The main return to the pool would be the green pipe near the house.

The pipe closest to us in the 2nd picture is the spa return. The check valve above the near pump, would allow some water to pass from the filter to the spa (although that would allow flow backward through the near pump, which is not ideal) and result in a spa overflow into the pool (?) when the spa motor is off.

The 2 suction lines on the near motor I can only guess one is the rectangular suction line and the other is the spa floor. The check valve would prevent and flow from this pump to go to the pool return and everything would be routed through the near pipe to the spa.

You will just have to play with the ball valves to determine which suction line is for what.

BTW, the ball valve you have are not typically recommended as then become stiff and often the handles break. It would be better to install actual pool valves (Jandy Neverlube or the Pentair/Hayward equivalents) in the future when the need arises.