I installed a new pump and filter and added 3 solar panels. I have no water coming back into the pool. It is flowing out but none is coming in the input. I am so new at this pool thing, I do not know what to do. I have an 18X33 AGP, Hayaward 1.5 pump (which I stopped at the pool place today and he said it is hooked up right-he showed me his and mine is hooked the same way). When I went to shut the pump off last night when I realized no water was returning into the pool, the pressure popped the skimmer cap off and blew water all over me. I drained and cleaned the pool this weekend (what a job) because of poor closing last year and an ice storm that filled my pool with leaves and branches, as it ripped up my cover, so the water is fresh but I don't want to add chemicals until I get the solar panels working, how can I tell if water is going into the panels and how do I get the water back into the pool.
Solar Panels/no water returning to pool
- Thread starter Tysnest
- Start date
I think that you have too much back pressure. That is why the skimmer blew up. I don't know what you need though, maybe a bigger pump, or maybe you just need to prime the panels, they could be air locked.
Wel thanks for the reply but I have no idea how to do anything you said. I just bought the new pump and it is the biggest I could get, it is a 21 inch tank with a 1 1/2 hsp motor. How do you prime panels or break an air lock
Maybe some pictures or a sketch of your setup would be the easiest way to let us see what your system looks like. AG pool solar panels have plugs in them that can keep water from going where you think it will go.
- Apr 8, 2007
- 1,616
- Pool Size
- 17450
- Surface
- Vinyl
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Hayward Aqua Rite (T-15)
Depending on the type of panels you have, they may be closed. The Solar Bears and some other brands have a red handle that can be mounted to adjust the flow from closed to any where up to all the way open. My guess is that they got turned to off or almost off? One of my last set of panels came closed, one was open.
How can water be going out but not going back in? That makes no sense as you will very quickly have an empty pool and flooded yard if that was truly the case.
I can think of a couple of possibilities. If the pump is too small for the height of the panels then no water would actually go through. If a valve was turned off anywhere in the solar panel run it would also not work. It is also possible for the plumbing to be completely wrong and simply dead end somewhere in or around the panels.
Something has to be off. What is happening is the pump is pushing as hard as it can, and when the pump is turned off, all of that back pressure returns to where it came from, the skimmer. Either there is a valve off someplace, or the pump cannot push the water that far/high. I have also had that happen if the basket in the pump was clogged, AND I have had it happen when the basket in the pump had no water in it. Thus it was full of air, with water on each side of it. The pump is trying to pull water through using the air, and it just does not work. Air and water compress differently, obviously, as they are of different densities. But, would it be possible to have a blow off point at the highest point, like at the top of the panels to actually get the air out, and water to that point?
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