Main Drain Leak - Help

[randybw1]

I'm new here and looking for some help. We just went through very very cold weather/lots of ice and temps in the 20s for several days. Pool pump ran just fine during that time. After everything thawed out, we noticed the pool level had really dropped. So I added water, after a cold night of the pool running all night, the water level had dropped again, just as much. So to make the story short, I found standing water in the shrubs next to the pool decking. I dug down and there are 3 pipes down there, running side by side, with the pool deck drain line right above them. The pipe on the outside closest to the house has a crack in the 45 degree fitting with water coming out. I've determined it's the main drain line because I cannot make the water stop coming out, now it's coming out more and more and the pool is basically draining slowly. The pool is several inches below the skimmers and the water still comes out the crack. I have the stuff to replace the 45 degree fitting today, but how will I make the water stop coming out the main drain? The water is cold and I have no scuba gear

Any tricks out there or obvious solutions?

Thanks!

 

[zea3]

Hi, welcome to TFP! You may be able to contact a pool repair company and hire someone to plug the main drain for you. The only other options I see are to try and plug the main drain with a sheet of plastic and some bricks to weigh it down, although that may be difficult to do depending on the location of the main drain. You might try wrapping the pipe with rubberized tape to temporarily stop the leak and repair it when the water is warmer. 2 part epoxy putty that sets in water may temporarily stop the leak as well. Otherwise you drain the pool until the water is a tolerable level so you can plug the drain yourself.

 

[duraleigh]

I may be misunderstanding but the crack should stop leaking once the pool level is at the same level of the crack, right?

Can you simply pump out the water to below the crack level and then make the repair?

 

[randybw1]

It's real close to that level, thanks for all the advice. I'm going to check it in the a.m. and will probably drain some to see if that makes it stop leaking.