Need New Surface Skimmer Advice

drgnslayr · Jul 14, 2014

Greetings everyone.

I'm rehabbing an inground concrete pool. It has only one skimmer on the wrong side of the pool, and that skimmer is cracked.

I am already having to completely replumb the pool, so I have dug out the sides all around the pool now and want to cut in three skimmers on the north end (we get only south wind all summer).

Can you guys recommend a good wall skimmer for my application? The pool is an L-shaped 36x18 ft pool.

BTW: this is a form-poured pool and the coping is concrete and poured into the sidewalls, helping with structure. I am familiar with the original builder and there is also plenty of steel in the sidewalls.

Thank you!

Casey · Jul 16, 2014

Bumping to see if we can get you any help with your project. Have any pics?

jblizzle · Jul 16, 2014

Not sure what skimmers to suggest, but 3 seems like overkill and may actually reduce the skimming effectiveness by splitting the suction.

drgnslayr · Jul 17, 2014

In this photo the blue items represent vacuum spots; blue square is drain, blue rectangles represent skimmers, blue dot is a vacuum line. Red represents return items; red fountain/bubbler, red dots represent returns on the left and the three at the bottom are spa massage jets on the back of an in-pool bench. The green is a flagstone wall and the surface around the pool is flagstone. I would like to be able to run the massage jets and water feature at the same time. I need to balance both sides of the pump, that is why I thought it would be best to go with 3 skimmers. My piping is 2". I currently have this designed with just one VS 3-hp pump but sometimes wonder if I should split and have a second pump.

Up to this point, concerning skimmers, I have focused on two from Hayward, the SP1071 Skim-Master series, and the SP1082 Auto-Skim series. I believe the Auto-Skim series has only one outlet and it is used to the pump. The Skim-Master has a second outlet used for equalizing. Is equalizing necessary? I find it hard to believe a child will get sucked into my skimmers. Since this is a remodel, it would take a great deal of effort to equalize it with the main drain. So I guess the real danger is with the main drain suction which I would plan to operate only during night time maintenance cycles.

All the skimmers are on the north side because this pool is in Kansas and 99% of summer wind direction is out of the south. Also, I planned to run directional clockwise returns to create a bit of top water swirls working debris into the skimmers.

All advice is well-appreciated.

jblizzle · Jul 17, 2014

The equalizer is protection for the pump is the water level drops below the skimmer level.

I think 2 skimmers and the drain should allow more than enough flow to support the bench jets and waterfall, likely 1 skimmer and drain (plumbed separately) would be enough.

You might want more than just the 2 return jets for circulation when the bench is not one though.

gwegan · Jul 17, 2014

Your main drain has to be split into two equalized drains.

drgnslayr · Jul 17, 2014

gwegan - I think it will be difficult (if not impossible) to split the drain on the bottom (at the bottom). the plumbing is in the concrete and doesn't appear until it hits the side. It would be quite a project to drill out an extra floor drain and run pipe over to the other floor drain pipe on the side and connect the two. I guess I could put in a suction vent on the side of the pool near the floor drain pipe and connect into the pipe.

jblizzle · Jul 17, 2014

There are ways to be safe and not have dual drains. Are you replacing the drain? I think there are also long rectangular ones that can be used individually. Of course, maybe you do not have to do anything there to satisfy code. But, I would certainly consider a method to prevent a single floor drain from being the only suction line.

poolmation · Jul 20, 2014

We just had our pool replastered and had the main drain split. They did indeed jackhammer though the gunite to expose the main drain pipe and jackhammer a path to connect the split drain together in a symmetric balanced way. Afterwards they patched with concrete. While it certainly seemed like a big deal to me it only cost $450 for that part and so was minor compared to stripping, new tile, and replastering. Interestingly it seemed to be the company's preferred method of complying with the VGB act. While there are many methods to comply, this seemed the simplest for them since they were so comfortable with it.