I can't remember if I ever posted anything but maybe an introduction, but I read all sorts of great information here last summer . Early-ish in the summer, on a whim, we bought a small 12' round pool (the $150 Intex K-Mart special, before they were sold out everywhere on the planet). The supplied pump was OK for a while, but wasn't keeping up, so I looked to upgrade to the heavier duty Intex..... but by the time we decided that was what we wanted to do (becuase I was tired of fighting the little supplied intex), those intex pumps were sold out anywhere - unless I wanted to pay like $500 on ebay. That was a no go, so I found a Raypak 1hp and a 25 ft2 cartridge filter online and hooked those up and we were off and running. That setup, with a chlorine tab bobber thing kept that little pool crystal clear. Looking for info on hard plumbing the raypak was when I stumbled on this site and started reading all about people's different plumbing setups.
Fast forward to this year - pool was such a hit we decided to upgrade. Got another above ground pool, this time from Costco. 12' x 24' x 48". (Installing it is a saga of its own that maybe I'll share some day, Lol) So much more room for 4 kids (and the occasional 2 adults). Based on what I'd read here last year, I went ahead and added a skimmer right off the bat. Unfortunately, with summer rapidly approaching, not all is happy in backyard pool land.
Problem #1, and the big reason I'm posting..... Went away for a long weekend (long story short, we had 2 foster kids for 22 months, were able to adopt them, and had a friend last minute gift us 6 days at her cabin and we jumped on it). Since it was spontaneous and last minute, I didn't do anything to the pool, came back and had some algae growing. I'm assuming that for it to grow after 6 days means that it probably wasn't totally happy to begin with. It wasn't a lot of algae, but it was more than none. My first instinct was to throw a couple of chlorine tabs in the floater and try to scrub/vacuum the bottom The algae came up pretty easy (it was greenish, if it matters). Didn't really suck up into the vacuum, though, just made the water all cloudy. Hooray.... . I ran the pump for about 30 hours straight and then I've been doing 4-5 hours a night and it's much clearer now - I could see the bottom of the pool today. A little stuff had settled to the bottom, so I tried brushing/vacuuming again today, even though it doesn't really suck all that well..... stirred everything up again, but as bad as the first time around.... so it's getting cleaner, but not perfect.... So, my second instinct (which maybe should have been my first) was to 'look up that forum I found last year and see what they have to say'..... and here I am trying to figure out where I went so wrong before the Mrs fires me and finds a new pool boy! Obviously I have lots to learn with the bigger pool!
Never ordered a test kit last year because that pool just stayed clean, so I have one on order, should be here in a few days. In the meantime, I'm filtering like crazy and trying to figure out the vacuum so that once I have the test kit I can SLAM the pool (I think that's what I need to do based on what I've read here so far). But since the directions to SLAM my pool say I need to be vacuuming it, I need to figure out how to make the vacuum suck.
And, if anyone has any other suggestions on how I ought to tackle the pool, I'm all ears. I'm a total rookie, but it seems like SLAM is the first order of business!
Onto the vacuum issue: It just sucks. Or, more accurately, doesn't suck. I have the skimmer and 1 through the wall vacuum port (the 2nd through the wall suction port is just capped right now), hard plumbed to a T and then to the pump. They suck like crazy under normal circumstances - with the pump on high, I can watch all the floaties on the top of the pool sucking into the skimmer with no problems at all, just like it should. On low it doesn't suck so aggressively that I can see floaties making a beeline to the skimmer, but it's moving water fine and has plenty of return, so I assume it's still working right I just don't see it so obviously. Since it didn't seem like it really sucks, I did try to do some basic troubleshooting. Ditched the vacuum head to start and attached the hose to the skimmer vacuum cap and then took the other end to the return and let water flow through until it's coming out the cap (I didn't have it stuck down to actually create a vacuum) just to be extra sure that I have no air in my vacuum hose. Once the water is flowing through the hose, clearly no air bubbles, I had the Mrs drop the cap so I'm sucking through it instead of the skimmer basket....and it doesn't really have a lot of suction at the end of the vacuum hose. Some, but not much.... Even though the skimmer is sucking stuff in like crazy before, when I put the cap on, it's like the other port does double duty and I just don't get as much flow through the skimmer. That makes sense, and I had seen a you-tuber who claimed you need to block the 2nd port or else you lose a bunch of your suction to the skimmer. So I tried that, plugged the 2nd port, and suddenly I've got suction for days at the end of the vacuum hose. Unfortunately, it can't keep up with the pump.... After 30 seconds or a minute, the pump chamber/basket isn't full anymore - and it will get low enough to suck air. That's definitely no bueno.... Get everything back happy again, and this time I block the 2nd port while I'm still just sucking from the skimmer basket. On it's own, the skimmer basket keeps up with the pump just fine. But when I put the cap on with the vacuum hose, it can't keep up. On low I can attach the hose to the vacuum cap and it keeps up with the pump just fine - but I'm not sure it has enough suction to work as a vacuum when it's running on low....
I'm thinking there are two possible solutions here (or maybe both my ideas are wrong... you tell me). My first idea was to hard plumb the vacuum. The elbow on the vacuum cap for the skimmer is smaller than everything else, and so it seems like if the 2nd port is blocked, the cap is too restrictive and the pump is pumping faster than I can get it water. If I hard plumbed with a jandy valve, I could switch over to the vacuum and have my 1.5" pool hose plumbed straight into it and eliminate that restriction. Normally it'd be pulling from the skimmer, but when it's vacuum time, I flip the valve and start sucking through the vacuum instead. The skimmer provides enough water to the pump when the 2nd port is closed, it only has issues when the vacuum cap is involved, which is why I'm thinking it's the restriction of the cap....With the jandy valve, if the vacuum line alone couldn't keep up I could theoretically find the sweet spot where it sucks just enough water from the skimmer to keep up but is pulling the bulk through the vacuum hose to give me the most suction.
Second thought is that I could put a ball valve on the 2nd port (right now I have 1 ball valve after the skimmer line and the line from that port have merged). If I had that 2nd ball valve, I could restrict the flow from that 2nd port without cutting it off completely, and, again, find the sweet spot where most of my suction comes from the skimmer vacuum cap, but enough comes from the 2nd port to make sure the pump is being fed enough water.
I look forward to hearing all the mistakes I'm making up here so I can learn how to fix them.
Fast forward to this year - pool was such a hit we decided to upgrade. Got another above ground pool, this time from Costco. 12' x 24' x 48". (Installing it is a saga of its own that maybe I'll share some day, Lol) So much more room for 4 kids (and the occasional 2 adults). Based on what I'd read here last year, I went ahead and added a skimmer right off the bat. Unfortunately, with summer rapidly approaching, not all is happy in backyard pool land.
Problem #1, and the big reason I'm posting..... Went away for a long weekend (long story short, we had 2 foster kids for 22 months, were able to adopt them, and had a friend last minute gift us 6 days at her cabin and we jumped on it). Since it was spontaneous and last minute, I didn't do anything to the pool, came back and had some algae growing. I'm assuming that for it to grow after 6 days means that it probably wasn't totally happy to begin with. It wasn't a lot of algae, but it was more than none. My first instinct was to throw a couple of chlorine tabs in the floater and try to scrub/vacuum the bottom The algae came up pretty easy (it was greenish, if it matters). Didn't really suck up into the vacuum, though, just made the water all cloudy. Hooray.... . I ran the pump for about 30 hours straight and then I've been doing 4-5 hours a night and it's much clearer now - I could see the bottom of the pool today. A little stuff had settled to the bottom, so I tried brushing/vacuuming again today, even though it doesn't really suck all that well..... stirred everything up again, but as bad as the first time around.... so it's getting cleaner, but not perfect.... So, my second instinct (which maybe should have been my first) was to 'look up that forum I found last year and see what they have to say'..... and here I am trying to figure out where I went so wrong before the Mrs fires me and finds a new pool boy! Obviously I have lots to learn with the bigger pool!
Never ordered a test kit last year because that pool just stayed clean, so I have one on order, should be here in a few days. In the meantime, I'm filtering like crazy and trying to figure out the vacuum so that once I have the test kit I can SLAM the pool (I think that's what I need to do based on what I've read here so far). But since the directions to SLAM my pool say I need to be vacuuming it, I need to figure out how to make the vacuum suck.
And, if anyone has any other suggestions on how I ought to tackle the pool, I'm all ears. I'm a total rookie, but it seems like SLAM is the first order of business!Onto the vacuum issue: It just sucks. Or, more accurately, doesn't suck. I have the skimmer and 1 through the wall vacuum port (the 2nd through the wall suction port is just capped right now), hard plumbed to a T and then to the pump. They suck like crazy under normal circumstances - with the pump on high, I can watch all the floaties on the top of the pool sucking into the skimmer with no problems at all, just like it should. On low it doesn't suck so aggressively that I can see floaties making a beeline to the skimmer, but it's moving water fine and has plenty of return, so I assume it's still working right I just don't see it so obviously. Since it didn't seem like it really sucks, I did try to do some basic troubleshooting. Ditched the vacuum head to start and attached the hose to the skimmer vacuum cap and then took the other end to the return and let water flow through until it's coming out the cap (I didn't have it stuck down to actually create a vacuum) just to be extra sure that I have no air in my vacuum hose. Once the water is flowing through the hose, clearly no air bubbles, I had the Mrs drop the cap so I'm sucking through it instead of the skimmer basket....and it doesn't really have a lot of suction at the end of the vacuum hose. Some, but not much.... Even though the skimmer is sucking stuff in like crazy before, when I put the cap on, it's like the other port does double duty and I just don't get as much flow through the skimmer. That makes sense, and I had seen a you-tuber who claimed you need to block the 2nd port or else you lose a bunch of your suction to the skimmer. So I tried that, plugged the 2nd port, and suddenly I've got suction for days at the end of the vacuum hose. Unfortunately, it can't keep up with the pump.... After 30 seconds or a minute, the pump chamber/basket isn't full anymore - and it will get low enough to suck air. That's definitely no bueno.... Get everything back happy again, and this time I block the 2nd port while I'm still just sucking from the skimmer basket. On it's own, the skimmer basket keeps up with the pump just fine. But when I put the cap on with the vacuum hose, it can't keep up. On low I can attach the hose to the vacuum cap and it keeps up with the pump just fine - but I'm not sure it has enough suction to work as a vacuum when it's running on low....
I'm thinking there are two possible solutions here (or maybe both my ideas are wrong... you tell me). My first idea was to hard plumb the vacuum. The elbow on the vacuum cap for the skimmer is smaller than everything else, and so it seems like if the 2nd port is blocked, the cap is too restrictive and the pump is pumping faster than I can get it water. If I hard plumbed with a jandy valve, I could switch over to the vacuum and have my 1.5" pool hose plumbed straight into it and eliminate that restriction. Normally it'd be pulling from the skimmer, but when it's vacuum time, I flip the valve and start sucking through the vacuum instead. The skimmer provides enough water to the pump when the 2nd port is closed, it only has issues when the vacuum cap is involved, which is why I'm thinking it's the restriction of the cap....With the jandy valve, if the vacuum line alone couldn't keep up I could theoretically find the sweet spot where it sucks just enough water from the skimmer to keep up but is pulling the bulk through the vacuum hose to give me the most suction.
Second thought is that I could put a ball valve on the 2nd port (right now I have 1 ball valve after the skimmer line and the line from that port have merged). If I had that 2nd ball valve, I could restrict the flow from that 2nd port without cutting it off completely, and, again, find the sweet spot where most of my suction comes from the skimmer vacuum cap, but enough comes from the 2nd port to make sure the pump is being fed enough water.
I look forward to hearing all the mistakes I'm making up here so I can learn how to fix them.
