Malfunctioning spa jet

[sweet]

Hi All,

I really should have brought this up with my PB, but I didn't. One of the jets in my spa barely works. It bubbles some and there's a little bit of water coming out of it. When I drained the spa last spring to clean out the drains, I took a peek inside that jet and saw a white hex bolt looking thing centered and at the back of the throat. I figured out what size it was and got a deep welled six point socket with extension and wrench ready. After filling the spa back I gingerly turned that bolt clockwise, and did not see any change, so I tried counterclockwise with no change. Below is a picture of the jet housing during the pool's construction

Does anyone recognize this, and was I heading down the right track with the socket wrench.

 

[budster]

That's a fairly common fitting, which should work well. I don't suppose that this one jet that performs poorly is at the end of the "run of piping for all the jets, is it? Is your jet plumbing "looped" or not?

 

[sweet]

Thanks for the reply. The setup is there are three jets to the right of the water and air return pipe tees, and two to the left. There is not a loop, air feeds in to the top manifold and water to the lower. The jet in question is the last one in line on the three jets side. If I plug one or more of the other jets, there is no change in how this jet performs. The pictures of the assembly I have(prior to gunite) do not show any signs of damage to either the water or air pipes leading to that jet. When the spa is drained and I fill it via the jets, water dribbles out of that jet, and sprays across the spa for the other four.

It really seems like that jet has an air and water obstruction of some type, or that the thing I saw at the back of the manifold is there to adjust flow. I guess I'm looking for someone to tell me if that's true or not.

 

[budster]

If it continues to perform poorly even with all other jets plugged, I'd say you have an obstruction, or that fitting is defective. I'm not familiar with any adjustments on such fittings.

 

[waste]

#1 - welcome to TFP!!


Some of the venturi jets have the flow adjustment that you've described (ie. turning the hex headed nozzle will increase or decrease the flow) and fully turning it will allow you to remove the nozzle. You can use a screwdriver to check for a small stone, etc - just poke it into the orifice and see if there's something in there, if so, remove the fitting with your hex wrench and get it out. I've seen stones, leaves and nut shells block them, if you take out the nozzle with the system running, anything ~ small should shoot out

 

[Alfred Beachport]

Yeah, sounds like it's just the jet nozzle insert.

I had the same symptom you do when I first got my rescue spa up and running. I poked my finger into the jet and could feel something in there, which turned out to be a chunk of another jet that had broken and that I had replaced.

Didn't want to drain the spa down far enough to get at it, so I borrowed my girlfriend's swim goggles and dove in with my socket wrench. Not the best way to treat a ratchet, but I doused it very well with WD40 immediately afterward.

I just unscrewed the nozzle insert and picked out the chunk of plastic.

You might phone up the PB and describe the symptom and ask if you're okay to take a socket wrench to it.