Returning to Pool Ownership

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You can always drain the spa first, attempt the drain cover fix and then fill the spa with fresh water. This would be one less thing to water down. Dump a cup or two of bleach in the spa as your refilling or after refilling and mix with the brush.

Try to refill the pool using multiple hoses - it will go faster.
 
Unfortunately, I don't have any check valves - the spa is draining right along with the pool. :p

I have an autofill, a hose run from the back yard with a sprinkler head ready to go, and another hose from the front spigot with a sprayer on the end. I'm using the sprayer to keep the spa moist (as well as pick it up and wet the sides/deep end as necessary), the sprinkler to handle the shallow end and hopefully steps, and the autofill will just do it's job. We'll see how the water pressure holds up. Unfortunately the clouds didn't hang around, but I'll keep everything nice and damp and the high is only supposed to be 79, so marginal, but should be ok.
 
You can empty the spa into the pool pretty quick. Set the suction side Jandy valve to suck from the spa, then turn your pool pump on for a short time. Watch as the spa drains and shut the pool pump off just as soon as the spa is empty. Then set the Jandy valves back to pool only - both the suction and return sides. This should allow the spa to be worked on and refilled while the pool is still draining.
 
Yup. I have a conference call about to start unfortunately, so for now it can drain slowly, but I had planned to isolate the spa and try to fill it once I'd repaired the drain cover - great suggestion. :)

And the clouds have started to make a reappearance. :p
 
First, a quick question. Can anyone identify this finish? Is it normal plaster or something else?

PoolFinish.jpg


New Spa Drain Cover installed:

SpaDrain.jpg


All done draining! (the pump wasn't running on its side like that):
AllDone.jpg
 
:goodjob: Great job on the spa drain cover fix! Now to fill it all back up again - that's going to take longer than draining.....

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You may also wish to pop the pool light out and clean or hose out behind it.
 
I had the same thought proavia, think I'll do that now. Edit - yup, lots of lovely brown sediment back there, all hosed out. The light's cord is coiled around the light fixture and I can see a little moisture inside the lens, so my hope that the non-functioning light is simply a burned out bulb endures.

I'm stoked about the drain cover - the quote to fix it if the screws were broken off (they were - flush with the plastic surround) was $500. Taking care of it for $35 in parts and my own labor more than pays for the water for the refill and my next repair job when payday comes around - replacing the bulb in the pool light.
 
So basically, that $500 quote paid for the repair, the sump pump rental, the water to refill, your TF100 and SpeedStir - with plenty left over for a few refreshing beverages. Heck, there's even enough left to replace the pool light bulb and the light housing gasket. And you now have additional knowledge about the pool too!

In all seriousness... when you do replace the bulb, get a new gasket for the housing (usually goes around the lens and seals the front cover, lens and housing areas).
 

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That autofill is a beast - it's putting out a decent stream. Both hoses seem to be running full bore as well. Yay waterpressure.

The spa is full and the pool water is about 2 inches below the swim step and rising. I'm hopeful I might be done before noon tomorrow at this rate.

I added the rest of a bottle of bleach and brushed it around, which given my fill water FC should get me into the ballpark once all water is added. I don't know what my final CYA will be so I wanted to make sure to get ahead of any solar loss until I can get the fill finished and a full test completed.
 
Fill started at around 12:15p or so yesterday, by 10p last night the water was within a foot and a half or so of full. I turned off the hoses, and the autofill completed the fill some time before 7:15a this morning.

Got the filter fired up, and after an hour or so ran my weekly tests:
FC 5
CC 0
TA 140
Ph 7.8
CH 200
CyA Less than 20 (some cloudiness at the 20 mark).

Floated a couple of pucks to raise the CYA a bit, and around 16oz of muratic acid to bring the Ph down to 7.5. The rest I'm going to leave alone for now. The CH will rise naturally given the conditions here. I'll plan to potentially add stabilizer tomorrow (I have to run to the store and am going out of town today, so tomorrow will be the ticket to purchase stabilizer).
 
If it's not one thing, it's another. ;)

The heater has been on the fritz - the wife asked me to fire up the hot tub after a hard day last week but I couldn't get the heater to fire (it's self-lighting - theoretically). It was fairly windy, but I suspect, given that it had a hard time lighting during the home inspection on a still, warm day, that the igniter needs to be cleaned or otherwise serviced. I have a small list of to-dos for the plumber already, so it shouldn't be a big deal to add "Grug want make gas heater work" to the list without incurring a ton of extra cost.

Tonight, a fine night to celebrate the mothers in our lives, on a whim as the kids were going to bed, I started up the pump and hit the spa button, and after a bit of sparking I was giving up on it when I realized the service light was out and I had four green and heating. A couple of plastic wine "glasses" of peach bellinis and a nice evening staring at the stars was more than worth all of the effort.

Now to keep up the vigilance and maintenance. I'll still need to get the heater looked at, and purchasing some stabilizer if I have time tomorrow (I spent the day working on a short deadline that's due tomorrow morning - heck, I'm still working on that deadline) but at least we had some nice downtime and enjoyed our "investment".

Cheers everyone.
 
Anyone have a suggestion for a decent (yet inexpensive) telepole vaccum? It's obvious that leaf raking and brushing isn't completely doing the trick here, and I'd like to be able to suck up that stuff. A robot/kreepy are out of budget for now unfortunately.
 
Runaway Ph!

Ok, so the previous owner has all of the pool returns pointed at the surface. While I'm currently working down my TA, it's ok, but pretty soon I'm going to have to reduce my Ph rise.

I don't recognize these returns however, so if someone here can let me know of a tool I could use to loosen them to adjust them I'd appreciate it! The design (it's a little hard to see, but I didn't want to risk submerging my phone) is a threaded pipe, there's the eyeball, and then there are two notched "tabs" that come up out what looks like a deeply seated ring. My ASSumption is that I need a tool that will engage those two tabs to loosen that ring, which will then allow me to adjust the point on the eyeball. In the image, you can just see the edge of one of the tabs below the eyeball.

Thoughts, links, tool suggestions? :) Thanks!!!

Image of the return:
http://wiredstar.com/images/sabino/20160601_202449479_iOS.jpg
 
Last edited:
Clicking on your link gives a 404 error. The actual link should be:
http://wiredstar.com/images/sabino/20160601_202449479_iOS.jpg
the "sabino/" is missing in the actual link.

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Anyway.... mine are somewhat similar. I suppose there is a tool (which I don't have). I use two small flat blade screwdrivers at the slots in the tabs to unscrew. Takes a bit of finesse and patience to get them to start moving. First time I tried it I was scared of breaking them......
 

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