Intex Skimmer Causes Pump to Make Horrible Sucking Sound

[genbeau]

Hello all.
We have an 18' above ground Intex inflatable pool. This is the second one we have had in about 8 seasons. We upgraded long ago to the 2500gph pump and it helped a whole lot. We had a skimmer on the old one and everything worked fine. It finally played out for some reason. I think a part broke. So, we bought another Intex skimmer just like it. We also had to replace the pump a couple of seasons ago when we replaced the pool. So, now the setup is a new 18' pool, new 2500 gph pump and a new skimmer. All the same stuff but new. (It is now about two seasons old but the skimmer issue happened a while back and we have been without one since.)
We hooked the skimmer up as before and it caused the pump to make a terrible sucking in sound like when someone is having a coughing spasm and cannot breathe well. The pump sounded like it was straining horribly. We unhooked it all and I asked the seller on Ebay about it. I was greeted with "that's an Intex problem so call them thing and no chance of a refund." We called Intex and got a poor girl that barely spoke good English. We couldn't understand her and she couldn't understand us so we finally gave up. So, we lost about $30 on that skimmer.
We still have it. It is sitting in the shed. I saw this website and thought I would ask y'all if y'all have any ideas about it. We bought a new pool kit and it included a flow reduction adapter that came with a picture of a skimmer but no real instructions. It made me think to post this thread. What does that do and will it help this problem? Thank you!

 

[frustratedpoolmom]

Its sucking air. period..., that's not an "intex" problem - its a connection problem or its defective/broken.
Have you tried connecting the pump directly, without the "skimmer" portion?

 

[jeffchap]

You can adjust how far those skimmers sit into the water. It sounds like you had it set too shallow, and it was suckling air into the skimmer.

 

[Richard320]

You can adjust how far those skimmers sit into the water. It sounds like you had it set too shallow, and it was suckling air into the skimmer.

I was just going to type that!

 

[genbeau]

Its sucking air. period..., that's not an "intex" problem - its a connection problem or its defective/broken.
Have you tried connecting the pump directly, without the "skimmer" portion?

We took it off not long after trying it and trying to contact the seller and Intex about it. We have just gone without the skimmer since then. The pump works great. Just means we have to clean more with a net. We got a battery vacuum after all these seasons for stuff on the bottom. We do miss the skimmer though. Thanks for the reply.

- - - Updated - - -

You can adjust how far those skimmers sit into the water. It sounds like you had it set too shallow, and it was suckling air into the skimmer.

My sister is the house guru on the Intex pool so I will have to ask her to be sure but I think she did all that. The first skimmer we had did wonderfully. So she had knowledge of how to do it. I think I remember her mentioning that and adjusting the settings. Yeah because at one point we had it too low I think. I'll have to ask her to be sure though. This skimmer looked okay so I don't recall there being anything physically wrong with it that was obvious that we could figure out. Thank you for replying also.

 

[genbeau]

I was just going to type that!

I asked my sister and she did try adjusting the depth. I think we even tried a different hose in case but there was nothing we could spot with the skimmer itself that makes us think it was bad. But, it could be. The seller didn't want anything to do with it after we received it and we were stuck with calling Intex which is awful. We would like to try it again because that first one was great to have. This new one (if I remember correctly) was like the old one. Please let me know if y'all have any more ideas. I appreciate all of your help so far. Thanks.

 

[genbeau]

I think we got it fixed today. Took a little doing because our pool was already up and going and filled with water. The connectors had stuck together too so it was fun trying to get them apart to hook the skimmer up. I found another place where others had said their skimmers were being pushed up at an angle and remembered something like that happening to ours. So, we attached it and when the pump was turned on the skimmer rose at an angle and was not pulling the water through. We did as those others had suggested and weighted down the bucket part leaving the hole clear of course. (We used rocks and a 2.5lb barbell weight.) Once we got the height adjusted right it did just fine. The surface of the water was much cleaner after only a little while of it running. Thank y'all for the help. Hope this helps anyone who may be having the same issue.

 

[genbeau]

Looks that only worked for the other day. We didn't run the pump yesterday but turned it on again today. It once again started sucking air (after having worked well two days ok) but it didn't sound as bad. We can hear the air though and air bubbles are coming out the other side where the water flows back into the pool. We have tried the weights thing and even switched for the old skimmer. Seems that the only thing wrong with our old one may have been the hose. But, it continued to bring in air. The weights kept the barrel part down but the blue part floats to the surface. We cannot figure out why air is coming in that way. Please help with any ideas. We are about to go back to no skimmer at all sadly. Thanks.

 

[Casey]

Welcome

 

[genbeau]

Welcome

Thank you!