what am i doing wrong???

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ta2dwonderwoman

ta2dwonderwoman

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Jul 1, 2016
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fall river ks
so, I just got a new sand filter/swg set up for my intex pool...tried to hook up the vacuum on a pole with a nice long hose and it was vacuuming for a few minutes and then just stopped pulling anything thru the hose. I tried hooking up to the pump directly, tried hooking up inside the pool on the port that sucks water out to the pump...in the end, it just would not work and when I tried to move my dial to backwash there was so much pressure built up, I thought it was going to break before it moved...I had to backwash and rinse 3 or 4 cycles to get it to let go of the pressure and let the handle turn freely as it should...am I just dense in some way? I really thought I understood, but maybe I am missing something? I had it set to "filter" assuming that the water needed to go thru the sand to be cleaned before going back into the pool...is that correct or do I need to set it on some other setting?

I thought it was clogged with leaves, couldn't see very well due to crud floating around...but in the end, it didn't seem to be the case...


thanks in advance for any help/advice :)
 
You have two options - vacuum to the filter or vacuum to waste. Usually when a pool is very messy or it is difficult to see the bottom debris clearly, the best method is vacuuming to waste. Of course always turn-off the pump before turning the multiport valve, and always turn the valve in the same direction. Are things working okay now?
 
yes, everything is running fine now, and I made sure to turn it off each time I switched settings, and I always turn clockwise to get where I am headed...the hose was not getting clogged up, when I did the backwash with it after I gave up, no debris came out, just water. I have no more debris in the pool at this point, or very little anyway, so I will try it again this afternoon and see if I have any better luck. it just seemed to pull in for a few minutes and then just stop...which resulted in the buildup of pressure in the pump... I just wanted to be sure I was ok to vacuum and have it on "filter" setting so that the water was not getting dumped on the ground :) tonight I need to read my salt content and add more to fine tune it and then hopefully tomorrow will be ready to turn on the swg!
 
And I have just about given up on this Intex automatic vacuum that hooks up to the water return line and supposedly works on the Venturi effect... it pretty much doesn't move unless I go out there and give it a kick... and when it does move it doesn't seem to be picking anything up so I think I may just return it and spend a little more money on something different
 
ok, so messing around the pool today I figured out that the spot where water comes back into the pool is making the pressure of the water flow coming into the pool much less as it disperses it like a sprayer instead of letting it "jet" out...so when I use the intex vacuum, I don't think it is getting enough pressure to operate correctly. I may do a slight drain and replace this with the one that it had on it before (which I thought was lost and hence the new one, but now I found it) and see if that changes things...this thing is not rocket science and there is almost zero reasons outside of pressure issues that it would not work...I think...
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Okay, so now let's go back to the very beginning and reevaluate. You mentioned it was working okay at first but then the pressure shot-up. No matter what you tried the pressure remained very high right? Is it still that way? Let's address the following items to be sure:

- Is pressure high both while vacuuming with the hose attached AND without a hose (just running the filter like normal)?
- Also, just to confirm, when you vacuumed, did you first submerse the vacuum hose and fill it completely with water?
- By any chance have you ruled-out the chance of any obstruction in the hose itself?
- Does the pump basket (w/ clear lid) remain full of water while vacuuming?
- Lastly, have you considered removing the filter lid and taking a peak inside to see if anything looks odd?
 
when operating things, it all works completely as expected except when I hook up my hose to vacuum with - I have tried hooking it up straight to the pump basket connection where water enters it, and I have also tried connecting directly to the port inside the pool...

- Is pressure high both while vacuuming with the hose attached AND without a hose (just running the filter like normal)?
I have not looked at what the pressure reads while vacuuming, but I have found that the handle on the top of the filter is very hard to move once I stop vacuuming and try to go to another setting. the pressure build up lets go as I backwash and rinse and after a few cycles, I am able to move the handle freely again

- Also, just to confirm, when you vacuumed, did you first submerse the vacuum hose and fill it completely with water?
yes, I made sure it was full of water each time.

- By any chance have you ruled-out the chance of any obstruction in the hose itself?
when I backwash with that same hose, I have nothing coming out of the hose, and the water comes out quite freely - there are no more leaves in the pool that I can see right now

- Does the pump basket (w/ clear lid) remain full of water while vacuuming?
the basket starts off full, then when I start it running, it drops by at least 1/3 of the depth of the basket

- Lastly, have you considered removing the filter lid and taking a peak inside to see if anything looks odd?
I have not thought of this or done it, but may have to if all else fails
 
Because of the increased pressure and tension in your multiport valve, I keep wanting to fallback on an obstruction. The water dropping might be an indication of that as well. Of course we know a suction-side leak will cause a drop in the pump basket too. Often times the vacuum hose is not as airtight as plumbing, and my strainer basket lets more in than normal while vacuuming. But that still doesn't explain the pressure increase and tension. It's odd that everything seems fine until you connect the vacuum to it. Any chance you could post a pic of the vacuum set-up you are using?

Going back to the system itself, pressure might increase if something got jammed in there when you first started vacuuming and perhaps sucked-up a good bundle of debris. Is that a possibility? If so, you might want to turn power off (double check) and reach into the pump where water enters the impeller to make sure there is nothing trapped or wrapped around that impeller. It should turn rather freely. Past that it's the multiport valve. You may need to remove those screws and look to ensure something didn't happen with the valve or some sort of obstruction. Be careful to position the valve exactly in the same position as removed. Tighten screws in a star pattern for equal pressure. Then lastly there's the filter itself. While you would think if it backwashes okay there shouldn't be an issue inside, I'm trying to rule-out anything at this point.
 

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I appreciate the help in what to look for...i will try to get hime early enough to do some sig but it could be the weekend before that happens as i commute 1 1/2 hours wed-fri and don't get home as early as i would like some days. ..will get back to you with info as soon as i can
 
So...i got home with a half hour of daylight left, so I decided to try one thing with this Auto vac before I lost my daylight. I turn the pump off and switch it to recirculate hooked up the auto vac... lo and behold it's working! It did stop once or twice but for the most part it's just tooling around doing its own little thing... definitely still have some fine-tuning of things to be done but I feel like I'm making progress... now I have to figure out if I'm losing water because if I am I'm going to cry...
 
Here are a few pictures of my vacuum setup... I can't see where I've done anything that should cause this issue... my hose is not cracked as far as i can tell, nor is it clogged up or collapsing... As soon as I turn on the pump there's a funny screeching noise that is coming from the valve where turn the water off on the outside of the pool. And as soon as I heard that noise I look down and water is disappearing from my skimmer basket on my pump. It never completely empties but it's pretty close to being below where the water comes into the skimmer basket and when I check my pressure it looks like it's less than when I'm running it without the vacuum. 20170416_113426.jpg

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Well, I'm just about stumped myself. Might have to call-in the cavalry for another opinion. But first, when you say:
As soon as I turn on the pump there's a funny screeching noise that is coming from the valve where turn the water off on the outside of the pool.
Click to expand...
Any chance you could post a pic a little further away to where we can see all of your equipment and/or pool set-up? I'm curious about that valve to see if there is any other possibility causing a water restriction.
 
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I am attaching my old pump real fast to see if it will work because I never had any problems with it.. if it works then I definitely believe that it's something to do with the pressure situation on the new pump... NFL turns out to be the case I'll have to do some more detective work to see if I can figure it out and if not plan to use the old pump anytime I need to vacuum because it will be set up anyway to run our solar hoses...

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You can't see the spot where the noise is coming from in this picture but it's just like the one on the other side where the water goes back into the pool that you can see in this picture... and it doesn't make that noise when I don't have the vacuum on it
 

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