Valve type for sheer descents

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D

Dodger

Silver Supporter
Sep 17, 2017
649
Silicon Valley, CA
We are using this holiday week to fix some leaky plumbing for our sheer descents. The leak areas are circled in red in this single picture, but each leak is actually on plumbing lines for 2 different sheer descents.

We are thinking of replacing all the way to below the elbow, so we can true up the height of the rising pvc and take some of the stress off of all the joints.

If you can advise the valve type we should use, that would be most appreciated. If there is any other advice about this length of plumbing, we'd love to hear it.


View attachment 72927
 
Dodger,

I am not a fan of ball valves, but if they are covered, like in a valve box, they work ok.. In general, when used on a water feature, they only need to be adjusted one time and you never touch them again.

Jandy valves are always better, but in this case, I doubt they have any advantage and cost a lot more..

Thanks for posting,

Jim R.
 
I suggest you remove that valve altogether and not use it at all. Put the valve back at the equipment pad where (hopefully) the start of that run goes. Use a Jandy neverlube of course!
 
Thanks everyone. Great input.

The Jandy valves are certainly a strong option. Jim is right that these valves should rarely need to be turned (once a year or less), so Jandy may be a little overkill.

That is an interesting idea to move the valve back to the pad. We are discussing the plus/minus of that. The main downside is we would lose the ability to shut off individual sheer descents (there are 3). We had one of them closed off for several months last year before we sealed a leak in the pool-side scupper area. But if we do decide to place a single valve at the pad, then maybe we'd go with a Jandy valve.

Regarding the street L, I'm not sure I follow. On the right side of the pic, the line goes straight into the back of the scupper. There is no elbow after the coupler. Or am I misunderstanding? Sorry if the picture is not very good. We were going to cut just to the right of that last coupler and plumb straight back from there.

Regarding the leak on the left, I will try again to tighten that.

Thanks again everyone!
 
Dodger,

Moving the valves to the equipment pad is the best idea, but assumes that you have three individual pipes from the equipment pad to the sheers... I assume you only have one pipe at the equipment pad and that it branches out to the three sheers out by the pool..

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
That's correct Jim. There is only one pipe out of the sheer descent pump and into the ground. It tees off somewhere underground.

I went out to take a picture and DOH! I forgot that there is already a valve on the outlet side of the pump. I've never adjusted that valve in 3 1/2 years.
In what scenarios would I adjust this Pentair valve?

* One idea is that it was probably a way to vary the flow amount to the SDs when it used to be a single speed pump.
* Another use seems to be to drain water. We currently use a hose bib that tees off between the main pump and the filter to drain partial amounts from the pool. Is this is a secondary route and useful because the SD pump draws water from the sidewall (lower than the skimmers)?

Also, does this configuration make it possible to close off return to the sheers and leave the bib closed? That seems like a recipe for disaster. What am I missing?


View attachment 72950
 
Dodger,

You are correct.. it would be unwise to close off the pump's output completely..

The valve was used to control the flow from a single speed pump.. not really needed with a VS pump.

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
Dodger the valve you show is a pentair never lube valve and would be a cheaper option than the jandy valve and would perform just as well. I have both kinds on my pool pad and actually I adjust the pentair valves constantly and never have a problem. Hope this helps.
 

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So the first leak (far right in first post picture) turned out to be from zero glue left in the coupler. We cut below the left hand elbow, and the coupler just dropped off the back of the sheer descent. I guess the glue was exposed to the sun for too many years and dried out? The alignment of the pipes was not perfect either, which put some stress on that coupler, but I don't know how much that contributed.

We ended up going with a new ball valve, but I can see why you don't like them Jim. It's hard to move brand new. I hope it's not impossible a year+ from now if/when we first try to close off that sheer descent.

I wanted to ask about painting the pvc. The line we removed is white pvc that was painted black. I read somewhere that that is done to protect from UV. What's the opinion from the TFP plumbing experts? Is painting advisable or not going to help much? I plan to bury these pipes better than before, at least to cover the valve handle from being a tripping hazard.

Honestly, I'm not crazy about the idea of painting it.
 
Code here in Clark County, NV requires all exposed PVC to be painted for UV protection.

But sounds like you are burying it, so not needed if so.

Did you get the ball valve type that you can take the handle off? It is better if you take it off so that it does not degrade from UV exposure.

Sounds like the coupling was never glued -----
 
Thanks Marty. I never thought about it being a code issue. I will look into the code here, just to understand the requirements in case we don't bury it.

I thought the coupler was originally glued because there was some dry blue (glue) residue on the male side. But who knows. Maybe it was a half-hearted attempt to glue it.
 
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