Shrunk Pipe? Weird!

[HappyWarrior]

Our hot tub has been closed for two years.

Today I filled it and found an air lock, so loosened a union nut to let the air out, but accidentally loosened it completely. Now I can't match the two pipes back up to re-lock it - it's as if the one pipe has shrunk!

Has anyone experienced this and/or heard of a fix? I can only assume my loosening it allowed the shrunken pipe to "spring" back, and seconds later it became too short to re-attach.

Pics below - notice how they don't match up. Also a wider shot showing where this is in the setup.

Cheers.

 

[ajw22]

Welcome to TFP.

Looks to me more like the ground shifted a bit and the equipment moved relative to each other and that put some tension on the connection. When you unscrewed it you found the movement. I think you need to see if you can force alignment or cut the grey pipe in the middle and use a coupler to properly align a new 90 degree fitting and union.

If you are going to hang around here then Read This BEFORE You Post and put details about your hot tub in your signature.

 

[x Wild Bill x]

I'm with ajw22. That connection was most likely under tension/stress and when you loosened the fitting it moved to it's natural unstressed location. It looks like your pump is not secured with any hardware and the gray pipe is "flexible". Do what you need to do to in order to flex the pump and pipe back into alignment and tighten the connection. Don't forget the gasket you have laying on top of the motor. I also recommend installing hardware to secure the motor in place once it is hooked back up. This will remove some of the force on the connections, especially at motor start up.

 

[Dirk]

I would go about this fix another way, rather than forcing the joint to align, and then just tightening it back up. That'll just stress the joint, which could cause it to eventually fail.

Either:

- loosen/move/re-tighten the various parts to see if you can align the joint without force,

or:

- secure the various components where they are now, if they are not already, so that they can't move relative to each other, and then replace whatever you need to of the connecting pipe so that it aligns properly, perhaps like Allen suggested, by cutting the pipe and reconnecting with a coupler. I think you might not even need to replace the 90 or the union. By adding a coupler in the middle of that grey pipe, you might be able to extend it just enough to align perfectly.

When you can tighten that union up without having to force the pipe one way or another, then you've got a sound connection.

Welcome to TFP! Come for the plumbing advice, stick around for the water balancing advice. Check out what we do here, you'll be glad you did.