Water Feature(s) under powered

[charmon]

I am having problems getting enough water to all of my water features at the same time. I have a newly installed 16x38x24 vinyl liner pool with two Pentair Superflo 1 hp pumps. One pump runs the pool skimmers and main drain. The other pump is for the water features which are listed here:
1. Three foot sheer descent
2. Four deck jets
3. Water slide
4. Buddy seat

All of my plumbing is 1 1/2 inch PVC. If I have the water fall and deck jets on and then turn on the slide my jets and water fall barely get over the edge of the pool. If I then turn on the buddy seat my jets and water fall are even worse. Am I asking too much to run all of this at the same time? Is there a way to make it work with the 1 1/2 in plumbing?

 

[jblizzle]

Welcome to TFP!!!

I think you are asking too much of that 1HP pump to run that many features at the same time. A bigger pump would certainly help, although larger pipes would probably help more.

EDIT: Any way to change the plumbing so that some of the features are run off of the other 1 HP pump? That may be the cheapest solution.

 

[charmon]

Thanks jblizzle...There is no way to change the plumbing. It is all installed under the concrete decking now. I forgot to mention that there is a single skimmer with 1 1/2 inch PVC providing the intake that measures just under 40 ft from skimmer to pump. Each of the water features have their own seperate run of 1 1/2 inch PVC with seperate valves on each. This means I have one intake and four outputs because the deck jets are all on the same run together.

If I have to change the pump that may be my only option. My concern is will a bigger pump make a difference with 1 1/2 inch PVC and if so how big is big enough?

 

[jblizzle]

So what is on the other pump for pipes? Add a picture.

The single intake is really your limiter. That should have been at least 2" pipe.

It should not be too hard to reroute 1 or 2 of the 4 water features to the return of the other pump.

It gets tricky to try and estimate the flow rate for different motors because the head loss will go up with the higher flow rates. mas985 is good at that stuff given enough information.

 

[charmon]

The other pump has two skimmers and the main drain on the intake side using 1 1/2 inch PVC and one main out that spilts off to feed two return inlets using 1 1/2 inch PVC.