Bubbles and zero pressure...

[swimfam]

I have been troubleshooting a leak for the past few weeks. The water level went below the skimmer port and held well. I got around to re-grouting the areas in the skimmer I thought could be leaking - sealed the grout and then re-filled water. Water seems to be holding fine now - time will tell. During this time, pump was not run at all (month or so) and no chems other than throwing some trichlor (left on-hand by previous owner).

Now, when activating the pump, I get no pressure (zero) and intermittent bubbles from one of the eyeballs. The bubbles are rather large and occur every few minutes or so - 3-6 bubbles at a time...
I've re-lubed the basket lid at the pump, and also tried to feel around for any excessive debris in the basket area. I sprayed water around the external plumbing to see if I could find a leak or anything. I haven't checked the pump internally...I'm guessing there is just some debris or something clogging the system? I also tried to backwash and nothing exited the waste line...

 

[jblizzle]

So is the pump basket filling with water?

Sounds like something wrong on the suction side or before the multivalve if you are not getting any water out the waste.

Have you ever had problems priming before? Try running a hose into the pump basket to fill it up and then put the lid on and turn on the pump and see if that helps gets things going ... although this should not be needed.

 

[swimfam]

anytime I take the basket lid off, the water sucks down (the lid says to fill basket prior to running pump). Of course, it wont fill but more than about 3/4 as it runs into the pipe inlet (haven't tried filling with a hose though - but have dumped a good 3gal bucket in there). It seems to me that the pump took a while to prime when it was 'working' a few weeks ago...

Again, nothing has changed other than letting the water level drop due to suspected leak, coupled w/ normal evap.

I'm going to go out and try filling with the hose - should the basket area actually fill completely? To me, it makes sense that eventually, it should overflow...

Thanks!

 

[jblizzle]

What is the pool level in relation to the pump level. For my pool, the pump is right at the water level, so it stays mostly full. If your pump is above the water level, the pump will never fill with the hose as the water will be raising the level of the pool. Best you can do is fill the basket up to the pipe and then shoot as much water into the pipe as possible and then quickly put the lid on and start it.

Your problem could be a suction leak preventing priming, or maybe the impeller is full of debris. Have you pulled the motor off to inspect the impeller?

 

[rdhetrick]

I have the same situation with my pool. If the pool level is below the basket, you will never fill the basket unless you close the valves from the drains/skimmers. Closing the valves won't help any because the second you open them, the water will drain out of the basket again.

For me, I just turn the pump on and wait. Sometimes it takes a few minutes to get all the air out of the system.

 

[swimfam]

Just went out - filled the basket as much as possible with the water hose and also applied silicone lube again to the basket lid/gasket...let it run for a while and it's running well now!

Now for getting kreepy krawly to crawl level and start adding chems. Hopefully my water leak is fixed

 

[jblizzle]

Keep an eye on it after you turn the pump off to make sure it does not lose prime again ... it should not if the system is sealed.

 

[swimfam]

hmmm, that's what I thought - wondering if there's more to my 'leak' than the skimmer - it was my best guess anyways. To me, it seems to lose prime every time (takes a minute or two to start pumping and a few large bubbles come out of the eyeball)...I'll watch it more closely now.

 

[jblizzle]

Now that it is running, did you purge the air out of the filter? (If you do not have a top mounted multi-valve)

 

[duraleigh]

To me, it seems to lose prime every time (takes a minute or two to start pumping and a few large bubbles come out of the eyeball)...I'll watch it more closely now.

If the pump basket eventually fills completely with water and you observe no bubbles in the pump basket while the pump is running, you likely do not have a suction side leak.

If the pump needs to reprime after being off for a few hours, then the leak is likely on the pressure side and should give you a visible indication of leaking water.

If the pump needs to re-prime after 12 or more hours of being off, it is a TINY leak and I would probably disregard it.