pfleavell said:
MikeInTN said:
If you need some help getting the pump up and going once the pool fills, just lemme know, and I can walk you through it.
That would be great, Thanks! It should be full by this evening. And Yes the installer said that the water needed to be half way up the skimmer to start the pump.
Trish
Did he also leave the little door out of your skimmer, and tell you to drop a tennis ball in the skimmer basket to break up the vortex? That little door is called a weir, and is really better than the tennis ball, plus when you shut your pump off, the weir helps keep Crud from floating back out into the pool. The water level needs to be a tad higher than halfway if you use the weir. Halfway will put the water level between two of the screws on the sides of the skimmer, right? I'd go for filling a little more until you get to the upper of those two screws if you use the weir. Use the tennis ball method, and you can probably get away with halfway up the skimmer.
Now, to start your pump:
(1) first thing to do is to make sure your three way valve on the other side of the Aquasmarte is set to 1/2 . I think the positions are 1/2, full closed, and full skim. This will put the return water to both of your returns.
(2) Make sure your skimmer basket is in place. The basket has some flattened sides around the rim that match up with the rim in the skimmer. Once your water level is up to where you need it to be in the skimmer, open the air bleed valve on top of your filter housing (should be a little lever behind it that you can turn). You'll hear air hissing out of the filter housing, and you should be able to see water filling up the pump basket. When water squirts out of the valve, close it.
(3)Now, plug in your pump. You'll see some air initially bubbling around in the pump basket, but this should disappear, and it should look clear in your pump basket, and you should feel water coming out of your top return now.
(4)Go ahead and open the bleed valve one more time to get out any air that was trapped in the pump, close when water squirts, and you should be good to go!
I wouldn't take the Aquasmarte feeder out of your system. Like i said in an earlier post, if you're going to be gone for a week or so, throw a bacpac in to use for chlorination while you're gone. Using them once in a while shouldn't bump your CYA level up dramatically.
Oh, in case the pool guy didn't tell you this either, you'll need to get a 1.5" rubber plug from a hardware store such as Lowe's or Home Depot so you can plug your skimmer, should you need to open up the filter housing or pump basket for cleaning, or open up the Aquasmarte feeder to throw in a bacpac. To do this, turn the pump off, take the skimmer basket out, put the plug in the hole in the bottom of the skimmer. Turn your 3-way valve to full closed. Now you should be able to remove the plug at the bottom back of the filter housing and drain the water from the filter. This also takes the pressure off of the pump basket, so if need be you can take the cover off of it and clean the strainer basket there as well.
I know it's been said before, but the best investment you can make is a good test kit. The test strips that came with the pool are pretty much worthless is you're going to use BBB. The two kits recommended on this forum are the TF-100 sold by a fellow forum member here, and the Taylor K-2006 kit. I have the K-2006 myself, but lots of forum members have bought the TF-100 and loved it, and it never hurts to have the guy who makes and sells the kits available on here either.
Both kits are a bit pricey, but once you get used to doing your own testing, you'll be glad you spent the money. The money you'll save in chemicals alone will pay for it.
HTH,
Mike
