Any way to seal a leak around a light with water in the pool?

[Fronzizzle]

Hello all,

We have two old light lenses in our pool, about halfway down the wall. I was outside just now and noticed a significant amount of water around one corner of the pool. Upon investigating, I found that water is leaking into the lens and then down the wall. We've never used (or even have) the actual lights, but I've recently had some issues and scrubbed the pool really well, I suspect that somehow my scrubbing caused a leak.

Obviously, the correct way to fix would be to drain and replace the gasket, but I'm not sure that's feasible. We are currently doing a SLAM so I'm not sure that stopping the pump and draining more than 1/2 the water is a good idea, not to mention what could happen by draining the pool that low. And even if that was okay, it would take more than a week to fill back up since we have to go through our water softener (on well water).

So...wondering if there is anything I can do, at least temporarily, to try and stop the leak?

 

[bioguy]

I don't think there is any problem with draining the pool of half the water to get at the gasket as long as you keep enough water to prevent the liner from moving around.

I'm on a well too and I can fill my pool a lot faster than that. Your pool is somewhat bigger, 3 garden hoses at full fills mine half way over night.

Can you bypass the water softener? Your calcium harness will probably increase, but that might be OK depending on where you are now.

There is silicone that you can use under water, but if it were my pool, I'd want to drain to get at the leak.

 

[bioguy]

Here's an old thread that might contain something useful. One person recommended inserting a metal plate in place of the light and using liner patch over the hole.

Short term, if you aren't losing too much water, maybe it's not that big of a deal.

 

[Fronzizzle]

Thanks for the replies. Our water hardness is already somewhat high, that's why we try and fill through the softener. We can bypass it, but would rather not if possible.