Broken Vacless

[strangiato]

Well, I'm not a happy camper! I was just going through the opening of our pool for the year and discovered that the pool service company that I use every year to close my pool broke my Vacless valve. The stem that screws into the pump was broken off in the pump. The plastic is stuck in the threads, and I can't get it out.

I know some will chastise me for not closing the pool myself, but I get very busy in the fall and just never have time to do it myself, so I pay to have someone else do it. I do the opening, but just before I was going to do it this year, I came down with a bout of Vertigo, and then 9 days later I got a nasty case of the 'rona. I'm now all better and trying to get it opened.

Now my pool is sitting uncovered and unable to circulate, so it has not even been vacuumed yet. Luckily, being an enclosed pool, it keeps most sunlight off of it, although it gets some in the morning and late afternoon.

On top of all that, I just looked it up and OMG those things are pricey. The cheapest I've found is ~$450.

Is there some sort of adjustment needed to these things when installing a new one?

Thanks all,
Tim

 

[strangiato]

Whoops, just noticed I put this in the Water Chem section. Admins, if you would move it to the appropriate section, please?

 

[proavia]

Post a few pics of the valve and surrounding plumbing.

Does the pool have only one main drain in the bottom?
Can that single main drain be isolated? Blocked closed at the skimmer?

 

[strangiato]

One main floor drain in the pool, a pair in the spa (one on the floor, one on the facing of the bench). Yes, the skimmer has a skim/drain valve. I think I see where you're going with this - just run the skimmer to keep it safe. Would the pair of drains in the spa keep it safe there?

These are few pics I took earlier when it was still light out. I tried various sized flathead screwdrivers to work the plastic out. You can see some bits and pieces of the plastic in the last pic inside the pump. The arrow is pointing at the inside of the pump well where the port is. I kind of wonder if I could screw in a new piece and it would push the old plastic through to the inside.

 

[strangiato]

Although, I just realized that I have no way to plug the port in the pump to allow it to prime. Tomorrow, I'll have to look through the bits and pieces that the previous homeowners left to see if there's a plug that fits.

 

[proavia]

Yeah - your could basically abandon the pool main drain. Plug it at the skimmer and at the main drain in the floor. Many pools don't have a main drain and it mostly isn't needed at all.

As for the spa, my 'guess' is that the floor drain is the spa main drain and the drain in the wall is plumbed back to the spa jet pump - if you have a separate pump for the spa jets.

Another option may be to replace the main drain covers in the pool and the spa with VGBA compliant covers.

Post pics of the entire equipment pad from a few different angles and someone may be able to help out.

 

[strangiato]

Okay, I'll get some pics tomorrow. It's pretty cramped in the equipment closet.

There's not a separate water pump for the spa, just an air pump. The main pump feeds the jets in the spa.

The drain covers may be compliant already. I know I've put my feet against them and felt almost no suction at all when the system was running. I'll get pics of those also.

 

[strangiato]

UPDATE: I just spoke with our pool service tech. He told me that we were supposed to receive a report of the valve being broken last fall. He is sending one of his techs out today to get the rest of the plastic out of the port on the pump. They're going to put a plug in the port and also verify if our drain covers are the VGB rated type. If they're not, we'll probably have them change them out. He claims that the vacless valves are not really used much anymore and that as they age, they are less likely to operate correctly.

 

[strangiato]

So, they put a plug in the pump in place of the vacless and I was able to start up the pool. It has been running for a few hours now, so I was able to get DE in the filter, Dichlor in the water, and vacuum the pool.

The tech was not sure if the covers are VGB rated or not, so he took pics and was supposed to send them to the owner of the service to get verification. I haven't heard from them yet, so here are the pics I took.

Spa Floor Drain


Spa Bench Face Drain


Main Pool Floor Drain