Did a little upgrading and now have questions.

[mac.dblues]

So, over the winter we bought a new sand filter for our Intex pool and as part of the process, I hard plumbed it to the pool to reduce drag inside the plumbing, and well, to be perfectly honest, so that I can say I hard plumbed our pool. Ha!

Since hard plumbing and upgrading to the Hayward pump and sand filter we have a problem when vacuuming with our Intex vacuum and 1 1/4” hose. Within 2 or 3 minutes, the Hayward sucks the water out of the skimmer basket at the pump. The through wall skimmer is still full and drawing water like crazy but our returns start bubbling.

If I get a regular pool vacuum, step up to a 1 1/2" hose and vacuum straight to my sand filter should this resolve my issue?

Another question, if you have the Hayward in wall skimmer and vacuum hose attachment, do you remove your skimmer basket or leave it in to vacuum?
We've never had this problem with the little Intex sand filters, but they didn't move half the water this beast does.

 

[Richard320]

Your pump is starving. My pump starves when I vacuum, and I have a large diameter hose!

But you shouldn't see air bubbles in the returns. It means you're sucking air somewhere. Vortex in the skimmer, maybe?

A larger hose should help, or you can just reduce the suction a little by drilling a small hole in the vacuum plate. I sometimes have to crack the spa drain to quiet the straining pump. It doesn't reduce the vacuuming efficiency that I can tell. The vacuum is still flowing as much water as it can handle.