Hayward superpump shaft seal replacement gone wrong

Oct 14, 2016
124
Virginia Beach
I have a leaking Super pump so I bought one of these seals to replace the shaft seal:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HEAUAAY/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Before I replaced it, I got the diffuser seal and housing seal from Leslies and brought in my shaft seal for verification as well. I was slightly skeptical of this seal as the pool store guy said it didn't look like the ones they sell (presumably the teeth on the side are what makes it heavy duty). After replacement and reassembly, when I flipped the switch, the motor hummed but did not spin. I surmised that perhaps the impeller was too tight and not allowing it to spin, even though I only tightened it to hand tight as the instructions said. So I removed the motor from the pump housing and it would not turn freely by hand. If I loosened the impeller a little and bumped the motor, it would turn but tighten up on itself and the 2nd time bumping the motor would result in the hum and no turning. Like an idiot, I did this a couple of times until a small puff of smoke came out the impeller opening. I figured at that point I burnt up the seal, so I stopped for the night.

So my question is, is the seal I have incorrect? I read that a bad capacitor can cause the hum/no spin as well, but aren't capacitors all or nothing? Can they get weak? If so, could a weak capacitor not allow the motor to overcome the tightness of a new seal? The pump/motor is of unknown age. If it is of help, this is the video I followed:

Hayward Super Pump Seal Replacement - YouTube

Thanks!
 
I was just ruling out the internal bearings. I had to replace mine this year. I also replaced all the seals and mine looked just like the one you posted. Could the seal have been installed backwards? Not sure if it even can be? I would also think that you would have to really tighten it down hard to get it to lock up. Hopefully someone with more experience will comment as I cannot remember anything internally that would cause it to lock. I was going to suggest taking the impeller off and see if it will turn on, but I guess thats impossible now?
 
I was just ruling out the internal bearings. I had to replace mine this year. I also replaced all the seals and mine looked just like the one you posted. Could the seal have been installed backwards? Not sure if it even can be? I would also think that you would have to really tighten it down hard to get it to lock up. Hopefully someone with more experience will comment as I cannot remember anything internally that would cause it to lock. I was going to suggest taking the impeller off and see if it will turn on, but I guess thats impossible now?

Thanks. Do the two halves of the seal rotate together? Or does the spring loaded half spin against the fixed ceramic side? Or do they not move at all and the shaft spins inside the two halves?
 
I figured it out for anyone that this might help. Turns out that when I initially replaced the seal, there was a small part of the seal that was left behind on the impeller shaft. It was black just like the impeller and having not done this before, I didn't know what to look for. I'm glad it was something simple, but a little PO'ed since the original seal would have worked and was supposed to be a heavier duty version for salt pools. Oh well, live and learn.
 
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