Intellivalve Stuck?

[Nomadic]

This is our first winter with a spa/pool combo controlled by Pentair Intellivalve / Intellicenter.

We have two circuits that had freeze protection on. The spa (suction from spa drain, water to spa jets) and the pool (suction from pool drain/skimmers, water to pool jets, bubblers and spa overflow). Yesterday freeze protection kicked in and the system was alternating between these two circuits. However, last night my daughter took the dog out and reported that the "spa was nearly empty" and the "pool was almost overflowing". I found the Intellivalve controlling the suction was stuck in an error state and any attempt to reset/move it just made a clicking noise. After looking up the manual, I removed the 4 bolts and by using the Interllivalve as a handle turned the valve as far as it would go the opposite direction. This managed to pull some section from the pool but it was still draining from the spa and not filling up. I found that by disabling the bubblers and pool jets and only sending water the spa overflow I was able to get the spa to fill up again. I disabled the freeze protection on the spa circuit to keep a steady state of things running.

As of this morning, the spa has filled back up and is very gently overflowing into the pool (usually a strong waterfall).

I've already put in a repair request for next week with my pool company, but in the interim is there anything else I can try to get suction disable from the spa so I can also run the pool jets during this 48 hours of sub-freezing weather?

Thank you.

 

[Texas Splash]

Welcome to TFP! I'll tag @Jimrahbe to see if he can help.

 

[Jimrahbe]

N,

Sorry, I have no experience with the IntelliValves, but it does sound like it has failed.

Good job on getting things somewhat back to normal.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[ajw22]

Welcome to TFP.

Post pics of your equipment pad and your valves and let us see the way things are set.

 

[Nomadic]

@ajw22 Thank you for offering to take a look.

Pictures attached. The red circle is where the broken Intellivalve was. The manual valves labeled pool jets and bubblers are what i've disabled.

 

[ajw22]

Is this IntelliValve working? I cannot see the LED to see what position it is in. if not remove the IntelliValve and put a handle on the valve to see what position the valve is set to.

Remove the handle from one of your other valves and put it on this valve so we can see what position it is in. You want the handle to be pointing to the skimmer suction label.

 

[Nomadic]

@ajw22 Thank you so much for the suggestions. It had never occurred to me to move a handle from one of the manual valves to that one.

I was able to do that and adjust it like you suggested (which was not to either extreme which is all i was doing by hand last night in the dark) and i got full suction from the pool with the waterfall and bubblers and pool jets running again. Thank you! (pictures below showing how i adjusted the valve and the LED of the working intellivalve)

I'm currently not running anything through the spa jets since I've disabled the freeze protection on spa mode. Should i do anything about that?

Thanks again!!

 

[ajw22]

You want some water flowing through your spa to protect its pipes.

See if this works. Put this IntelliValve into SERVICE mode and use the yellow arrow to move the LED to 18 or 20. That will allow some water to flow through your spa and over your spillover.

I don't like water flowing over the spillover during freezing weather but it is preferable to have damaged tile then damaged pipes in the spa.

 

[Nomadic]

Thanks again @ajw22 - was able to put it in service mode and manually adjust everything so i have water going through all pipes (pool / spa drains, skimmers, spa jets, bubblers, pool jets). This forum has been a fantastic resource for me. Thank you.

 

[guinness]

This forum has been a fantastic resource for me. Thank you.

Please consider Supporting TFP as it helps to keep the website servers running.

 

[Chaser918]

Thanks again @ajw22 - was able to put it in service mode and manually adjust everything so i have water going through all pipes (pool / spa drains, skimmers, spa jets, bubblers, pool jets). This forum has been a fantastic resource for me. Thank you.

Something I just discovered with these intellivalves is when the power flashes, the valve will reset and go back into auto mode.
Be weary of that if you’ve got it set in service mode a certain way to protect during freezing conditions.

Also had a brand new one start erroring out on me when it got cold over Christmas, works fine now that it warmed up.

Im very weary of these things now unfortunately.