We just bought a house with a pool and I'm on the learning curve to figure how to take care of it. TFP has been a great resource.
One item I recommend folks who bought a house with a pool do is to check in whether the prior owner replaced any items with an incorrect part number. I was completely unaware that the prior owners (or their pool service) replaced the skimmer float valve with the wrong part. This surfaced while trying to figure out what my particular pool components were with the help of @JamesW.
Turns out this is a particularly bad error. As the photo below shows, what I had was something with a smaller diameter. This makes it worse than useless as the edge of the disk actually covered the primary input line to the pool filter/heater pump (again thanks to @JamesW for helping me to know that)! For a while (since we first moved in) I had wondered why the waterfall from the spa into the pool was rather choppy. Turns out this was the problem: the pump had been working extra hard as it was being somewhat starved of water so the flow to the spa was reduced. Moreover, there was one occasion where the waterfall just mysteriously stopped. In hindsight, the water level dropped too much and the float valve was unable to do it's job (i.e. switch the water source from the skimmer to the main drain).
Once I replace this item (with the o-ring it came with -- which was also missing) the water fall started working beautifully with full force. Also I tested reducing water level ... this time the valve worked ... it dropped as designed to seal the skimmer from the input and all water was drawn from the 'equalizer' (main drain) with the waterfall still working. Although I can't hear a difference I'm sure my pump is working better as well.
Another, perhaps less important item, was that the Wier gate was missing entirely. I bought one of those and installed it as well. The cost being a drop in the bucket of a very expensive home. Note: the Wier gate had rough sides that rubbed a little against the skimmer and didn't rotate smoothly (which is perhaps why the original was discarded) so I had to sand both sides ~1/16"... now it moves easily and works to pull surface debris much more effectivly than without one
One item I recommend folks who bought a house with a pool do is to check in whether the prior owner replaced any items with an incorrect part number. I was completely unaware that the prior owners (or their pool service) replaced the skimmer float valve with the wrong part. This surfaced while trying to figure out what my particular pool components were with the help of @JamesW.
Turns out this is a particularly bad error. As the photo below shows, what I had was something with a smaller diameter. This makes it worse than useless as the edge of the disk actually covered the primary input line to the pool filter/heater pump (again thanks to @JamesW for helping me to know that)! For a while (since we first moved in) I had wondered why the waterfall from the spa into the pool was rather choppy. Turns out this was the problem: the pump had been working extra hard as it was being somewhat starved of water so the flow to the spa was reduced. Moreover, there was one occasion where the waterfall just mysteriously stopped. In hindsight, the water level dropped too much and the float valve was unable to do it's job (i.e. switch the water source from the skimmer to the main drain).
Once I replace this item (with the o-ring it came with -- which was also missing) the water fall started working beautifully with full force. Also I tested reducing water level ... this time the valve worked ... it dropped as designed to seal the skimmer from the input and all water was drawn from the 'equalizer' (main drain) with the waterfall still working. Although I can't hear a difference I'm sure my pump is working better as well.
Another, perhaps less important item, was that the Wier gate was missing entirely. I bought one of those and installed it as well. The cost being a drop in the bucket of a very expensive home. Note: the Wier gate had rough sides that rubbed a little against the skimmer and didn't rotate smoothly (which is perhaps why the original was discarded) so I had to sand both sides ~1/16"... now it moves easily and works to pull surface debris much more effectivly than without one
