New to Pool ownership - Florida

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Janos5303

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Dec 30, 2015
7
Kissimmee
Hi all,
I am renting a house in the Disney area that has an in-ground pool. There is a solar/ propane heater that has never worked and the property manager won't fix. I have had a skim-a-round for about a year and it was working great. It did great with pollen and other really tiny surface particles. A week ago it stopped working as well. There is a pool service that cleans and checks the water quality, but I never see the guy. I don't think my pump suction is as strong as it used to. My neighbor has a similar set up and the water coming back into the pool is forceful, mine bubbles a bit and there is very little pressure. 103485103484
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I have tried closing off the main drain and then the skimmer but there is little suction. The filter is clean and the pump is primed. Could the broken heater system be slowing things down? Any advice on improving suction would be appreciated.

Thank You!
Janos
 
First thing I would check is the skimmer basket and the pump basket. Those should be cleaned fairly regularly because they can restrict flow quite a bit.

Heaters do get plugged up sometimes, but probably best to start with the easy stuff. What pressure reading are you getting?
 
If the problem is in the heater, it'll show up as weak return in the pool and high pressure on the filter gauge. The same applies if the filter is dirty. I don't think that's your case. You state the filter is clean so I assume you've done that recently.

That puts the problem on the pump side. Is the pump strainer clean? What's growing around the pool? Pine needles or similar stuff can slip past the skimmer basket and the strainer basket and end up clogging the pump impeller. The pump spins just fine; it just doesn't move much water. Think of taking a fan and taping across the blades. That's one possibility. There's also the possibility of a suction side air leak. You say both that the pump is primed but that your return bubbles a bit. Air in, air out. You need to look and see where it's coming from.

Leak Detection - Trouble Free Pool Suction Side Air Leaks - Trouble Free Pool
 
And just to be sure, does the gauge read 0 when the pump is off?

20 PSI is not crazy out of line or anything, but does sound a bit high to me for your set up. Perhaps the cartridges need a bit more cleaning. Hopefully someone with more cartridge filter experience jumps in, but I would see if I could get the cartridge cleaner. I'd try some acid (muriatic) diluted 4:1 and see if there's any sizzling on the cartridge, which shows calcium scale. I believe you should be able to see light through the paper when they're clean. I'll put up the bat signal on cartridge cleaning.

For around $20 you could bypass the heater completely (provided you're OK with learning PVC plumbing which is fairly easy). For around $50 you could build in a bypass line, so any future heater could still be easily installed, or if you're able to fix the heater.
 
Janos5303 said:
The pressure is reading about 20psi.
Click to expand...
We have almost identical equipment set-ups. For me, 20 psi is extremely high if my pump is on high speed. On low speed it shows almost nothing. But on high, I clean my filter once it's over 10 psi, otherwise my return jet pressure in the pool gets weak, and I get a churning/backwash in my bump basket from the back pressure. I would be curious to see a full set of water results. How does the water look right now? Crystal clear, or is there some cloudiness to it?

I can't quite make-out the purpose of that valve after the filter. It looks like it may be a heater by-pass valve, but from the angle I can't tell for sure.
 
That one looks like a 'draining' line (waste line) to me, but I don't know. There's also a pipe behind that one I can't figure out. A picture from the front looking toward the wall might help, or two pics at 45 degree angles to the wall. Thanks for jumping in, Pat.
 
Thanks to everyone for the responses. My suction is still very low, if I don't switch the main drain line off, there is no suction at the skimmer.
The pool is clean and seems to be circulating as it should. I purchased a skimaround that worked great for a couple of years but now it's not as effective.
Here are a few more pictures of the setup.

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