Telescoping pool fountain permanently on. Help!

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T

TMcManus

New member
Jun 30, 2023
3
AZ
I cannot find the valve to shut off the telescoping pool fountain. It has been retracted to the bottom of the pool for the three years I owned it, and recently popped up to the surface when the pump went on. There is no valve anywhere to shut off the flow of water to it. It appears it may have been epoxied/glued into place at the bottom of pool, so perhaps that explains why it always stayed down (you could feel water pressure coming up from it when the pump was on, but it stayed down at bottom of pool and didn't telescope upwards).

Is "gluing" the head back down with putty or something similar recommended? I can't think of any other practical way of getting it to stay retracted down when the pump is on.

Attached is a picture of the type of fountain I'm describing, and the collar that is screwed in at the bottom of pool where the fountain telescopes out from.


Telescoping Ftn.jpg


Collar.jpg
 
Here's the equipment. We can't identify a valve that would control the flow to this fountain. The booster pump runs a pressure sweeper. For three years after inheriting the pool, that telescoping fountain was grounded in the collar at bottom of pool, though I seem to remember water pressure coming out of it when the equipment was on. I'm not 100% on this, as I didn't even think twice about what that thing was that was sitting at bottom of pool. It just didn't telescope upwards, so I never thought twice about it.

To Texas Splash - nothing is threaded when it is raised up. It's a series of PVC-looking pipes (one larger diameter, followed a smaller diameter) until its fully telescoped up to the pool surface.

It's a complete mystery to me as to why this suddenly happened this week...I frankly didn't even know what was until now. No pieces appear to have broken off or anything. I think if I can't find a valve, the easiest fix would be to somehow affix an underwater epoxy / glue to the fountain head to affix it to the collar, though admittedly, that isn't as ideal as somehow shutting off the water to that fountain. It is permanently "on" as long as the motors are running (which I wouldn't mind if the vacuum sweeper wouldn't get tangled around it, which has been happening this week). It is a massive mystery as to why this only began occurring this week after 3 years.



Attach16532_20230701_112502.jpg
 
Most likely, it is this red handled ball valve.

It looks like part of the handle recently broke off and is on the ground, which indicates that someone probably turned the valve recently.

1688236488349.png
 
Use care if you try to turn that valve off. Too much "persuasion" and you could break or crack the valve or piping.
 
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That is definitely good detective work, you guys know how to zoom in on the pictures! I thought about that valve too, but didn't want to touch it, thinking it was a valve controlling water to the booster pump? That motor was just replaced recently. And I also didn't want to mess with it given the other commenter's post about being very careful to not break it.

Perhaps I'll give that a try though...for now I have a paver in the pool over part of the fountain so it doesn't telescope upwards.

Thanks again.
 
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