Good evening,
I have an above ground pool, and I've been having never-ending problems with it for the last couple of years.
Two years ago, it kept losing water, and I couldn't figure out why until the water got down far enough that I could see a couple of rips in the liner. I've replaced the liner with a brand new liner, refilled it, and then attempted to get the pool up and running.
When I had the pool refilled and was working on getting it balanced out, the summer ended, and the snows came. The next year, I tried to go out and get the pool cleaned up, and every time I tried to vacuum the pool to get all of the junk off the bottom of the pool, whenever I would hook up the vacuum hose to the plate that goes in the skimmer and restart the pump, it would work for about 5 seconds just fine, then the pump loses prime, and there's little to no suction from the vacuum head.
I would turn off the pump, open the cover to reprime the pump, reclose the cover and then restart the pump, and same thing happened. I finally got tired of the headaches, even my friend who used to work in the pool industry was out of ideas.
Fast forward through most of pandemic, this year I'm trying to get the pool opened up and usable for the first time in 3 years. After replacing the liner, I replaced with a new set of stairs with a protective pad below them to avoid damaging the liner again. I hooked up the pump with the hoses to the pool, filled it up again over the skimmer, added chlorine, ran pump for filter, pump seems to run just fine. So far so good. I add flocculant to pool to get particulate matter to sink to the bottom, let it settle down, hook up vacuum head to hose....and pump will not keep prime again.
Since then, I've replaced all of the hoses connecting the skimmer to the pump to the filter to the return, purchased a new vacuum hose, replaced the vacuum head, replaced the skimmer and return jet. As far as I know, the pump isn't that old (possibly 3-5 years at the most). Filter tree has been replaced very recently as well.
Essentially I've got a 95% brand new pool, but the pump still won't maintain prime when I try to use a vacuum. Seems to work just fine in filter, recirculate and even pumping to waste, until I hook up any sort of vacuum.
What's the next step? Is it time to replace the pump again?
I'm open to any and all suggestions, and if any additional information is required, please ask and I'll do my best to provide as much information as I can.
Thank you in Advance,
Adam
I have an above ground pool, and I've been having never-ending problems with it for the last couple of years.
Two years ago, it kept losing water, and I couldn't figure out why until the water got down far enough that I could see a couple of rips in the liner. I've replaced the liner with a brand new liner, refilled it, and then attempted to get the pool up and running.
When I had the pool refilled and was working on getting it balanced out, the summer ended, and the snows came. The next year, I tried to go out and get the pool cleaned up, and every time I tried to vacuum the pool to get all of the junk off the bottom of the pool, whenever I would hook up the vacuum hose to the plate that goes in the skimmer and restart the pump, it would work for about 5 seconds just fine, then the pump loses prime, and there's little to no suction from the vacuum head.
I would turn off the pump, open the cover to reprime the pump, reclose the cover and then restart the pump, and same thing happened. I finally got tired of the headaches, even my friend who used to work in the pool industry was out of ideas.
Fast forward through most of pandemic, this year I'm trying to get the pool opened up and usable for the first time in 3 years. After replacing the liner, I replaced with a new set of stairs with a protective pad below them to avoid damaging the liner again. I hooked up the pump with the hoses to the pool, filled it up again over the skimmer, added chlorine, ran pump for filter, pump seems to run just fine. So far so good. I add flocculant to pool to get particulate matter to sink to the bottom, let it settle down, hook up vacuum head to hose....and pump will not keep prime again.
Since then, I've replaced all of the hoses connecting the skimmer to the pump to the filter to the return, purchased a new vacuum hose, replaced the vacuum head, replaced the skimmer and return jet. As far as I know, the pump isn't that old (possibly 3-5 years at the most). Filter tree has been replaced very recently as well.
Essentially I've got a 95% brand new pool, but the pump still won't maintain prime when I try to use a vacuum. Seems to work just fine in filter, recirculate and even pumping to waste, until I hook up any sort of vacuum.
What's the next step? Is it time to replace the pump again?
I'm open to any and all suggestions, and if any additional information is required, please ask and I'll do my best to provide as much information as I can.
Thank you in Advance,
Adam
I think it may help to see a few pics of the pool and your equipment pad. But in general, when we have problems vacuuming it's because air is getting pulled into the suction side - like a broken straw. Somewhere on the suction side from the vacuum plate at the skimmer, the hose(s), plumbing line, 3-way valves back to the pump. Even the pump itself at a drain plug or the O-ring under the clear lid may be losing suction pressure due to an air leak. If your pump is moving water fine without a vacuum, I doubt changing the pump will do anything. But let's see some pics and perhaps it will give us more ideas.