louky1150

Well, I had one job to do re. photos and blew it. I forgot to take a pic of the back of the panel covering while looking at this tub for my father. I did take a pic of the front of the cover and of the components in the panel FWIW. Also, I'm sure you guys who do this for a living will get this, I could not get this to fail to work while I was there. My plan was to (hopefully) catch this pump NOT picking up, leave it running and bleed it at the union as mentioned; if it did pick up it would reinforce that there was an air problem causing this. Unfortunately, it didn't fail to pump while trying it 20 times or while I was getting the covers off etc. The plumbing is a mess. Whoever replaced the main pump wasn't able to get a match so the pump is not bolted down in it's location. The circulating pump has been replaced with one that had garden hose fittings on it, with the tubing just forced over the garden hose male threads, secured with a worm gear clamp. One of these joints had a small leak that I couldn't stop by tightening. There is deteriorating wiring and some signs of overheated wiring coming out of the panel. The system seems pretty unsophisticated. The controls have a temp setting with plus and minus buttons. The pump button goes from off to low to high, back to off. The circulating pump runs continuously and appears to be a separate loop, just going through the heater. According to my father, the small circulating pump runs continuously as long as the breaker is on. The main pump cycles on low periodically on a timer. I didn't see any sign of a separate air blower, didn't see anything I would identify as a diverter, didn't see a Hartford loop, I didn't really see an ozonator though I might not know what I was looking for. Any further ideas would be appreciated, until I get back down and take a pic of the schematic. Thanks!

Thanks! It is a Jacuzzi brand, I will try to get the info posted. I am scheduled to go down Wednesday and I will take a pic of the controls and the plumbing. He has not mentioned any error codes.

cranbiz: I spoke to my father yesterday in preparation to traveling to look at his spa. He tells me that the ozone generator is on all the time that power is on to his system. He is saying it is generating the small bubbles even when the other pumps are not running. I was wondering if this is normal, or if the generator should only come on if one of the other pumps is running? I know this could just depend on how it is wired, but if something malfunctioned to keep this on all the time, could this be a route to adding unwanted air in the plumbing? He says the problem just surfaced all at once, after 13 years without this issue. Thanks!

Cranbiz: Thanks for the prompt reply. I looked up a YT about cracking the union and I will take tools down to do that step. You mentioned air lines for the blower, and possibly a bad check valve. Can you describe the blower you are talking about so I can look at it and see if I can locate the check valves? Thanks!

I am trying to help troubleshoot my father's older Jacuzzi hot tub, he lives a couple of hours away from me. I will be visiting in a week or two and want to have all the information possible for when I go. The symptom is random, intermittent failure to pump through the jets. He has changed the filters, and a couple of months ago, he had the pump changed. From his description, it sounds like he is getting air in the system as the pump turns on and runs but no pressure. He may go out and start it again an hour later and it will pump, without him doing anything to bleed the air, he may go out an hour after that and it won't pump. The next day it might pump, or might not. When he changed the filters, he noticed several large bubbles (1 inch diameter) that came out of the hole where the filters screw down. He also notices a stream of really small bubbles that continue after this. He says there is a "small pump" that continues to run even when the main pump does not. The technician that installed the new pump mentioned something about "ozone" and said the other small pump was not even needed (?). I would appreciate any help in figuring this out and troubleshooting steps to solve this problem. I can take pictures when I go down if needed. It sure seems like there is air getting into the system from somewhere so any ideas where it could come from are appreciated. Does anyone know what the "ozone pump" the technician referred to does, and if it could, in fact, be disconnected, at least as a troubleshooting step? Thanks, in advance!