Leak - suction side, pressure side, or in between?

[sampeterson18]

The title sounds silly, but bear with me. I'm not a pool expert, so I've applied the best logic I can without really knowing what's going in inside that pump & filter.

I've been doing a lot of reading, both on other sites and here (including most of the threads in the wiki), and I'm not sure what to think. I have air bubbles in the pump basket, and coming from the inlet, so I must have a suction-side leak, right? The pump also refuses to prime most of the time. But I've done the "pour water over ever possible culprit" test a few times, and it never changed anything. The bubbles kept coming. The pump basket is sealed tightly, has a new o-ring, and has lots of lube on it.

But I also found that setting the filter to recirculate or waste allowed the pump to prime every time, and doesn't produce any bubbles from the inlets at all. That would seem to preclude the possibility of a suction-side problem, because those parts are all still in use. It would seem to indicate that there's something happening further along in the process - around the filter, I would assume.

Then I realized that most of the people posting probably didn't have one thing that I do - something that, if I understand correctly, bridges between the suction and pressure side. I have a Prozone ozonator (http://www.prozoneint.com/pz7.php). I don't have a picture of it right now, but it appears to have been installed correctly, per the instructions in the manual (http://www.prozoneint.com/manuals/20...2011-10-09.pdf - see page 4).

Am I on the right track? Would a leak in this assembly cause the kinds of problems I'm seeing? I wanted to do a sanity check before going too far down this road (or spending money on replacement parts for the thing). Thanks in advance.

[CarlD]

My thinking is if the bubble in the pump basket isn't too big, like the size of a "slider" hamburger patty (without the bun) or smaller, you don't really have a problem.

[BigDave]

... bridges between the suction and pressure side ... I don't have a picture of it right now, but it appears to have been installed correctly, per the instructions in the manual ...

If it bridges the suction and pressure of the pump, it is not installed correctly and could be the source of air in the strainer. A picture may help.

My question is: Why would you want or use an ozonator?

[sampeterson18]

My thinking is if the bubble in the pump basket isn't too big, like the size of a "slider" hamburger patty (without the bun) or smaller, you don't really have a problem.

So the bubbles coming from the inlet and the inability to prime the pump when it's set to filter are normal?

[sampeterson18]

If it bridges the suction and pressure of the pump, it is not installed correctly and could be the source of air in the strainer. A picture may help.

My question is: Why would you want or use an ozonator?

It came with the pool, which came with the house. It seems to be doing a great job (very little chlorine required), other than this possible issue. I've seen lots of great reviews of them - is there a problem I'm not aware of?

"Bridging" may be the wrong word. The manual uses the word "bypass" - that may be more correct. My apologies if the terminology was wrong. It's installed as the manual instructs (page 4 of http://www.prozoneint.com/manuals/20...2011-10-09.pdf). I'll try to get a picture up shortly.