Ok here's the question. My hot Tub started making noises and after doing some research we decided to take the pump apart to replace all the seals. We bought the seal kit and replaced everything. Put the pump back in and it's still making the noise, when we had it out we checked the shaft and it spun freely, could it still be the bearings in the motor or could it be a air lock or cavation in the system. How do you bleed it? This does not have a trap, and the only plug it has is the pump drain plug. The jets are working on low and high speed (with the noise) but there is alot of bubbles coming out of them as well as water. Could this be air in there, that needs to come out. I also filled the tub through the filter so as not to get air in there. Anyone have any ideas please help us out here. Thanks in advance. This is a Max-E-Glas H/L pump with a A.O. Smith motor 2 speed 230 volts 2 1/3 HP. # UQS1202R

The source of the noise being from the motor bearings or from the pump housing assembly is something you'll have to determine yourself. To do an absolute check, you'll need to disassemble the pump and kick the motor on high speed to see if there's any bearing noise.

If the noise sounds more like air cavitation then most likely you're getting air sucked into the pump cavity from SOMEPLACE. I assume you don't have a suction strainer so you can't see the water level.

I would immediately suspect the rubber (or paper) gasket at the suction side of the pump housing. There should be four small bolts that attach the flange (round tube goes into a square thingy) to the pump cavity. You'll need to either replace that gasket or get some permatex #2 or versachem #2 (black stuff and nasty too - NON-Hardening! ) from the local auto parts store and cover the old gasket with it. Even if it kind of comes apart... try gunking it up pretty good and reassembling it. Power it up and see what happens. (Don't EVEN try this with any kind of plumbers goop or putty, you need the killer stuff I mentioned above).

Since these things discharge vertically, all of the air should rise to the top even if there was an airlock. Most of the time the airlocks occur when the pump head is rotated 90 degrees off center - to create a side discharge for plumbing convenience (and owner hell when refilling).

See if that helps and let me know what you can find out.