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It sounds like you have a leak somewhere. Turn off the valve supplying the water to the house. Wait however long it has been taking the pump to kick on by itself. If it doesn't kick on, wait another ten minutes. If it still doesn't kick on, turn the valve back on and wait to see if pump runs by itself. If it does, you have a leak somewhere. If this is not the case, your problem may be a bad expansion tank or pressure switch. Good luck!.
I am presuming you're asking about a basement sump pump, the kind that keeps your basement dry. Well, those things are not meant to run all the time. They are usually triggered by a float valve. That is a device that moves according to the water level in the sump (in other words, the hole). When the water gets high enough, the float activates a switch, the pump kicks in, the water is flushed away, the float falls and that turns the pump off until the cycle starts all over again. The frequency of the cycle depends on how fast the sump fills itself. I have one that kicks in five times a minute. Another might have a much longer off time. But don't be worrying about yours not being on all the time... that is how they are supposed to behave. Of course, if you have water flowing out the top of the sump, that is a sign things are not right with the pump. Then you really need help.
Water pressure makes the unit kick on and off. Water could be leaking from the toilet tank into the bowl and from bowl into the pump. Or the check valve inside the discharge elbow (on top of the lid) may not be sitting properly or is being obstructed causing waste water to leak inside the pump, creating enough water pressure to make the unit kick on and off by itself.
You problem could be one of several things.
First, pumps have a thermal protection switch that shuts the pump down when overheated.
You could have rust after only one season that overheats the pump and it shuts down.
The switch could be bad.
There could be an electrical issue when running it on a long cord of the wrong gauge.
Plug the pump into an outlet without extension cord and see if it makes a difference.
A lot of these pumps do have automatic thermal switches built into the motor end cap, Double check that its being fed the name plate voltage and that the voltage doesn't drop when the pump is running (which would indicate a loose or bad connection or just undersized wire in the circuit)
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