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First Semi-urgent problem!

J

Joswhaha

Active member
Howdy y’all,
Today marked 1 full week since taking ownership of the car wash. I fell like everything is coming along slowly but surely. A few minor leaks here and there no big deal.

Until I was about to go home around 7:30 pm today. In the bay I am working water starts pouring from above the ceiling. Now for a week into this I feel like I have a decent understanding of what most things do and where the water flows for the self service bays. I shut off the valves I think will stop the rain but nope it still looks like someone left the hose running in the attic.

I scrambled around shutting off the RO tank and looking at solenoids like I knew what I was doing. During this time I ventured in the attic a few times to make sure it was still leaking, I guess. Finally, after about an hour of figuring and scrambling I found the issue with the water not shutting off.

There is a solenoid valve from the city water that feeds the pump that was not closing. I cobbled some parts together to shut the bay off for the time being(it was already not in service)

I am really feeling like a car wash owner now!
 

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Looks like you have some work ahead of you. In your first pic, you see the rust on the reducer fitting. Someone used a steel fitting. You don't want to do that. The smallest piece of rust will stop at your wand nozzle and piss off your customers. There is also a galvanized fitting. I wouldn't use them either. It will take longer but they will rust. More things to clean up in your second pic. Fittings leaking and soon to blow etc.
Some will say galvanized is ok, but brass or stainless is the way to go.
Take some time, clean up all the issues one bay at a time, and you will reduce your number of emergency repairs.
 
And by the way, open up that solenoid valve, if the seats are good you can get a rebuild kit for a few bucks.
Also, the water should have been coming out of the wand, not in the ceiling, so you need to fix those leaks before putting that bay back in service.
 
Joswhaha said:
Cold only, it looks like those valves open on my presoak feature. I’m not sure about that yet though.
Click to expand...
They shouldn't. They're only for cold rinse, and presoak comes out of a tank which has to meet with water out of another tank, otherwise the pressure will just stop the flow of presoak. The only thing that should open with your presoak solenoid will be the 453P solenoid on the high pressure pump outlet.
 
In time, your perspective changes. A leak would have freaked me out when I first opened. Now, I actually don't mind repairing a leak at all, because it's so simple to diagnose and repair most of the time.
 
Normally such breakdowns only happen when your away on vacation! Somehow my car wash equipment knows when I’m unavailable!
 
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