JC - Manifold Plunger Stuck

[rshiggaon]

Hello - I've got Jim Coleman super saver stand, and I'm dealing with a bit of a glitch. It has a rinse tank and each bay has a ball valve and check valve. Right below the ball valve it T's into soap, wax, and presoak. The snag is when the brass plunger/stem gets stuck, the rinse water backflows into the product mixture tank and messes up the dilution and overflows. I plan to use the stainless plunger kit going forward as they fail.

Need advice on a couple of things:

1. When this hiccup occurs, it's a bit of a detective game to pinpoint the troublemaking bay. I usually turn on each bay and keep an eye on the product mixture tank level. Any simpler trick to figure out the culprit? I tried to observe each plunger from all bays, but I did not see anything wrong.
2. I'm toying with the idea of throwing a check valve between the manifold and the mixture tank. Any thoughts?

 

[Greg Pack]

If the level of your hot water holding tank is lower than the level of the chemical tanks gravity would prevent the dilution you describe from taking place. If water is backflowing in your product tanks it's likely coming from your cold water rinse solenoids. They are located low on the pump stand at ankle level. It has a pressure reducing valve that should be set fairly low. I think I keep mine at 20 psi, although I think cat says their pumps can tolerate up to 60 psi inlet pressure. That is the same valve that controls your weep water pressure so be aware they may need to be evaluated for adequate flow if you reduce the pressure. Also make sure all your weep check valves are functioning properly and not allowing high pressure into the manifold.

 

[rshiggaon]

Hey, thanks! No hot water tank here.

Just to clarify, you're thinking the check valve in one bay's weep mizer is acting up. It's causing water to go backward when customers use that product (CAT pump's running + solenoid's open). If that's the case, it should have happened with other functions using the CAT pump. But, currently, it's just the pre-soak. This issue regularly occurs for pre-soak, soap, or clear coat, just not all at the same time.

Also, I'll turn the ball valve between the cat pump and weep mizer check valve tomorrow to rule this out.

Cheers for the advice!

 

[Greg Pack]

All the super saver stands I have seen have a water storage tank that is usually fed with hot water located on the pump stand. Not everyone uses hot water so it may be fed with cold water in your case. Cold water rinse is pressure fed through a manifold. The soap wax and medium pressure presoak functions should gravity feed through the tank. When rinse is selected the rinse solenoid is opened allowing pressurized water to feed into the pump and override what should be hot water coming form the tank.