Manual blowout system

[Andy Burn]

I have a 2 bay car wash in the Ottawa Valley region and it gets darn cold here. This week we are expecting -18 degree Celsius temperature. There is a Dixmor Weepmizer connected, however, when the temperatures are low, I am wasting a lot of water. Being on city water, my bills are pretty steep for the water usage. Someone suggested me a "reclaim" system to capture the weep water and recirculate it. However, given the small size of my equipment room, I am skeptical about introducing the water system.

I would like to ask your advice of using a manual blowout system for the days or nights when it is too cold to have the wash open. The current weepmizer system design is as follows:
Valves 1 and 2 feed the high pressure gun with weep water
Valve 3 feeds the 2 foam brushes through a manifold with weep water
4 is the solenoid valve for the weepmizer
5 is the check valve from the weepmizer

I was thinking of putting in a check valve between 2 and 3 and introduce compressed air and then flush the system with anti-freeze. By turning the weepmizer off, the solenoid valve will be open. I can then close valve 5 ensuring that there is no backflow and proceed to open valves 1, 2 and 3 individually and complete the blowout cycle. In your valued opinion does this plan make any sense?

Will a utility pump work to introduce the anti-freeze to the system? And would 40 ~ 50 psi be a good pressure to blowout the system?

 

[Randy]

When it get cold here, not -18C. I pump windshield washer fuild into the systems with a spare flojet pump, blow air into the system to blow out the washer fuild at about 40-50psi, turn off the power to everything and come back when it warms up. We don't enough business when it get real cold to justify keeping the place open and I hate the cold.

 

[celica]

Hi Andy, I'm in Kingston, just down the road from you. I hate unfreezing bays, you get busted fittings, guns, so I let the water flow. The issue with the water reclaim is that the water temp keeps getting colder and colder as it recycles. You also have electricity costs and need to plumb it so a power outage won't freeze you up. I know a few guys that have tried it, but give up after having freeze ups. Having your car wash freeze up is such a pain that I wouldn't bother. Raise prices to cover the water costs if you have to. What are you charging ? I'm $ 3. for 3 minutes.

 

[Andy Burn]

Hello Celica,

Thank you for taking the time to reply. I am $3.00 for 3 minutes, however, being in a small town, the water is really expensive and my bays are not too busy. Sometimes I just make enough to pay for the water and hydro. I wanted to dismantle the bays at one point and just add the space to the existing convenience store, however, decided against it.

The exorbitant water bills are making me think outside the box. I was interested in putting a manual blowout system so that I would not have to weep water when I close my wash.

 

[celica]

hi andy, It wouldn't be a problem hooking up an air line from your compressor to blow out the lines first. Any utility pump should work to fill the lines. It's a question as to if you want to do it every cold night. You do want to have your wash open every day in the daytime. I have customers washing in -30C. I couldn't shut my wash down at night because of the Taxi cabs, tow trucks etc that operate 24/7. If you going to be in the Kingston area, feel free to stop in for a visit. I'm at 311 Bath Road.

 

[2Biz]

This is what I designed to replace the original antiquated Mark VII weep system. It also incorporates air blowdown and washer fluid injection for semi automatic/manual operation....The two poly tubes at the bottom are for air and washer fluid. Weep water comes in from the top... I also have a LP washer fluid automated blowdown and washer fluid injection system that winterizes 8 LP hoses that I pull WF from...

Air is injected to whatever bay I want till the HP hose is purged....Then I open another valve from the washer fluid injection system that uses a flojet pump.....I leave the HP hose filled with Washer fluid and leave the weep BV turned off till I want to bring the bay back into service. At first I was blowing the WF out, but had too much trouble bringing the bays back online. The inside of the hose would dry out and flake off debris in the hose. Almost 100% of the time I'd have a plugged nozzle. Leaving WF in the hose eliminated that issue and still keeps lines from freezing to -20°... Tested to -16°!

I never close completely down...Sometimes down to (1) bay, but still open for the die-hards!

So to the OP, maybe this will give you some ideas! Its actually pretty simple and works great!

 

[Andy Burn]

Thank you 2Biz for the pictures and the valuable insight. My blowout system was a success last night at -18. I had WF in the high pressure hose and the system was back up in no time.

 

[2Biz]

Looks Great! Glad my design helped you come up with a workable solution!