no presoak to bay

[MEP001]

I've found that the Hydrominders that come new with the plastic valve stem tend to fail by flowing less water than they should, which means not enough soap is pulled with it. Rebuilding it with a complete kit will solve that. After the third one I discovered doing this I went through ahd rebuilt them all.

 

[Jeff_L]

To figure out whether you have a foot valve problem, do the following. Poke a hole in the hose after the hydrominder which goes into your holding tank (not the hose going into the concentrate). Put a decent sized hole in it above the water level. If you have a foot valve problem it would syphon the mixed solution back into your concentrate, then when the tank fills it will dilute the solution even more. With the hole in it, it will only draw air back in the hose and leave the mixed solution alone.

(I take no credit for this advice, I read it on another thread in this forum. I did it to all my hydrominders and it works very well.)

 

[Jimmy Buffett]

Yeah it was the foot valve. Thanks guys!

 

[Jimmy Buffett]

I guess I spoke too soon. I lost it again. I can replace the plastic plunger with the metal ones, right?
Do I really have to take as many things apart as it seems to remove the hydrominder. There must be a swivel that I am missing to remove the hydrominder.
Thanks

 

[Jimmy Buffett]

I got it. It seems to be working. We'll see if it works tomorrow!

 

[MEP001]

The 506 Hydrominder (with the clamp-on bracket) is definitely a pain to work on. I try never to use them, in fact I don't know why anyone would when all it takes is a slightly taller tank and a pipe thread to garden hose adaptor.

 

[Jimmy Buffett]

I'm still sol with this. So far I have replaced the foot valve, cleaned the screen, rebuilt the hydrometer, and moved up to a grey tip with a hole in it about as big as my thumb and still very little product to the bay.

 

[MEP001]

Bypass the whole setup and run a separate pump with air agitation. Last night I washed my car at a place with the same system, and the presoak was weaker than the HP soap and took 30 seconds to reach the gun. It was one of the worst presoak systems I've ever used. I know the idea behind their setup is to get good coverage in a short time, but that does no good if it's just lightly soapy water.

 

[Greg Pack]

Remove the plunger from one of the solenoids and see if the product becomes plentiful. If so, it's time to take a harder look at your solenoids

 

[Bubbles Galore]

did you solve the problem yet?

 

[Jimmy Buffett]

Well I've managed to injure myself. I'll dig into the solenoids when I can walk again. I'll just have to keep dumping chemical in till then.

 

[MEP001]

If you're dumping chemical into the tank and making it stronger and it works for a while, then the problem must be with the Hydrominder. Did you rebuild it, and is it filling the tank at a good rate? Did you change the foot valve in the chemical pail, and have you checked to make sure that the new one is holding? Is there a small hole in the hose off the Hydrominder into the mix tank to prevent backflow into the concentrate if the foot valve fails? There's a possibility that you've already diluted the chemical and it won't work right regardless of what you try until you change it out.

If you would address all these suggestions and reply with what you've done this would go a lot faster.