Got a call from a customer with an old self serve, no automatic. Lack of water coming out to the tanks. When one of my techs went there, he says, you pull down on the float in the main water tank, and mostly air comes out. Same thing with a hose bib on the wall. He thinks the water company is doing pressure tests. No, I tell him, turn off the main valve at the air compressor, and see what happens. It goes away. When the air is turned back on, everything is normal. There is no blowdown of any waterline at the place. This is FL and it doesn't freeze this far south. I'm going over there later to see if I can find a path, but can anyone suggest something? Just when you think you know it all.....
This is a good head scratcher
- Thread starter mac
- Start date
whitescout
Banned
Without knowing anything about your system, the first thing that pops into my head are multiple bad check valves if you inject air into your low pressure manifolds.
Air is mixed with the low pressure chemicals at the manifolds over each bay. I have seen this air backfeed through the pump and into the tank. In this case however, the air was in the water line feeding the tank. Even the hose bibs on the water line before any equipment.
PaulLovesJamie
rural 5 bay SS
I cant think of any reason why turning the compressor off would have "solved" this - can you clue me in to why you even thought of that?
I cant really think of a solution, but my first thought is that I dont trust the water dept. They've changed my water pressure (by a lot) without telling me, turned the water off without telling me, etc.
I have pressure gauges all over the place - one where the water enters the building, one after the backflow preventer, one after the softener ... you get the idea. It's a cheap way to check my wash, a sweeping glance at 20 gauges every time I enter the equip room tells me a lot.
Anyway I guess I"m trying to say I'd put a pressure gauge on the incoming water supply, and I'd call the water co and ask what they were doing.
I cant really think of a solution, but my first thought is that I dont trust the water dept. They've changed my water pressure (by a lot) without telling me, turned the water off without telling me, etc.
I have pressure gauges all over the place - one where the water enters the building, one after the backflow preventer, one after the softener ... you get the idea. It's a cheap way to check my wash, a sweeping glance at 20 gauges every time I enter the equip room tells me a lot.
Anyway I guess I"m trying to say I'd put a pressure gauge on the incoming water supply, and I'd call the water co and ask what they were doing.
Wally
Member
Mac my guess is it`s somewhere in the low pressure system, foam brush, tire cleaner.Somehow air is getting back into the hoe bib.
jprb
Member
You said it's not in a freeze zone, but is there provisions for a weep system that might be hooked directly into the water line?
JPRB
JPRB
robtl
central Ky
Did you check where your backflow preventer was to see if it has dumped, maybe the water co lost pressure and air got into the system then.
I had the tech turn off the air at the compressor because air was coming out of the water lines. It was just a hunch, and it may have been one of those odd coincidences that it stopped right then. There is a building right next door and its water was fine. Water dept said no work going on in the area. There is no provision for any weep system. This is an old place that has had a string of inept people working on it. It is leased from the owner and the lesee doesn't want to put any money into improvements, even gauges. Maybe UFOs were there doing something. If we find it, I'll let you know.
robtl
central Ky
I once saw a automatic coffee maker tied into the sprinkler system in a office building,
go figure
go figure
MEP001
Well-known member
Was it so the sprinklers coming on would start the coffee brewing in the morning?robtl said:
One of the dumbest things I've ever seen anyone do was at an old place of work, a girl at the front desk had a space heater plugged into the same power strip as the computer. It kept tripping the breaker in the power strip, so she unplugged the strip from the wall and plugged the heater in there. She plugged the power strip into the first outlet she saw: in the power strip, then called me in to see why her computer wouldn't turn back on.
pitzerwm
Active member
When I worked for Singer Business Machines in 1970, we charged a number of people $75 to plug their unit back in.
bneckrock
Bill Neckrock
Bill, the mention of those old calculators brought back some memories of my first job in public accounting. The juniors used to set Fridens chunking along and sleep off a tough night. I wonder what happened to all those machines.
pitzerwm
Active member
Fortunately, I came in just when the new electronic ones came out. It was no wonder they went under. We would get a box of 12 electronics from Japan and they all worked and lasted forever, we would get a box of 12 from the Singer factory in CA and 10 wouldn't work out of the box. I started moonlighting in my own business and the boss got mad and canned me, later they were all out of a job too.
Mystery solved ! This was one of the strangest ones I've seen in a while. Here is what was happening. When some of the bays were on a foaming low pressure function, some of the foaming product went back through the high pressure hose to the pump. This is easier to do if you have non weep guns and someone leaves a bay on and drives off. This place has a weep system that is very old. The foaming product was going backward through the weep and into the main water supply. The product was about 50 psi, while the incoming water is less than that. So big soapy air bubbles would accumulate in the water line and burp into the main water holding tank. It would also back directly into the tank through the faulty main check valve.
