[img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] I'm going to try and control myself here so I don't sound too cynical, [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img] but after spending YEARS in the water supply business.....that's pumps from teeny-tiny to thousands of HP.... it still AMAZES [img]/forums/images/icons/shocked.gif[/img] me how many ways have been devised to keep from doing the right thing where pump installations are concerned. YES, I KNOW that the pump dealers are battling the price-shopping public, and YES, I KNOW that the public has little or no appreciation for well-engineered and well installed pumping systems if the cost is six cents higher than the other guy; but the fact is that: "You gits whut yew pays fer". Tiny storage tanks are the pits. There is not enough capacity to iron out the fluctuations in pressure from starts and stops, and they cause the pump to cycle just that much more. Variable speed pumps are fine.......for municipal customers and places where HUGE variations in flow must be accounted for and there is no space for a hydro-pneumatic tank. Why anyone would use one in a domestic setup is beyond me.......except for price........to avoid buying a decent sized tank. The other thing is that so many homeowners will drill where THEY want to drill and not where the tank and pump should rightly go. If a proper location is chosen to begin with, a large tank is not a problem, but heck, WHY PLAN ANYTHING when you can just slop it in. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img] Landscape watering is a big problem for domestic water systems because the instantaneous flow is so much higher than the normal domestic use, and there is often a high pressure requirement for big sprinklers and THAT must be dealt with by using pressure regulators or the dishwasher valves will be slamming. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] Good-sized residences with lots of lawns need to have the pump sized for landscape watering FIRST, and the domestic use secondarily. Most good sprinkler timers have a pump "on" circuit that will keep the well pump from cycling while landscape irrigation is in progress, and that's a good way to set things up. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] Modern technology is nice; and I'm a firm believer in using what works the best. What you have to keep in mind, however, is that well and pump systems are VERY LONG TERM when compared to other consumer goods you might buy. The pump will have to deliver thousands and thousands of acre feet of water over it's useful life, and will be responding to literally hundreds of thousands of "ON" clicks of that pressure switch. It isn't a bit unusual for a submersible pump to last twenty years if the water is decent and there is no sand coming into the well. Do you think you can expect a constant-running variable flow unit to go that distance? How many bladder tanks will you buy in twenty years? I often went into pump rooms ....or looked at outdoor locations which had hydro-oneumatic pressure tanks with the destination dealer's name still showing on the side of the galvanized tank that was shipped by TRAIN in some cases; thirty od forty years ago. It was like a page of HISTORY, and a testament to a job well engineered and well done. In those cases the first two words the customer usually said were: "I need......." instead of: "How much......." [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] The equipment that is available for domestic well installations today is designed to reduce INSTALLATION TIME AND COST by having ONE FITTING do several jobs, and enabling the crew to get done quicker and do five more jobs that same day instead of hanging around for cool-aid and cookies from ma and pa while they finished up the many details on a typical designed-from-the-ground-up pump installation, and maybe got back to the shop by four o'clock. By furnishing a cut-and-dried one-size-fits-all type of water system, the dealer can cut costs and maybe get the job. The system may not exactly fit the jobsite, but who cares when price is the main consideration. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img]
CJDave
I have also been in the well business for many years. Born in the business. Father and grandfather were well drillers and pump installers. Myself over 30 years in the business. I agree with you on most everything. Too many people are price shopping instead of getting good stuf at a reasonable price. It is funny to me that people will listen to a brother in law or a neighbor before they will take advice from an experienced pump person. Might have to do with getting so many different opinions from different pump people. Just like you and I disagree on variable speed pumps. I stopped using these things 12 years ago. Even on municiple systems they are expensive, more troble than they are worth, and do not save any energy. Variable speed pumps may work OK on sewage pumps and the like but, when you need to maintain a constant pressure you will lose head by the square of the speed. If you can slow a pump down by more than 10% then the pump is way oversized. Slowing a pump down by 10% reduces the horse power by only 25%. Most pumps will drop this much or more horse power by letting the pump run at full RPM and simply restricting the output with a valve. This is not only less expensive but more reliable than using variable speed. I also used to use as big a tank as possible. For over ten years now I have been using small tanks with a Cycle Stop Valve. I have systems with 40,000 people on a single 86 gallon pressure tank. My own house well uses a 20 gallon tank that only holds 5 gallons of water with a 2HP 25 GPM pump. A drip system in my garden uses only 3 GPM and was causing my pump to fail every 2 years even with (2) of the 86 gallon tanks attached. After installing the Cycle Stop Valve I removed these two big tanks and installed the 20 gallon tank. I have been using the same pump now for over 10 years. The Cycle Stop Valve has already saved me 5 replacement pumps. For more info see www.cyclestopvalves.com. Big pressure tanks, water towers, and variable speed pumps are a thing of the past.
I couldn't get that website to load, but I'm going to try again when I have more time. Those CSV's were non existent when I was doing water well work. They MAY have been around, but the domestic work was not our focus and we only doid domestic water systems when one of our customers insisted on it. I'm going to be re-habbing a well here on my Iowa 'farm" this next year and I already know that the pressure tank is blamo. The destination dealership stencilled on the tank shell hasn't been around for thirty years at least, maybe more. [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
CJDave
Your right CSV's have been around for 10 years but the word is slow getting out. Many pump companies will not mention a CSV because it makes pumps last longer and use smaller tanks. Kind of like selling percolating carburetors, that make any car get 75 MPG, through the man that owns the gas station. He will only mention them if he has too. Then he will try to void warranty on your car if you use one. Make sure you use an (s) on valves or the web page won't work. Or call them at 800-652-0207 for written info.
Since we have a couple of well guys in here now, I have a question I 'd like answered....My new well has iron in the water, and it is starting to stain my driveway and the bottom of the brick around my new house.....I have a large pond near the well....about 200 ft away... the sprinkler installer said if I ran a line from the well to the pond and then pumped out of the pond it should eliminate the rust staining in the water....any truth to this?...would the iron settle to the bottom of the pond?.....any recommendations on pump type/size...I have about 23 gal per minute coming from the well curently @ 60 psi....I need to do something fairly quick, before the stains become too bad and I cant clean them off...I have power washed them off once already (using muriatic acid), but I dont want to use that stuff around the flower beds and such....and will the iron problem get any better with more use...or will it get worse as I use the well more?...the well is about 3 months old!
bigbukhntr
mixing the water with air will cause the iron to fall out of solution. This will happen when you pump the water into the pond. Pumping water out of the pond is a good way not to have iron. However, now you must also pump leaves, fish, sticks, things like that, so a good screen is needed before the pump in the pond. This can also be done with a storage tank with a small air compressor adding the air to the mix and then you will not be pumping trash out of the pond. It can also be done done in the well with an air line but the stuff will settle to the bottom of the well. If you have a lot of well below the pump this will work. If your pump is already close to the bottom of the well this can ba a problem. There are probably some chemicals that can be used as well. You really need to talk to a water treatment company about the best way to do this. Try Triple O Systems, Inc. 408-378-3002 or www.tripleo.com Pump size can probably be smaller because you are only lifting from a pond or storage tank instead of from the depth of the well. When you decide where you are pumping from the pump can be sized accordingly.
1994
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote