Looking for suggestions - supplying house from water storage tank.

pwright · Feb 18, 2014

Our house at the mountain property is under way and it won't be long before we'll need to finalize the plumbing details. As it is right now the water comes from a well and is pumped up hill a little ways to a storage tank (550 gal). This tank sits approximately 25' above the base of the house. 1" line runs down to the house (and down the hill to the tractor barn and where the camp trailer is parked).

Can we do without a pressure/expansion tank by using a whole-house booster pump like:

Simer 3075SS 3/4 HP Pressure Booster Pump - Amazon.com

Or maybe the Grundfos:

Grundfos MQ3-35 (115V) 3/4 HP Pressure Booster Pump - 96860172 - FreshWaterSystems.com

Anybody done this and if so how well did it work? Or is it a bad idea?

TnAndy · Feb 18, 2014

Yes...those work fine, as long as you include a pressure tank. Lot of places sell them as a package....small booster pump with a small ( like 2-3gal ) pressure tank.

IF you can get a bit more elevation on your storage tank ( like 50' or so ), you could do without the pump. That is the way we do ours....spring down to tanks ( two 1500gal ) and on down to the house/everything else.

IF you do decide to move your tank, go with a bigger line.....1 1/2" at least. The bigger the line, the more volume you can get, and you have less friction loss. I used a 1", and wish I'd gone bigger. IF I were doing it over again, I'd go 2", and maybe 3".....add some firefighting water capacity while I was at it.

C4Ranch · Feb 18, 2014

The bigger the pressure tank the less your pump will cycle. Without on, my guess is the pump will turn on every time you open a faucet.

I have a 12-14gal tank for my cabin currently fed by storage tanks and have a 3/4 hp shallow well pump to build pressure.

pwright · Feb 19, 2014

Thanks guys. Unfortunately it isn't practical to get the tank any higher than it is currently. Yeah, I should have run a bigger supply line but I think we'll be okay.

C4Ranch - that's correct. The pump will come on each time but they are rated for that kind of service. The typical shallow well pumps definitely need to have a pressure tank.

Wouldn't be terrible to have a pressure tank. It is just one more thing to find a place for.

Western · Feb 19, 2014

We had a similar set as you describe, except a 1000 gal tank was installed by the previous owner, . Water was pulled from the tank and supplied the whole farm using a jet pump, no pressure tank and no real elevation change. Pump lasted over 15 years.

C4Ranch · Feb 19, 2014

May not be a concern, but if the pump cycles every time water is used, youre gonna see it in electric consumption. Startup has the greatest draw.

For me, just knowing it's cycling every time would drive me bonkers... Like a dripping faucet.

pwright · Feb 19, 2014

Thanks Dennis. Do you know offhand what kind of pump was used?

C4Ranch - The startup draws are very short though. I wonder what the current consumption curve looks like on a pump going into a pressure tank. Would imagine it increases somewhat as it gets the tank back up to static pressure.

Some back of the envelope calculations suggests that in a worse case scenario where someone gets a glass of water five times in an hour (5 * 20 secs) the boost pump would consume about 26 watts/hour while a pump on a pressure tank running only once for less time (80 secs total) would be about 22 watts/hour. Probably completely silly numbers though.

bandaidmd · Feb 19, 2014

I ran my house off a portable tank for a couple weeks while a new deep well was being drilled just used my old shallow well pump gravity fed from the portable tank. Definatly want a bladder tank in any system you use.