Pressure switch on well PLEASE HELP!

[ByronBob]

The first pressure switch is wired to the second one. If you only have one pump in the bottom of the well I can't understand what the second switch is for?

Try disconnecting the top pressure switch all together and run the water system and see if it's even doing anything.

In the house do you have another blue tank like the one you you say might be for the water hammer issue? That looks like your bladder tank which regulates your system. With an 80 gallon retention tank in the house I'd be surprised if you need another bladder tank in the house.

Sounds like you lowered the pressure and for the moment I know that was the objective but when time allows sir I'd get a working pressure valve in there to see what your system is actually doing vs guessing. That way you can set the pressures correctly without educated guessing.

 

[JimR]

Looking at your switches I would say he is using one for a cut-in and the other for a cut-out. Otherwise there would be four leads on each switch. You only have two leads per switch. Why? God only knows. My sister had a bozo wire in two switches on her pump. Not only were both hooked up. But he had them both setup the same way. The pump would sometimes come on and sometimes it wouldn't if one switch was open. You need to use only one switch. Rewire them to make it right and remove the other switch. You should have the power (black) and neutral wire (white) and two wires for the pump (black and white) in one switch box. On my switch the black wire is on the left side left screw and the white wire on the right side left screw of the switch. The same color wires from the pump connect to the other two terminals. Black to black, white to white. The small nut is or the cut-in pressure. The large nut is the cut-out one.

 

[Westonium]

This is all excellent advice!

This also helps support me fixing all of this crap. Now I have web witnesses as to the idiocy of the previous owner. I can point my wife to this thread and she may better understand all the hub-bub.

The electrical mess he (previous owner) left is the kind of stuff that gives electricians nightmares. It literally did even. We had to drop some serious coin to get the wiring under the house straight. My favorite was the 2 or 4 gauge (reallly thick) wire air-splice wrapped with 1 layer of electrical tape under the family room.

I can fix this guys, I just am not familiar with pressure switches. I will be re-doing it all in copper - possibly even brazed copper. The electrical will be done at the same time. The heat wire can go - it serves no purpose. There is a heat lamp in the pump house, and the thing is semi-insulated. I say semi because the roof was not correctly waterproofed and the fiberglass batting is molding and falling down.

So basically I am going to:
* rebuild the plumbing in copper, allowing for ONE pressue switch and a working pressure gauge

*remove all the dead or dangerous wiring

* put in new armored wiring (would meet code specs)

Obviously folks, this here is a sad example of why cities everywhere want more and more permits and more inspections - an inspector would have run out of paper citing what was wrong with this. I am going to make it right and safe as possible.

I'll remember to take pictures. Maybe it will help someone else?

 

[turnkey4099]

Very good plan! The problem you will still be left with is having the pressure switch gauge at the well and the tank/house at a different location. Makes getting the pressure dialed in a bit more complicated. You should aim for a 40/60 setting -at the house-. You will need to compute how much additional pressure you need to set at the well to allow for the elevation distance. .43 psi per foot rise. Over the distance you are running with 1 1/4" pipe the pipe restriction (unless you have a -lot- of elbows) shouldn't be enough to matter.

You will still need two gauges, one at the well (I see there is one there already but apparently not working) and one at the house to verify your settings.

Be sure you have a PRV valve on the water heater. I have seen the results of one of those tanks blowing and it ain't pretty. From you discription of the rest of the system I suspect there isn't one.

Harry K

 

[_RaT_]

Jim my thoughts too. That would complicate things if nothing else. It certainly looks jury rigged. The blue expansion tank looks like it could also be split open with the kind of pressure that must exist. If the pressure tank is up at the house which was many feet higher then the source, then the pressure switch needs or should be as well for the best accuracy. I would relocate the pressure switch to the house and use a pair of control wires to pull a relay for the pump. That not only simplifies the adjustment, but saves the pressure switch from having to turn on a 3 HP well pump. A big fat relay can take care of that. When he adjusts the pressure switch down at the bottom, he has no idea what the pressure at the top will be without running back and forth. That might be a problem if the wire is not already in though. For folks putting in a well, run two conduits. One for power to the pump and include 120V for utility needs like lights, plug etc and a second conduit for control wiring. One other thing, with a 3 HP well pump he is either very deep or well oversized/high gpm well for irrigation. If oversized, he should really be sure to have plenty of pressure tank(s). The on torque for a submersible well pump that big must be large. My next well pump will be a constant pressure pump. They start at 0 RPM's and ramp up in RPM running at the RPM required to maintain the flow at a given pressure.

 

[JASTN70D]

Rat

<font color="blue"> "saves the pressure switch from having to turn on a 3 HP well pump. A big fat relay can take care of that" </font>

I have been wondering if this is the reason for 2 switches in the first place?

 

[_RaT_]

Could be, but that would be awkward and not really work as I think about it. If both were 2 pole switches and he used the 2 contacts on one switch for one leg and the other switch for the other leg, synchornizing the two would be nearly impossible. One would surely always lead or lag. My thought would have been a second pump somewhere. I guess you could even have the second one set at extremes of the first so that if the first failed, the second would take over.

 

[RobertN]

It looks like a rat's nest... A few notes from my well.

Get a new gauge and pressure switch. If you do in fact have minerals in the water, it will gum up the orifices on the gauge and switch over time. We have lots of iron. First, my gauge went whacky, and then my pressure switch did the same. Plus, if you get a new pressure switch, you'll get all the instructions on setting it properly.

Make sure all covers are on the pressure switch. Whoever installed our, left one of the samll covers off where a conduit could attach. A small frog goit in there, and shorted itself across the switch. Our pressure was really bad then!

If you have minerals, add a 10" canister filter right off the well head. Keep all the gunk out of your water system. Make sure to put shutoff valves on both sides of the filter to ensure easy maintenance...

You have TONS of head pressure to overcome. As mentioned before, head pressure is 0.434psi/ft(funny how there are lots of Fire Fighters and plumbers and do-it yourselfers here!). You have about 43psi of head pressure to overcome before you get to the house. If you want 50 psi at the house, then you need 93psi at the wellhead.

650' of 1-1/4 line will still have friction loss. You might as well calculate it all in if you want to fix it right... As a relative starting point, 1-1/4 PVC SCH40 has 0.63psi loss at 10gpm per 100'. That's only 4psi over 650', but might as well calculate it in.

So, overall, you need about 97psi at the wellhead for 50 psi at the house. Given the typical 40/60psi on/off point for a pressure switch, you need about 85/105 set at the well head.

Folks have mentioned the pressure tank; check it too. When I had my system "tuned", they drained the pressure tank, and checked the air pressure on the bladder. Seems to me they set it about 40psi empty; that is worth asking you plumbing supply house about...

We have a little different situation.... Our house if level with the well and pressure tank. But, we have a Granny flat that sits about 250' from the pressure tank, and about 50' higher. If we have 50 psi in the tank, the best my Mom-in-law gets is 21psi... If we use any water at our house, she has no pressure.

We finally put a storage tank in her garage, that has an on-demand pump on it. The tank fills off our well supply, even at the measily 21psi she gets up there. Then, she has her 40-50 psi in the house. She is MUCH happier since the setup was installed!

 

[JimR]

Ooops, I should have mentioned that I have a relay in between the pressure switch and the pump. I forgot all about that box. It should be mounted near the pressure switch on the wall. Need pictures of either? I'll take them for you.

 

[_RaT_]

Jim, that is the beauty though of the control wire. I set up a system where the pressure tank/ pressure switch was setup in a barn and then about 3000' feet down the road was the pump house and relays. The current demand to pull the relay coil is very small thus the voltage drop is very slight even at that distance. We had two, 2 pole 240V relays with 120V coils that ran a 1.5HP booster pump and a 5 HP booster pump. The adjustment of the system was very easy. This whole configuration was needed because of the elevation increase from the source.