Need 2 Bladder Tanks!?!?

billboe · Feb 4, 2002

My water system <font color=red>had</font color=red> two bladder tanks. One small one (~2.5gal) at the well head and a normal size one (?30?gal; ?4' tal & ?1.5' wide) at the house. This past weekend I noticed the small one was leaking, so, I just removed it and capped the hole. Is there any reason to have two? The distance from the well to the house is probably about 100yards...

Thanks!!!!

Anonymous Poster · Feb 5, 2002

The small one was probably put there to act as a hydraulic shock absorber to prevent the pipe between the pump and the house from fracturing.
You could probably accomplish the same thing with about 4 feet of hose with one end plugged off. Install the hose in the same port as the small tank was, and bend it into an inverted U.

billboe · Feb 5, 2002

Interesting Franz!

What kind of hose? I presume it would need to be expandable!?!? Also, why the "inverted U"?

Thanks!

Chuck52 · Feb 5, 2002

Franz is basically describing a do-it-yourself water hammer arrestor, which is an air filled chamber plumbed into your water line to disipate the hammer effect of opening and closing valves in the line. The site below describes the commercial ones.

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.factsfacts.com/MyHomeRepair/PipeNoises.htm>http://www.factsfacts.com/MyHomeRepair/PipeNoises.htm</A>

Chuck

billboe · Feb 5, 2002

Hmmmmm... I would think that the one bladder tank at the house would be enough to solve the hammer effect!??! Unless, due the the relatively long distance from well to house, the sudden pressure from the pump could cause the pipes to burst???

Well, as I was writing this, I talked to a plumber and a well driller... The plumber said that if there was a check or anti-siphon valve between the house and the well, then, this may have been used to enable the use of a hose bib near the well head... This doesn't make sense to me!?!? The pressure tank wasn't large enough to make much of difference here!??!

The driller said that if there is a pressure switch near the well head this tank would be needed... The only switch that I know about is near the tank at the house. He also said I shouldn't need to worry about the problem Franz mentioned (and I speculated on above)...

Who knows!?!?!?

patrickg · Feb 5, 2002

Go to your friendly local purveyor of fine well pumps (with pencil and paper). Open some boxes if you have to do so to get the 800 numbers for customer assistance. Call them. You will find there are right and wrong ways to use multiple tanks and most clerks where pumps are sold, most well drillers, and the majority of us here at this forum don't really know. I thought I could apply simple physics to work out my system. Failing that use the water to electricity analogy and work it out. I learned a lot from a knowlegeable customer service lady in a few minutes on the phone. Suggest you try it.

Patrick

patrickg · Feb 5, 2002

Over time the air will be disolved into the water and the thumper stopper will cease to work. You could put a Schrader valve or something like that in it to allow the user to replace the air as it is lost, refilling it once in a while.

Patrick

Anonymous Poster · Feb 6, 2002

The hose doesn't need to be expandable, it's just acting as a hammer arrestor. It used to be done on a lot of pressure washers, till the price of spring loaded hammer reduction chambers became relatively inexpensive.
The reason for the inverted U shape is that it lengthens the life of the trapped air in the hose. If the hose is left straight, the water can absorbe the air easier. With the inverted U, it acts like a plumbing trap, and the air gets compressed instead of disolved. Trapped air is an interesting thing, especially when you try to bleed it out of a hot water heating system. If you ever noticed a steam pressure gague, it is fed by a pipe with a complete circle, pigtail, to prevent water from reaching the gague itself.
It's just one of those natural phenominons engineers constantly try to overcome.
My thinking is the person who originally installed the system had a [censored] good reason. Do you really want to find that reason the hard way, for the price of a WellXtrol tank?