Wierd water pressure problem

My home was built in early 60's. 2 story, crawlspace, well, copper pipes, 2 full baths (1 up, 1 down), kitchen on 1st level. We moved in just about 2 years ago. We have never been on a well before.

2 nights ago, I flushed the upstairs toilet, it refilled with dark gray water. I flushed again-lighter color, but still very gray. In the morning when I turned on the upstairs shower, there was very little water pressure and the water was grey, same for the sink. Downstairs bath and kitchen water is almost normal. Very slight gray tint, but plenty of pressure. I was getting small black (smaller than ground pepper) particles in the water all over the house. I changed the filter this morning hoping to have corrected the problem. There were larger flakes of rust in the bottom of the filter cannister. Water is now clear but still lacks proper pressure to upstairs bath. The toilet upstairs does not appear to be affected by this problem as it seems to refill in the same amount of time.

I have been in the crawlspace to inspect the pressure tank-ok, no leaks. Pressure at the schrader valve is 30psi. Hot water works ok (except for lack of pressure upstairs).

Can anyone please give me some insight as to what might have failed, or is failing, in my plumbing to have caused this.

Notags

Galvanized supply pipes?

No, I checked that. Black plastic piping from well and pressure tank. That switches over to copper to CPVC up to the water softener then back to copper to the rest of the house.

master plumber mark

do you have a water conditioner????

If you have a water softener in the system, it probably most likely has failed on you and "blown a gasket"

We see this a lot....with high water pressure, .when it re-generates at night the unit gets stuck at one spot in the cycle and then all the resiin inthe mineral tank "siphons" into the water lines..the next day when you turn on somtrhing in the house.


it is a total mess ...to flush out all the lines

if this is the case, you will probably need to flush out the water heater, install new ballcocks on your toilets too, jsut to be safe...

you will be needing a new water softener too...

I don't have any ideas of why the gray water but... If a water softener allows the loss of resin into the plumbing, the distributor oring seal to the distributor tube, the distributor tube itsself or its bottom basket is broken. That's the only way resin can get into the plumbing. The repair parts cost less than $25 and the resin can be replaced, so the softener doesn't have to be replaced.

When a softener is in regeneration and water is used, you get hard water, not water throguh the softener. All, or at least the vast majority, of residential softeners will have that feature; it's called an internal hard water by-pass.

Gary
Quality Water Asscoiates

Thanks to all who responded.

I contacted Culligan, they confirmed that the media was escaping into my plumbing. I purchased and installed a new unit (not from them).

Thanks again!