Need help with banging pipes

[Evan conklin]

This will take a bit to explain but I will try my best. I live in a guest house of a friend. A few weeks ago I needed to turn off the outflow from the hot water heater. When I turned it back on we starters getting some banging pipes. We drained the system and tried to bleed air out of it to no effect. Our landlords got the pressure tank replaced and still nothing.
Those are the nuts and bolts. Explaining the system and sumptoms is where it gets more complicated. We are on the same system as the main house. Our main water pipe splits off from the main houses at the well head. We do not have a pressure tank in our house there is only the one in the main house. The banging seems to be triggered by running water, hot or cold, in our house or the main house. It is not associated with any turning off any fixture or a flushing toilet. The banging sound changes location and severity/amplitude and is always preceded with a buzzing sound, that sounds like the well pump as crazy as that seems. To reiterate the point, the banging is triggered even when we are not running any water in our house.

The new pressure tank has helped decrease the frequency of the banging and the buzzing sound preceding it is now 15 seconds as opposed to 5 seconds with the old tank. Draining the system and closing the spigots and fixtures before turning the water back on decreases the amplitude for a time but it is still there and gets worse after a day or so.

I guess that’s all. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[WorthFlorida]

....The banging seems to be triggered by running water, hot or cold, in our house or the main house. It is not associated with any turning off any fixture or a flushing toilet. The banging sound changes location and severity/amplitude and is always preceded with a buzzing sound, that sounds like the well pump as crazy as that seems. To reiterate the point, the banging is triggered even when we are not running any water in our house...

I suspect the valve you used to turn off the water initially is the cause if it has a seat washer. It is lose or deteriorated and it vibrates (buzz) as water flows. As for the banging it a mystery to me possible it's a gate valve. Some water heaters a gate valve is used and as they age, the stem for the gate breaks on the inside opening it back up and you may not have realized it.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Reach4]

I presume the pump is a submersible down the well.

The banging seems to be triggered by running water, hot or cold, in our house or the main house.

That water use triggered the pressure switch to turn the pump on. Then the water use can be stopped well before the bang.

I suspect the valve you used to turn off the water initially is the cause if it has a seat washer.

Evan describes a bang when the pump shuts off after reaching the shut-off pressure. The

I am wondering if removing the suspected check valve at the main home would stop that bang. Another thought is that the check valve at the pump is failing, and is slow to close.

 

[Smooky]

Make sure the valve you closed, is all the way open.

 

[WorthFlorida]

Could be debris loosen up and its jamming a valve somewhere.

 

[Valveman]

What does the pressure gauge say when this is happening? And is the pump even running when this happens?

 

[Reach4]

What does the pressure gauge say when this is happening? And is the pump even running when this happens?

What I suspect was being described is somebody in either house uses water. The pressure drops to the cut-in pressures. The submersible pump turns on, and that is what is picked up as a "buzzing sound". I can't hear my submersible pump, unless I am next to my pressure tank, and even then, I just hear a gentle hum.

When the pump cuts off, there is a water hammer.

Of course I might have read more into it than I should have.

 

[Evan conklin]

That is what it seems like to me but I am ignorant of how stuff works. How could we fix that.

 

[Evan conklin]

We don’t have full access to the main house where the gauge is. It’s hard to be sure if the pump is running when it happens

 

[Reach4]

We don’t have full access to the main house where the gauge is. It’s hard to be sure if the pump is running when it happens

You could put a garden hose thread pressure gauge in your house. It can go on an outside hose spigot, a laundry tap, or the drain on the water heater. Expect while the pump is running, for pressure to be rising. When the pump shuts off, expect the pressure to hold steady or drop.

We suspect the needle will jump up momentarily when the single bang happens.

Such a gauge is under $20, and often under $10.