perrycat
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I'm a maintenance tech for a property that has aprox. 1000 units, 3 seperate boiler plants, and it's built in the early 70's. I have constant service calls for water temperature fluctuation mainly in showers, the faucets never seem to get a complaint. This problem also seems to be happening at all 3 sections of the property, each section has a boiler plant for heat and cooling and domestic hot water.
All the units have the same tub and shower valve, they're Price Pfister with integral stops on each one ( half the time the stops don't work anyway) and they're washer type valves.
People as of late have been allowed to put in their own laundry washers and dryers, so maybe half to three quarters of the units have a washer dryer now, and when it was built they all had a laundry room with pay washers and dryers ( those are still there BTW)
I went to one building and on a hunch, used a gauge to check the water pressure from one of the laundry machines in the laundry room. The hot was 115 PSI ( I know that's super high I guess.....thermal expansion maybe?? most people were at work at that time) But the cold water was maybe 55 PSI.
So, question to you if you could give er a shot, is it possible that the water is "fighting" each other whenever anybody opens up the shower valve? I read something about a check valve that you put on the recirc line, and we don't have any on any of them that I've seen. Where would you locate that anyway? in the boiler plant right after the recirc pump?
Also, I've had this maybe hair brained idea that it could be because the washers in the valves are all so old, integral stops included, that maybe somehow the washers are like flipping back and forth somehow inside the shower valves, and somehow stopping the flow a little and then flipping back and the flow gets stronger again....is that possible?
One last one, and I REALLY hope it's not this, is that is it possible some plumber sometime in the past, even way past, crossed a hot and cold line in a repair and how could you track that down? that seems like that would be a real night mare, but it's happening in all 3 sections so I don't think that's what it is.
Well thanks for reading all that and thanks in advance for any input. These calls are driving me nuts....I will say that today I went on one and what had happened is that on the integral stop on that shower valve somebody only cracked open the hot side and the cold side was full blast....I rebuilt the shower valve and put the hot all the way open again and it's real strong now, I think that one I fixed...but I wish there was just one culprit and I could find it and fix it, heat exchanger, balancing valve whatever.....that's another thing....if I just said " you need a new shower valve" on every one and we put in pressure balanced valves, would that cure it for that specific apartment? Which are good strong really long lasting valves to use? I would like to keep em all the same so I dont have to have a plumbing supply house in the parts shop.
Steve
All the units have the same tub and shower valve, they're Price Pfister with integral stops on each one ( half the time the stops don't work anyway) and they're washer type valves.
People as of late have been allowed to put in their own laundry washers and dryers, so maybe half to three quarters of the units have a washer dryer now, and when it was built they all had a laundry room with pay washers and dryers ( those are still there BTW)
I went to one building and on a hunch, used a gauge to check the water pressure from one of the laundry machines in the laundry room. The hot was 115 PSI ( I know that's super high I guess.....thermal expansion maybe?? most people were at work at that time) But the cold water was maybe 55 PSI.
So, question to you if you could give er a shot, is it possible that the water is "fighting" each other whenever anybody opens up the shower valve? I read something about a check valve that you put on the recirc line, and we don't have any on any of them that I've seen. Where would you locate that anyway? in the boiler plant right after the recirc pump?
Also, I've had this maybe hair brained idea that it could be because the washers in the valves are all so old, integral stops included, that maybe somehow the washers are like flipping back and forth somehow inside the shower valves, and somehow stopping the flow a little and then flipping back and the flow gets stronger again....is that possible?
One last one, and I REALLY hope it's not this, is that is it possible some plumber sometime in the past, even way past, crossed a hot and cold line in a repair and how could you track that down? that seems like that would be a real night mare, but it's happening in all 3 sections so I don't think that's what it is.
Well thanks for reading all that and thanks in advance for any input. These calls are driving me nuts....I will say that today I went on one and what had happened is that on the integral stop on that shower valve somebody only cracked open the hot side and the cold side was full blast....I rebuilt the shower valve and put the hot all the way open again and it's real strong now, I think that one I fixed...but I wish there was just one culprit and I could find it and fix it, heat exchanger, balancing valve whatever.....that's another thing....if I just said " you need a new shower valve" on every one and we put in pressure balanced valves, would that cure it for that specific apartment? Which are good strong really long lasting valves to use? I would like to keep em all the same so I dont have to have a plumbing supply house in the parts shop.
Steve