installed new shower body, low water pressure

backdown00 · Aug 5, 2013

Hello All,

I recently had the below shower body installed:

http://www.moen.com/search?search_scope=0&search_terms=Moen+3867BN

And now the water pressure is so low its hard to even shower. There is great pressure throughout he rest of the entire house. Not sure how to fix this?

Thank you all!

WJcandee · Aug 5, 2013

Well...it's a 2.5 gallons-per-minute showerhead. It probably isn't the pressure, per se, that's the issue, it is likely the flow restriction device contained in the showerhead. Although the EPA keeps trying to make it more and more difficult to remove these devices (which you either perceive as pernicious or glorious), most showerheads today still come with them being fairly-easily-removable. If it is not unlawful to do so where you are, I might look at the instructions and see if there isn't a section regarding "low water pressure" wherein they explain how to properly configure the showerhead where low local or well water pressure makes it not function properly with the restriction device in place...

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hj · Aug 5, 2013

It could even be flow lost because of the vacuum breaker in the line. Without being there it is impossible to tell you WHERE you are losing pressure and flow.

Jadnashua · Aug 5, 2013

It's hard to know what the state of your plumbing is in the UK. While there are some people that visit from outside of the USA, problems you may have related to your infrastructure probably wouldn't even be thought of by most of us.

WHat are you using for hot water supply? What is your actual water pressure? If you're running the hot with a pumped system, the pressure isn't the same on both the hot and cold supply lines...on US style valves, this will prevent the valve from opening fully (there's a pressure balance valve in the thing). That's the only big thing that comes to mind, but a bit of info on your supply setup may be useful.

MichaelBukay · Aug 6, 2013

maybe they didn't flush out the sediment after they sweat the pipes. could be a clogged screen in one of the connections. or some junk ended up in the cartridge. if someone other than you installed it, they should take the time to fix it.

hj · Aug 6, 2013

The item he shows is a handheld shower unit, NOT a shower valve, so the comments about soldering or installing a valve may be irrelevant.

backdown00 · Aug 6, 2013

wjcandee said:
Well...it's a 2.5 gallons-per-minute showerhead. It probably isn't the pressure, per se, that's the issue, it is likely the flow restriction device contained in the showerhead. Although the EPA keeps trying to make it more and more difficult to remove these devices (which you either perceive as pernicious or glorious), most showerheads today still come with them being fairly-easily-removable. If it is not unlawful to do so where you are, I might look at the instructions and see if there isn't a section regarding "low water pressure" wherein they explain how to properly configure the showerhead where low local or well water pressure makes it not function properly with the restriction device in place...

Based on everything I have seen, this might be it. I'm going to attempt to fix this tomorrow by putting a hole in this white cap (flow restrictor) in the shower head so that more water is flowing through

backdown00 · Aug 7, 2013

After removing the shower head, there is some sort of screen filter part where the shower head connects to the flexible pipe. When I removed that the pressure is crazy powerful. I assume this net is a filter of some sort, no idea why or how its blocking pressure.

installed new shower body, low water pressure

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