#36 Why is the plumbing pressure too high? (with Cody Mack)

Where does the water come from?  How do you know what pressure you need in a building? Are you over 80PSI?  Are mountain states the only ones who have big fluxuations in municipal water supply pressures?  What is a "noisy little guy?"

In this episode, the guys are throwing paper airplanes and talking about pressure reducing valves.  Our PresCal is sold all over the world, so we have seen some crazy applications.  Dan, Greg, and Cody discuss what pressures you should shoot for when adjusting a PRV.  They also explain why two pressure reducing valves in series may be a great way to go.  If your PRV pressure is creeping up, there is one quick thing you can do to get it back in service, without running to the wholesaler.  

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Transcript

0:00
[Music]
0:04
welcome to ask a leafy the podcast that
0:07
dives into real life problems that
0:09
plumbing and HVAC technicians face in
0:11
the field we're your hosts from the
0:13
caleffi tech support team I'm Greg Tubbs
0:15
and I'm Dan furkus welcome we look
0:18
forward to sharing some stories from our
0:20
Tech calls and using our background and
0:22
expertise to make your days a little
0:24
easier
0:27
thank you hey there welcome back to
0:30
another episode of the ask caleffi podcast
0:32
I got Dan in the studio with me and what
0:35
are we doing today oh we're going to
0:37
talk to Cody Mack again
0:42
about his five things you need to know
0:44
series oh he's a return victim yeah I
0:48
know yeah button for punishment
0:49
gentlemen what can you say yeah you were
0:51
well it doesn't help that you uh
0:54
basically reside right across the
0:56
cubicles from us so yeah yeah we can
0:58
throw paper airplanes at you whenever we
1:00
want we can talk of all about the
1:01
downsides of working at caleffi but let's
1:03
move on okay no you guys are a pleasure
1:06
uh no today we're going to talk about a
1:08
plumbing topic we're going to talk about
1:10
pressure in Plumbing Systems about time
1:12
why it keeps creeping up and everything
1:14
like that or why you might have high
1:16
pressure in your Plumbing Systems
1:17
whether it be uh
1:19
um residential or commercial type
1:21
building and stuff like that so that was
1:22
a pretty cool one that we did for the
1:24
five things yeah certainly a topic we
1:26
get a lot of questions about on the tech
1:28
line we certainly do yeah since we uh we
1:30
jumped on the scene with more and more
1:31
Plumbing products about a handful of
1:33
years ago yeah we're getting more and
1:35
more phone calls about this and and uh
1:37
you know why why the plumbing pressure
1:39
is too high is this kind of a big one
1:41
and I would start by saying that most of
1:44
your plumbing codes are are going to
1:46
restrict the water pressure into a home
1:49
or Commercial Business to 80 psi so that
1:53
is kind of one of the biggest drivers
1:55
there with that is that uh you know you
1:57
want to maintain that pressure below
1:59
that 80 psi for the sake of the fixtures
2:01
a lot of your fixtures are only rated to
2:03
80 psi too and so there's a lot of
2:05
liability involved to make sure that
2:07
that you're not over pressurizing those
2:09
systems and uh and causing any issues
2:12
and yeah so so one of the big ones that
2:14
we talked about uh in the five things
2:16
you need to know where the
2:18
water actually comes from and uh you
2:20
know in most municipalities
2:22
they're getting water from a well or
2:25
some type of a source and then they're
2:27
putting it up in a water tower which
2:28
means that you've got this big elevation
2:30
change between where the water is being
2:33
used and where the water is being stored
2:34
and and that elevation change can add a
2:38
lot of pressure to that system to the
2:40
tune of about 0.433 SI per foot and
2:43
usually in a water tower scenario like
2:45
in a small town where I live it's not
2:47
that big of a deal but if you've got
2:49
water stay like in a reservoir up in the
2:52
mountains or something like that you
2:54
know it could be hundreds of feet you
2:55
know yeah right 0.433 PSI per foot
2:58
starts to add up real quick pretty quick
3:00
yeah it does yeah and so so yeah I mean
3:03
if if you're running into a lot of
3:05
issues I mean chances are if you if you
3:06
work in those neighborhoods you know you
3:08
know about all those guys that are
3:09
having having high water pressure issues
3:11
and then you know I've even talked to
3:13
Illinois which is uh for us people from
3:16
Wisconsin we refer to that too far from
3:18
us
3:19
uh not too far from us but we you know
3:22
we always refer to as the flat land you
3:24
know kind of thing and uh and so you you
3:26
know how much elevation changes can you
3:28
have in the state of Illinois I trust me
3:29
I've driven through it it's it is one of
3:31
the flattest states that you're going to
3:32
run into
3:33
um but what they're doing in a lot of
3:35
those municipalities there too is
3:36
they're cranking up the pressure uh to
3:39
distribute to be able to reach a little
3:40
further out
3:41
um than uh than what they could
3:42
previously and so there are some of
3:45
those places where you know granted they
3:47
might not have a lot of high elevation
3:48
but they're running higher water
3:50
pressure to be able to get that that
3:51
water supply out further and further as
3:53
more and more subdivisions go up sure
3:55
it's like that not uncommon in those
3:57
areas too to see that water pressure
3:59
vary yeah quite a bit yep and I you know
4:02
I'm I used to deal with it I'm sure you
4:04
guys did too uh gas pressure and would
4:06
do the same thing all the time heavy
4:07
load days and stuff like that where uh
4:09
you know all of a sudden you know your
4:11
gas forced air furnace or boiler or
4:13
whatever uh it's not getting proper
4:15
Inlet pressure it's the same thing with
4:16
water if there's more and more demand
4:17
you know the water pressure to drop off
4:20
quite a bit especially the further out
4:21
you get and so uh so yeah it can make a
4:24
big difference and again if it's over
4:26
that 80 psi you need to do something
4:28
about it so typically what what you're
4:30
seeing in most applications is they're
4:33
using a pressure reducing valve and and
4:35
uh what's great about a pressure
4:37
reducing valve the name of it is it
4:39
tells you exactly what it does it
4:40
reduces the pressure coming into those
4:42
buildings so you can get it underneath
4:43
that 80 psi and keep a safe reliable
4:46
pressure to those buildings and and that
4:48
is one of our big products uh one of the
4:50
it's even a global product for coffee
4:52
but we've been selling a ton of those
4:54
guys and we get a lot of questions about
4:56
PRVs for sure yeah we sure do and one
4:59
nice feature with the PRV is that you
5:02
know if you set that outlet pressure
5:03
that Inlet pressure can vary and it's
5:06
still going to maintain so I mean if you
5:08
have a PRV set to you know 45 PSI and
5:12
your Inlet pressure is fluctuating from
5:15
you know 80 to 120 PSI it's not going to
5:19
matter on the outlet that PRV is going
5:21
to control that pressure right for sure
5:23
now the one thing I would say is is that
5:25
you know obviously you're you put in a
5:27
PRV because your pressure's too high but
5:29
uh but there's sometimes that it's even
5:31
too high for a single PRV in some cases
5:33
and uh and so you know in most cases uh
5:37
it doesn't matter if it's ours or
5:39
anybody else's in most cases you're
5:40
recommending more than no more than a
5:43
two to one ratio Inlet Outlet so if you
5:45
know say for example if you've got 120
5:47
PSI in you typically don't want to set
5:49
it more or less than 60 PSI in the
5:51
outlet yeah but you know in most cases
5:54
we can get closer to three to one ratios
5:55
but the problems you run into there is
5:57
that a lot of times the pressure
5:59
reducing valves can get a lot they can
6:01
get noisy they can start to squeal and
6:03
chatter and things like that and that's
6:06
something that you want to avoid and so
6:07
you know I've run into a lot of
6:09
applications especially in like the
6:10
North Carolina markets and stuff like
6:12
that where there is a lot of mountainous
6:13
regions and a lot of elevation changes
6:15
and stuff like that where instead of
6:17
actually using a single pressure
6:18
reducing valve they actually use two of
6:20
them in series and sure they use the
6:22
first one as a first stage so to speak
6:24
yeah it just dropped from like 200 down
6:26
to 100 or 200 to 90 or something like
6:30
that and then and then they use the the
6:31
second one to drop from 90 to 60 or
6:33
something you know or something of that
6:35
effect so that way you're not doing it
6:37
all in one valve because that one valve
6:39
if you try to do that three or greater
6:41
than three to one ratio across one valve
6:42
it's going to be a noisy little guy yeah
6:44
it's going to be working pretty hard
6:47
so uh but uh the other thing we get a
6:49
lot of phone calls about you know when
6:51
it when you talk about Plumbing pressure
6:53
and stuff like that like chances are
6:54
they already have a PRV in but they're
6:56
still running into issues with with uh
6:58
the pressure being too high on the
7:00
outlet of that PRV and one of the
7:01
biggest ones we run into is is dirt and
7:04
debris uh in your PRVs what do you guys
7:06
run into with that we see that a lot
7:08
with dirt and the PRVs you know it's
7:10
typically when we'll get one back on a
7:12
warranty
7:13
um and the issue is it's being sent back
7:15
because it reminds the PRV failed well
7:18
it won't maintain Downstream pressure
7:20
right pressure starts to build
7:21
pressure's starting to creep up yeah so
7:23
we'll take that we'll pull it apart and
7:25
it's not uncommon for us to find debris
7:27
in the cartridge we'll clean them out we
7:29
can put them back in and pressure test
7:31
them and they work great yeah they work
7:33
perfectly fine yeah uh you know and it
7:35
makes me laugh too I mean there's a lot
7:36
of pressure reducing valves out there
7:38
that are less than favorable or less
7:41
than fun when it comes to cleaning them
7:43
and and I think that's one big Advantage
7:46
with our PRV at caleffi is you can pull
7:48
that cartridge out in one piece it's not
7:50
17 screws and 15 different parts and all
7:52
that stuff you can pull that cartridge
7:54
out and you can clean it and I what I
7:55
joke about is is that if for the time it
7:57
would have taken somebody to just pull
7:58
the cartridge clean it and put it back
8:00
in uh it would have been minutes by
8:03
comparison to going back to the
8:05
wholesale house and getting a new one
8:07
coming back and putting the new one in
8:09
and then having to go back to the supply
8:10
house to take the old one back and do
8:12
all the warranty procedure and all that
8:14
screwing around I mean you talk about
8:15
wasted time I mean everybody talks about
8:17
time being so precious and how there's
8:19
not enough labor well you just wasted
8:20
three hours sending a guy back and forth
8:22
to the wholesaler to to get a warranty
8:25
and I can tell you what chances are the
8:27
new one probably probably going to run
8:28
into the same issue well yeah Greg and I
8:31
see yeah I mean I had one one contractor
8:34
call me he put in three different ones
8:36
same job it said did you pull the car to
8:39
GI pulled the card he didn't pull the
8:40
cartridge because we got all three back
8:41
they had thread tape copper fouling they
8:44
had
8:45
um like iron little piece of iron sand
8:48
in them
8:50
all sorts of debris and all three of
8:52
them and you know I wanted to call the
8:54
guy back and say there's no way you you
8:56
clean Yeah clean these out but at the
8:58
end of the day it's like when I think he
9:00
ended up putting a fourth one in and we
9:02
had the rep out there I said you need to
9:04
purge the line to flush
9:06
the line I said I want you to put a
9:09
bucket under the line before you even
9:10
put this PRV back in the unions and I
9:12
want you to blow it off oh look at all
9:15
the stuff that comes out
9:16
yeah that's exactly why you're having
9:20
well guys I mean you got to remember
9:21
we're here with tech support and take
9:24
the time and call us because Cody
9:25
mentioned it by time you take that PRV
9:27
out return it get a new one put it in to
9:30
see the same problem occur we can talk
9:32
you through pulling the cartridge on
9:34
site it's flushing the cartridge right
9:36
there's probably no PRV out there as
9:38
easy to Service as ours flush it out
9:40
clean it out put it back in service and
9:42
we'll save you a return trip and having
9:45
to have Parts because more than likely
9:46
if it's brand new out of the box very
9:49
rarely does something go bad right out
9:50
of the box right and how many parts are
9:52
involved with repairing ours
9:54
one cartridge exactly that's it
9:56
pre-loaded with all the parts so you
9:58
don't have to fight with diaphragms and
10:00
springs and screws and any of that yeah
10:02
exactly yeah and I mean when you when
10:04
you look at the inner workings of a PRV
10:06
I mean it's it's allowing flow or
10:08
allowing fluid past the cartridge in
10:10
order to bring the pressure up on the
10:12
outlet side and and if there is any dirt
10:13
or debris in there it's it's basically
10:15
going to follow up that ceiling element
10:16
at the bottom of the cartridge and if
10:18
that if it can't seal off it's going to
10:20
require more pressure on the downstream
10:22
side to kind of back pressure to help
10:24
seal it off and then sometimes it won't
10:26
seal off at all so you know it's
10:28
especially apparent
10:30
um you know I've had jobs especially new
10:31
construction jobs where they they run a
10:33
new water line and there's all kinds of
10:35
dirt and debris in that new water line
10:36
and then they've got a uh they're you
10:38
know they're basically getting it all
10:39
piped up in the house and you know they
10:41
might be running it during the day but
10:42
then all of a sudden from you know four
10:44
o'clock in the afternoon until the next
10:45
morning nobody's there and it just gives
10:47
it all night to basically you know bring
10:50
that pressure up little by little by
10:52
little and and again all it all it would
10:54
have taken was a cleaning you know a
10:56
simple simple cleaning that would take
10:58
five minutes you know and flush the line
11:00
clean the cartridge flush out the body
11:02
and you're set to go and that's that's a
11:05
you know and that's honestly one of
11:06
those things you can look at as being a
11:08
potential for upsell I mean if you've
11:10
got dirty water I mean that's a that's a
11:12
a strainer a media filter you know
11:14
whatever the case may be at the very
11:16
least a strainer but a you know a good
11:17
cartridge type media filter might not be
11:19
a bad right A Bad Case there either and
11:21
then some type of maintenance program to
11:23
stand behind it yeah exactly yeah get
11:25
your get your feet back in the door
11:26
there and everything like that repeat
11:27
business so
11:29
um the other big one that we run into
11:30
quite a bit is the fact that pressure
11:32
reducing valves uh kind of inadvertently
11:34
they act a bit like a check valve and so
11:37
so they allow water through but they
11:39
don't allow water back I mean unless the
11:42
the cartridge is all full of dirt and
11:43
debris like we talked about before but
11:46
anytime you and you talk about upsell
11:48
and you know getting getting more on
11:51
your tickets and stuff like that the
11:53
fact is anytime you put in a pressure
11:54
reducing valve you need to add an
11:55
expansion tank as well and then that's a
11:58
big one because you know we we've talked
12:00
about this before with other uh other
12:02
chats with expansion tanks is if you
12:04
that water doesn't have anywhere to go
12:06
to go backwards or anything like that
12:07
and you've got a water heater in that
12:09
system that heated water will start to
12:11
expand and it needs a place to go and
12:13
that's where the expansion tanks come
12:14
into play so if you are putting in a PRV
12:17
definitely look into putting in an
12:19
expansion tank or for example if you're
12:21
running into a fluctuating pressures and
12:23
you've already got a PRV and expansion
12:25
tank maybe that expansion tank is
12:26
undersized or maybe it had failed or
12:28
something to that effect sure and that's
12:29
that's a symptom like guys run into all
12:32
the time and we get a phone call well I
12:34
think the PRV PRV is bad
12:36
well no do you have an expansion tank
12:38
well no or yeah I do did you check it is
12:42
it is it waterlogged well I don't know
12:43
or is it too small well how do I size it
12:46
you know so those are all other things
12:48
that kind of lead right people start to
12:50
point at the PRV when it's actually not
12:53
the PRV it's the lack thereof of an
12:55
expansion yeah you'll see you'll see
12:57
that Weeping at the relief valve on the
12:58
water heater and you know in some cases
13:00
that could have that pressure in the
13:03
building because of thermal expansion
13:05
creep higher than even what the inlet
13:06
pressured to the between that to the PRV
13:09
is sure you might have a you know 120
13:11
PSI pressure coming in but because of
13:13
thermal expansion you know that building
13:17
pressure will creep higher and it will
13:19
go off at the relief valve if you don't
13:21
have a pressure
13:22
um sorry an expansion tank in place yep
13:24
or a functional expansion tank right
13:26
maybe it did fail you know they don't
13:29
last forever either and so yeah I mean
13:31
anytime you're you're putting in a
13:32
pressure reducing valve uh definitely uh
13:35
an expansion tank to go along with it
13:36
you know and in most cases I mean a lot
13:39
of these municipalities are getting
13:40
pretty stringent on on their water you
13:43
know once the water's been in your house
13:44
they don't they don't want it back no
13:47
returns yeah and you look there were
13:49
PRVs on the market that had bypasses on
13:52
them yeah yep and I still get questions
13:54
well why do you just have a bypass well
13:57
yeah it's the idea what that bypass is
13:59
is that it if the outlet pressure gets
14:02
higher than the inlet pressure it will
14:04
allow water to flow backwards it's like
14:06
a little check valve it basically allows
14:07
backwards flow but not forwards flow
14:09
through it but with that in mind the
14:11
problem is with that is that it's
14:13
relying on the fact that your outlet
14:14
pressure is higher than your Inlet which
14:16
is funny because the chances you know
14:18
the reason why you have a PRV in the
14:19
first place is because your Inlet
14:20
pressure is too high right and uh and so
14:23
we yeah you're right we do get a lot of
14:24
phone calls about that is how come your
14:27
pressure reducing valve doesn't have a
14:28
bypass valve built into it and it's
14:30
really because it's just completely
14:31
unnecessary and uh you know if you've
14:34
got Inlet pressure higher than 150
14:36
anyways uh you know you're never going
14:39
to get bypass around that pressure
14:40
reducing valve without having the
14:42
pressure relief valve pop on your water
14:43
heater anyways plus your municipalities
14:46
don't want to see water becoming bad it
14:48
could potentially contaminate
14:50
you know the rest of the system yeah
14:52
correct for sure yeah and so I mean
14:54
you're seeing a lot more municipalities
14:56
requiring uh testable backflow
14:58
preventers whether it be double check or
14:59
RP type backflow preventers and and
15:02
again you know inadvertently just kind
15:04
of a nature of the Beast with a PRV it
15:06
it doesn't want to allow water back and
15:09
in a bypass valve really isn't I
15:12
wouldn't call it a feature
15:14
it's something that you you want an old
15:17
school sending water back uh you want to
15:19
you want to keep that water in your
15:20
system so so yeah I mean if if you're
15:22
ever curious about those bypass valves I
15:24
mean there's some other manufacturers
15:25
you can see it in there how the bypass
15:27
valve works but again it's relying on
15:28
the fact that the outlet pressure on the
15:30
PRV is higher than the inlet which in
15:32
most cases doesn't happen that's the
15:34
whole reason why you have a PRV in the
15:35
first place right yeah it's kind of a
15:37
sign that there's another issue for sure
15:39
for sure if you're if you're relying on
15:41
that bypass valve at all yeah I think
15:44
you're doing something wrong right yes
15:46
so yeah but uh but yeah I mean they're
15:48
they're you know that was the number of
15:50
things that we did when we talked about
15:52
um why your plumbing pressure creeps up
15:53
I mean just uh you know to talk about
15:55
all the different reasons why it could
15:57
potentially happen and there's others
15:58
too but but we wanted to hit on those
16:00
the five most common things and you know
16:02
if you guys have questions don't
16:03
hesitate to reach out to us like like
16:05
Dan mentioned before I mean we've talked
16:07
to a lot of different contractors
16:08
Engineers wholesalers uh you know we've
16:11
we've heard about a lot of different
16:12
scenarios and uh and we can definitely
16:14
uh use that information to help you too
16:16
exactly absolutely
16:19
all right well all right well you can
16:21
tune in to the five things you need to
16:24
know on our YouTube channel if you want
16:25
to learn more and hear more from Cody
16:28
um otherwise thanks for joining us thank
16:30
you check it out
16:31
thank you for tuning in if you ever need
16:34
help please feel free to contact our
16:36
tech support team anytime at
16:40
techsupport.uscaleffi.com or call us
16:43
during our business hours at 7 30 a.m to
16:47
4 30 p.m Central Time
16:50
414-238-2360
16:57
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