Plumbers in the house?

House was built with some ridiculous fire sprinkler system. The system is designed to always have fresh water in the lines- I guess fire gives a shit if you give it stale water.

I am on a well with a 1hp pump, hydrant at the well casing. Line runs into the basement feeding a 82 gallon pressure tank. From the pressure tank, the line feeds a 400 gallon storage tank plumbed to a 5hp booster pump. From there, a main line basically runs the perimeter of the basement, with Ts off to the sprinklers, faucets, and toilets.

It seems to me that using 6 total hp to feed water to the house is a bit silly, as well as expensive when the electricity is factored in. If i flush the toilet, the booster pump runs for 2-3 minutes. The pressure tank is pretty much pointless, as it is only pressurizing the hydrant and the line to the float valve. (No hydrant and a switched float would have made more sense.

Any way I can get away with re plumbing all this crap? I dont mind flushing the sprinklers from time to gime, but this seems to be done a bit stupid.seems that i could T off of the line coming from the pressure tank, feed my faucets/toilets, and not impact the sprinklers. Maybe leave an outside faucet connected to that apparatus so i can flush it.

A 5hp pump is about the size of a big block motor. There's no way you have something that moves 5000 plus gallons an hour to flush a toilet.

Maybe it's 1/5th hp?

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Originally Posted by Wulf202

A 5hp pump is about the size of a big block motor. There's no way you have something that moves 5000 plus gallons an hour to flush a toilet.

Maybe it's 1/5th hp?

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Well, i can look tomorrow to be sure. I would say it is in the neighborhood of 80lbs, keeping the water pressure in the house at 60psi.

ETA: the motor is about the same size as the one on my buddies 80 gallon compressor. Louder too.

Here's a video. This is from flushing a toilet. I get about 10 seconds of noise free water out of the kitchen sink before this thing kicks in.

I am not a plumber. I do not have a sprinkler system in my house.

My house has a 1600 gallon cistern that gravity flows to my shallow well pump into a 20 gallon pressure tank. From the pressure tank, it feeds the faucets and such. I believe it is a one horse power pump. When the toilet is flushed, it will kick on for about 10 seconds or so. Running a faucet and it only kicks on after about two gallons of water are used.

If the water runs from the well to the pressure tank, then to a holding tank, it sounds like they are out of order. The booster pump should only need to kick on if there is a major drop in pressure. With an 82 gallon pressure tank, the booster pump should not need to kick on at all.

From my understanding, you need a pump from the well to a holding tank, a pump into the pressure tank to pressurize the system, then through the booster pump to the rest of the system.

Like I said, I am not a plumber. You will also need a backflow prevented between the storage tank and pressure tank.

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Originally Posted by encorehunter

I am not a plumber. I do not have a sprinkler system in my house.

My house has a 1600 gallon cistern that gravity flows to my shallow well pump into a 20 gallon pressure tank. From the pressure tank, it feeds the faucets and such. I believe it is a one horse power pump. When the toilet is flushed, it will kick on for about 10 seconds or so. Running a faucet and it only kicks on after about two gallons of water are used.

If the water runs from the well to the pressure tank, then to a holding tank, it sounds like they are out of order. The booster pump should only need to kick on if there is a major drop in pressure. With an 82 gallon pressure tank, the booster pump should not need to kick on at all.

From my understanding, you need a pump from the well to a holding tank, a pump into the pressure tank to pressurize the system, then through the booster pump to the rest of the system.

Like I said, I am not a plumber. You will also need a backflow prevented between the storage tank and pressure tank.

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This is kinda what i was thinking. If they had the pressure tank on the other side of the storage, at least I could wash my hands before the thing kicks on. However, this would make the hydrant useless, and the p-tank is currently managing the well pump.

If they would have put the p-tank after the storage/booster, then plumbed hydrant back out, we would probably be ok. As it stands, the booster runs constantly when water is on.

I would prefer to make the sprinklers almost standalone if possible. The electricity bill shows that it is not currently a good configuration. I hope i can just plumb out the fixtures separately from the fire system.

My pump would constantly run until I figured out the bladder was ruptured in the pressure tank. Once I got the replaced, the system worked a lot better, with the pump only running part of the time.
The problem with sprinkler systems, they need to be flushed if they dont have flowing water. It is usually done annually, this keeps the sediment from blocking sprinklers.

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Originally Posted by encorehunter

My pump would constantly run until I figured out the bladder was ruptured in the pressure tank. Once I got the replaced, the system worked a lot better, with the pump only running part of the time.
The problem with sprinkler systems, they need to be flushed if they dont have flowing water. It is usually done annually, this keeps the sediment from blocking sprinklers.

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I would guess that the well pump is alternating fine, as everything is brand new (new build). Its the booster pump that is running constantly, and it draws enough that the lights dim when it kicks on.

Do you have enough pressure and flow before the pump to feed your house without a booster?

I can't watch the video. Probably my phone

I wouldn't move the tee for the domestic supply before the pump but rather add bypass type valving so you can select booster or not (3 valves) in case company uses the water pressure or resale or whatever

With the appropriate check valve you should be able to do that part easy enough but the booster needs to stay on the fire sprinklers without restrictions ovbiously and those pumps not running can cause a flow restriction which may be all you need to get around for filling a toilet. Assuming your pressure before the pump is close to 60 psi.

If the pressure is acceptable for you but not for the sprinklers i think I'm reading your description right you'd have to do another main run around the perimeter of the basement of gravity fed and cut in the supplies you want to that. You could go all fancy and bring in each home run to near the pump and manifold the whole damned house. Then you could get into flow switches and automation. Really just depends on your imagination budget and needs

There's also the option of changing to a dry or glycol sprinkler but since it's already built that wouldn't be cheap

Dune crazy and evil rhino are the resident pipe masters

I did confirm the pump at 5hp. Have a 1hp pump in the ground.

Looking like i need a backflow valve inline to the storage tank, then valving off to smaller lines to feed the sinks/toilets/tubs.