repurposing a well pressure tank

[ed_v]

I recently had to replace my well pressure tank. After I remove the bladder, any ideas on a cool project I could use it for?

Thanks,

Ed

 

[koditten]

How are you getting the bladder out?

I got a spent one, too. I just last week changed out a 20 gallon one and was wondering as well what to do with the old tank.

I don't think using it as any type of pressure vessel is likely. Those walls are stupic thin to begin with and if water over pressurized, you just get a big leak. Do that with and gasses and you could have a dangerous condition. As you know there is no port for a relief valve.

About the only thing I could imagine is to make it into a lawn roller or some sort of red neck grill.

In all probability, mine is going to the scrap yard after I fill it full of bullet holes.

 

[rslaback]

I made one into a rolling waste oil drum. Mine was a fiberglass tank. I pulled out the bladder then fastened a fuel hose and spout to the bottom fitting. The tank I was using has a plastic bulkhead that has the air valve in it and when you take that off it has a 4" diameter hole.

Oil goes in the 4" hole. When it is full you bolt the head back on, pressurize it a bit and the air pressure will pump the oil out the hose.

 

[Kevin54]

how do you know when one goes bad? I've never been around one that has went bad. Does your pressure go up in the house, or do you lose all pressure? I was always under the impression that the pressure tank is use to control high pressure and it brings the pressure down for the house. I know that it works in conjunction with your pressure switch. Our outside hydrant has hellish pressure when it is coming directly off of the pump.

 

[koditten]

Usually you will see it in your electric use first. The well pump will short cycle, sending the electric bill up quite a bit.

First you can try to repressurize it, but I've never had one start working again after it failed.

 

[22george]

l cut the side out of my old one and used it as a holding tank for cutting fluid for my horizontal band saw

 

[Kevin54]

Usually you will see it in your electric use first. The well pump will short cycle, sending the electric bill up quite a bit.

First you can try to repressurize it, but I've never had one start working again after it failed.

So if one goes bad, does the pressure go up in the house, or does it go down when you turn a faucet on?

 

[ed_v]

So if one goes bad, does the pressure go up in the house, or does it go down when you turn a faucet on?

Your pressure switch will let you know when the tank goes bad.

Ed

 

[Hey Old Man!]

When you pressure tank "fails" you may or may not know it from looking at the tank. The tank could rupture, spilling water all over the floor, this would be obvious. What might not be so obvious, and is far more common is that the bladder inside the tank has failed. First, most tanks sold today have a lower chamber, where the water goes in and out and an upper chamber where there is an air charge set about 2 psi lower than the cut in pressure on your pressure switch, which turns your pump on and off. When the bladder fails, eventually the tank completely fills with water. Water has several unique features, one of which is that it can not be compressed. Once the tank is filled with water and you open the tap, the pressure quickly falls to the pump cut in (on) pressure causing the pump to run, which quickly fills the small draw on the tank, and the pump shuts off. This is what's known as short cycling. You still have water in tap but every time you turn on the tap the pump starts and as soon as you turn off the tap the pump stops. The easy way to tell if the bladder has failed is to depress the stem in the tire valve you find at the top of the tank, if you get water instead of air, the bladder has failed, replace the tank, there is no repair (residential only). Hope this helps.

 

[Charles (in GA)]

A blown bladder will cause the entire tank to fill with water. When this happens, there is no "cushion" and no air pressure to drive the water into the system. The pump will hammer on and off fairly rapidly because the pressure will fall off to nothing almost instantly after the pump shuts off (water being non-compressible). A tank that has air, but the pressure is low will cause the pump to short cycle, but not near the rapidity of a waterlogged tank, and a tank whose pressure is too high will cause the water to flow good till the tank is completely empty, bladder fully expanded, and suddenly the pressure will drop to nothing for a split second while the pressure switch cycles the pump on.

If you need to reset the pressure in a bladder tank, you need to turn off the pump and open one or more faucets in the system. Put air pressure in the tank and keep checking until the pressure is steady at 2 psi below the pump switch cut in pressure. It is necessary for the faucet to remain open so the bladder can force out any water in the tank and fully expand. When done. close the faucet and turn the pump breaker back on.

The link is a good discussion on doing this, and much more.

http://inspectapedia.com/water/Water_Tank_Bladder_Adjust.htm

Charles

 

[Ed ke6bnl]

Mine has been in service for the past 29 years BUt you can tap the outside of the tank and the lower half will sound hollow and the top will be a thud when the bladder goes the whole tank will have a thud sound as it is all filled with water. I have been told.

 

[zkling]

Forge, smoker, BBQ?

 

[scrumpy]

Kevin, it has very little to do with pressure in the long run. The pump switch is set to turn on at a low pressure and off at a higher pressure. The bladder tank is used to provide a storage of water and pressure. So as the tank fills the pressure against the bladder will go up ans compress the air in the bladder. Then when the tank hits the high pressure the pump shuts off. The bladder will continue to provide water while the pump is off until it hits the low limit again. This slows the cycling of the pump. If the bladder fails there is no longer any storage and the pump short cycles very quickly as water doesn't compress. Hope that helps.

Scrump

 

[Kevin54]

Kevin, it has very little to do with pressure in the long run. The pump switch is set to turn on at a low pressure and off at a higher pressure. The bladder tank is used to provide a storage of water and pressure. So as the tank fills the pressure against the bladder will go up ans compress the air in the bladder. Then when the tank hits the high pressure the pump shuts off. The bladder will continue to provide water while the pump is off until it hits the low limit again. This slows the cycling of the pump. If the bladder fails there is no longer any storage and the pump short cycles very quickly as water doesn't compress. Hope that helps.

Scrump

Now don't take this as me being a smartass, as I honestly don't know, but if it doesn't have anything to do with pressure, why is it called a pressure tank, and why does the outside hydrant have so much more pressure than anything in the house. I'm not talking about a hose bib, but I'm taking about the hydrant that we have right beside the well.

Like I said above, I was always told the pressure tank was used to regulate the pressure in the house, and bring the pressure down to a manageable pressure. I do know that if a house has low pressure, a pressure switch can be changed somewhat, but should never exceed 60lbs, and most are factory set at 40lbs.

I'm also wondering now if the pressure tank, which has been in since the house was built (1988) may be where I am getting rust particles in our whole house filter. Maybe 10 years ago, maybe a little less, I noticed rust particles, or more likely rust flakes in the whole house filter. On plumber said that our pump was sitting too close to the bottom of the well and I should bring it up some. Our well is 125' deep. He came over one evening after work, we pulled the pump, and we cut maybe 25' off of the tubing. Our well had 60' of water in it, so we are still close to being in 35' to 40' of water. But it never took care of the rust flakes. I'm wondering now if it may not be coming from the inside of the pressure tank. I may just have to get me a plumber out here to check things out now.

 

[madoc1]

kevin, rust is a good sign you may have a bad pressure tank. that is how we figured out mine was bad.

jim

 

[scrumpy]

Kevin,

Without knowing I am guessing the hydrant has the same pressure but has more volume if it is hooked to the well. The pipe at the pump is usually 1.5 inches. Your house is .75 and taps are .5 inches. Your pump will push at possibly a higher pressure while it is running to fill the tank. The tank and the system are limited to the pressure setpoint max and the ability to flow through the smaller piping. A 3/4 pipe flows 125% more than a 1/2. Plus you need to account for loss over the length while it is open and running. The hydrant is on a larger pipe and a much shorter run.

scrump

 

[Richard Cranium]

Kevin, the easiest way to tell is look for the valve stem (like your car tire) let just a little out, it you get water it is bad, if you get air you are fine. Just enough to either hear air or see water is all you need to do.
How about making a lawn roller for your yard to get the night crawler humps out with the old tank...Rich

 

[Kevin54]

Well after hearing what Madoc1 said, now I'm a little worried. I guess I'll crawl under the house to see if the tank has water or air.

Now I have another question.....why all of the different sizes in pressure tanks?

To the OP, my deepest apologies. I don't mean to hijack your thread. I will start another thread of my own so that I am not hijacking. And again, you have my apologies sir

 

[larry_g]

Like I said above, I was always told the pressure tank was used to regulate the pressure in the house, and bring the pressure down to a manageable pressure. I do know that if a house has low pressure, a pressure switch can be changed somewhat, but should never exceed 60lbs, and most are factory set at 40lbs.

The tank does not regulate the pressure. It modulates it, or accumulates it. The tank has air over water. Think of the air as a spring. When the pressure in the system reaches cut-in of the switch the tank is nearly empty of water and full of air. As the pump starts to pump water is forced into the tank, filling it with water, and compressing the air till the system is at cut-off pressure. So now you have a tank with a volume of water in it with pressured air above it. Now you can fill a sink, flush a toilet, do the dishes all on the water in the tank without the pump kicking on. Once you have used enough water from the tank that it drops to a level where the pressure in the tank is at cut-in then the pump kicks on and refills the tank and the cycle repeats.

So the pressure tank is really an accumulator that prevents the pump from cycling each time you get a glass of water.

lg
no neat sig line

 

[scrumpy]

Ok getting back to the original question - with Halloween around the corner this could still be a garage project. Just from a well pressure vessel.
www.instructables.com/id/Propane-Bottle-Jack-o-lantern.

 

[Carguy99]

i cut mine in half( you can see it poking up) and made a natural gas fire pit. came out very nice.

 

[Charles (in GA)]

The tank does not regulate the pressure. It modulates it, or accumulates it. The tank has air over water. Think of the air as a spring. When the pressure in the system reaches cut-in of the switch the tank is nearly empty of water and full of air. As the pump starts to pump water is forced into the tank, filling it with water, and compressing the air till the system is at cut-off pressure. So now you have a tank with a volume of water in it with pressured air above it. Now you can fill a sink, flush a toilet, do the dishes all on the water in the tank without the pump kicking on. Once you have used enough water from the tank that it drops to a level where the pressure in the tank is at cut-in then the pump kicks on and refills the tank and the cycle repeats.

So the pressure tank is really an accumulator that prevents the pump from cycling each time you get a glass of water.

lg
no neat sig line

^^^^

Saves me from typing the same thing, Its just a hydraulic system. Fluid is in-compressible, if you don't want the pump cycling every few seconds, you have to store, under pressure, a quantity of fluid, and then be able to push it out into the system as its needed.

Kevin needs to spend some time on Youtube.

 

[LennyTheLizard]

I wanted to respond about a subject that I actually understood, but Larry_G gave the perfect explanation already.

That being said, I have a tank sitting on my back porch for the last three months that I just can't seem to throw away, but haven't figured a way to re-purpose yet. I like Gerry's Oil burner on youtube, but this unit is just not cut out (too thin steel).