Anyone have experience with well water tanks?

I lived in an older home several years ago and the water pressure was really low. Put in a new pump and tank and still had no pressure so I plumbed the whole house with PVC. The original metal pipes were full of rust. I had a 1 foot length of pipe that I cut out that you could not see daylight through. It was completely full of scale but the water had made a small channel up and down through the pipe where it was not a straight shot through.

I don't think that the bigger tank will help much with water pressure. Do you have the pressure switch set to around 40/60 instead of 20/40?

Yes I bumped it up to 40/60 and MAYBE I noticed a little?

All the reading I've done online the bigger tank will give me the set pressure longer...kinda obvious...right now you can be in the middle of a shower and as soon as the tank empties and the pump cuts on your water press drops to nil.

Maybe I'm looking for project that doesn't need to be done?

Like I don't have enuff to do already.

as I said before, I have no experience at all with wells and tanks...but I do have experience with pressurized fluids and can tell you that in order to maintain a steady pressure, there has to be airspace above the fluid...

fluids aren't really compressible, so they don't stay pressurized...there is almost always a gas (air) that is actually being compressed along with the fluid and that is what allows a relatively steady pressure...

so yes, a larger tank would hold pressure steady longer as long as there was more airspace in it as well as water....


ETA: I know this is probably more than you wanted to hear, but it may give you some insight as to how the entire system works...

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whenever I would drain it

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Stupid question, but it's best I go ahead and ask anyway. When you say drain "it", do you mean drain the tank or drain the bladder?

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the first water out after re-filling would always bring crap

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Can you describe that "crap"? Color? Consistency? Anything to indicate the bladder is crapping out?

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Stupid question, but it's best I go ahead and ask anyway. When you say drain "it", do you mean drain the tank or drain the bladder

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I should say turn water off to the house...maybe to clean a faucet head or replace the pump maybe. Turn breaker off to the pump...open a faucet and let the pressure off the system.

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Can you describe that "crap"? Color? Consistency? Anything to indicate the bladder is crapping out?

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Some sediment...as in sand or fine dirt. The water would have a reddish / brown tint. I surmised the bladder would drain and then when I turned the pump back on it would get fresh water from the well splashing down in bottom of bladder and and stirring up the shite in the bottom of the bag...does that sound right?

I took a sample to a local well water store to test and they said it is manganese. We continue to get sediment/sand/dirt come thru the lines and get caught in the faucet screens, washing machine screens and our tankless heater screens. Not a lot...but enuff for me to want to install some kind of filter system coming out of the well...of after the pump...whatever is recommended.


ETA....mostly sand I would say...to be honest I havnt looked THAT closely...but it's sand

I shouldn't say when the tank is empty....when the pressure drops to its cut on limit...you can feel the shower pressure slowly dwindle and then the pump cuts on and your like hey!!! Water.

Now when I say it dwindles its not a trickle, it's enough to shower but its not optimal in any way I should say. The wife complains... how's that for a finite answer.

I have a question. I've noticed that when someone is running the water in my house my pump cuts on and off alot. I don't think it's normal. It will turn on for 20 seconds then turn off for 20 back and forth. Is that Normal? I've never had a problem with water pressure though.

I see to separate and unrelated issues occurring simultaneously.

PRESSURE: You lack a proper air gap in your tank or bladder is hardened, or tank is waterlogged. (I'm betting on hardened)

SEDIMENT: The sand screen at the bottom of the well pipe has given out.


1) Pressure Issue:
Liquids (water) do not compress. Air does compress. The compressed air at the top of your pressure tank is what gives you water pressure, regardless of the size of the tank. If you had a plain galvanized tank, then the obvious culprit would be that your air pocket in the tank is gone and you need to get some air in there. However, you have a bladder tank.

I'm going to recommend you check the air pressure in the top of the tank. If you check it and water comes out, then there is your problem…a waterlogged tank. Change out the tank. If no water comes out, then adjust the air pressure as needed (add air if the pressure is more than 2 psi below the pump cut-in pressure / release air if the pressure is 2 psi above the pump cut-in pressure)

But if I had to bet money, I'm going to suspect is that since you have a documented high manganese level, that the manganese has coated the interior surface of the bladder, hardening the bladder leaving it inflexible. This will give the very symptom you're describing. Only course of action in this situation is, again, to replace the tank. I'd go with a larger tank.

A larger tank won't necessarily give you more pressure, but the increased surface area of a larger bladder stay flexible for more years in the presence of elevate manganese.


2) Sediment Issue:
The well screen is partly compromised, plain and simple. You can try the filtration route, but you will be changing filters on a very regular basis. Two alternate approaches.
A) Pull the well case and install a new screen ($$), or
B) rig-up a sediment trap.

Sediment Trap:
This is a piece of Aggie-engineering that I helped a guy develop. He had the same problem you do. We installed an old water heater tank in the water line (I don't recall if we put it before or after the pressure tank). Most of the sand from the well would settle in the "sediment" tank before moving on. He then had a filter in his house that captured any remaining sand.

A couple times a month, he would open the drain valve at the bottom of his "sediment tank" and blow out the accumulated sand. Worked like a charm, however, that was fairly coarse sand.

You probably ought to just install a filter for starters to see just how much sediment is coming through, and only do a sediment trap if the filter is having to be changed more often than you want to frick with.

Hope this isn't TMI. Keep us posted on how this develops.