Old style 2 handle shower valve.
When the well pump kicks on the shower goes stone cold.
Not fun, better than getting cooked I suppose but would like to fix it.
Will a new shower valve with scald valve fix it?
Or some other gizmo that could be installed in the lines before the fixture so I don’t have to practice my DW texturing in public?
Lines could be accesed in a closet about 6′ from the fixture. My DW skills are better suited to inside the closet.
Joe H
Replies
I'm wondering if it might be simpler to adjust your pressure tank so there isn't such a large differential between full and empty.
How long has it been doing this?
There may be a problem with your water heater if the problem started recently.
That is a puzzler, outside of a pipe blockage all I can think of as a cause is is that your piping is arranged such that there is a big extra loop from the shower to the WH and back again.
My choice would be to rearrange the piping if possible.
Is this a new place in NM??
Art, rearranging the plumbing is what caused it.
Had a kinda temporary kluge that I changed so as to have the pipe in the wall rather than outside. Worked fine til then.
Incoming from well goes past the shower on it's way to pressure tank. T in incoming line from well to shower at that point. Just before P tank incoming line Ts again to the water heater which is next to P tank.
Hot line out of WH goes back into house and shower is first T in the line from WH.
WH & P tank are about 10' from shower fixture.
Seems like incoming from well is much higher pressure than residual in system so forces more cold into T line to shower than what is arriving from the WH?
Don't know what to think, but there's no going back to the original set up that was just temporary so as to have a working shower.
Is this a new place in NM??
No, this is the SOLD place in Utah, kinda need to fix this somehow before escrow closes.
Joe H
Yep, that would do it. both cold and hot whould be downstream of the pressure tank, and HW feed taken of about the same point or earlier than the cold feed to the shower.
Other than expensive fixture, could try a using a globe valve closed 60 to 90% off in the cold feed to the shower to balance pressures.
Edited 7/23/2009 10:37 pm ET by junkhound
Art, globe valve is a ball valve?
I can get within 3' of fixture out to about 7' away, closer better or no? Or no difference?
Joe H
Globe valve is a directional valve that is designed to restrict flow.
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Globe like Bill said. Called a 'globe' valve since the body looks like a round globe, vs. a disk like a gate valve or just straight like a ball valve.
Globe valve is easier to adjust to restrict flow, does not matter where you put it in the cold line to the shower.
A new pressure-balancing shower valve would fix the problem (doesn't have to have anti-scald). It can be really tricky installing one through the finished wall of the shower, but it can be done. It's essential to get yourself a remodelling plate - it allows you to cut a large enough hole to install the valve, and then cover it up.
I've done this a couple of times. The 2nd time I fished pex through the wall to connect the new valve to the old copper, as I ran out of room to solder the joints. Another possibility would be to connect the new valve to the old pipe with a Shark Bite fitting, again avoiding soldering in a confined space.
Simply installing a partially-closed valve upstream won't provide any dynamic balancing.
Regards,
Tim