I think we may have some major plumbing issues, maybe a NAF! situation.

Factual Questions
1

We have a constellation of intermittent symptoms that have arisen over the past few weeks: occasional low water pressure at sinks and shower; very slow/clogged toilet with no obvious cause; two instances of a water slowly leaking through ceiling; small shards of glass/ceramic inside one toilet’s fill valve (had to clear them out because they were keeping the valve open). I don’t know if they’re all related or coincidentally occurring. At this moment we have very low water pressure in all sinks and neither toilet tank is filling.
These issues have arisen slowly over the past couple weeks at least. First we noticed an intermittent lack of pressure at some faucets and a shower.

Then I noticed master bath toilet tank kept on running despite the float cup and arm being raised. I contacted Kohler and they said to take the cap off the fill valve and turn on the water to flush debris. When I took the cap off, I found very small ceramic-like shards. I flushed them out and used tweezers to pull out the rest. The fill problem stopped.

Then we got a ceiling leak, but we thought it might be a spill from an unclosed shower curtain—until it happened again. We checked and there were no obvious signs of spillage upstairs. It wasn’t a lot of water, just a slow drip that amounted at most to a few inches in a bucket before stopping and not returning. The leak is pretty much below the guest bath toilet. It only happened twice, although we have used both mater and guest showers and toilets.

The guest toilet is above the leak and may be acting funny (but we never paid much attention to its tank so this could have been going on for a long time). There are air bubbles rising from the bottom of its fill valve. We found no direct signs of water outside the tank/bowl.

Lastly, the toilet in the master bath (not directly over the leak) just stopped flushing. It’s acting like it’s clogged in that water and waste very slowly drains. But unlike previous clogs, using a plunger has had no effect. I have not yet used a snake on it. It’s a fairly new toilet (year or two old) and one of Kohler’s better models. It has never had a backup/slowdown problem.

We’re on a private well with pressure tanks and a Water Source brand whole-house filter/air injector to remove sulphur. We also have a hot water recirculator, installed by a plumber. It is the kind that works with a timed pump at the hot water tank and a temperature valve under the sink. The timer has been off for the season. I hope that’s all the relevant background.

We have a call in to our plumber, but thought to ask here to see either what we’re likely in for or if there’s anything we can do/check to isolate the cause—or if we should call his ‘emergency’ line. (I wrote all this before noticing that both upstairs toilet tanks weren’t filling—I think that may answer the question of status).

Grateful for any thoughts you may have~

2

It sounds like there is some sort of debris in your water line. (Just call me “Captain Obvious.”) I have no idea where it might be coming from.

But on the tip of most of your faucets there is a little round piece that unscrews. Debris is probably collecting in there and restricting the water flow. (The part is called an aerator.) Unscrew it, take it apart, and clean out any gunk you find in there and see if that solves your low pressure problems.

3

Heh, being a resourceful teen of the 80s, I’d been pretty familiar with aerators as a source of brass screens. When all this first started up I had pulled a couple off hoping to find them clogged, but to no avail. Also changed the diverter and cartridge in the kitchen sink, which seemed to help that–but now it seems it was only coincidental.

Made some further checks; our pressure tanks were minimal. Ended up on the phone with our plumber–he’s going to be here first thing tomorrow morning.

We may be in for a bit of misery.

He’s been here before and did the original interior plumbing. When we was here years ago (unrelated), he told us how hard it was to find water for this house. They had to drill to some absurd depth for the area, and even then the flow was anaemic enough that they had to put in two pressure tanks to maintain flow. So his first impression is that there is an unknown leak somewhere (doubtful; we walked in and around the house and other than the two short-term, small leaks there’s no sign of a tank-depleting quantity of water).

His second off-the-cuff guess, and possibly our best worst-case scenario, is that the pump timer may be on the fritz. It was set up to fill the tanks at night during low usage, so maybe it’s not turning the pump on like it should.

And of course, the worst case scenario is that the well is dry. I have no idea where to begin contemplating the cost of something like that. Is it in the thousands? Tens of thousands? Something that’s generally covered under homeowner’s insurance?

And this leave the leak question pretty much unresolved.

4

Oh dear, that does sound bad.

The toilet not flushing thing makes me think your main vent stack might be blocked, although that wouldn’t be causing any of the other problems.

Good luck to you. Let us know how it turns out.

5

What is a NAF! situation?

6

How old are the pressure tanks? The older conventional tanks were glass lined, however it is rather rare for them to deteriorate and show anything in the water like that.

A leak could be anywhere in the system including in the well.

If you snap some pictures of the area at the pressure tanks I can give you some trouble shooting advice.

What climate are you in?

7

Ditto that. Doing a bit of googling, I see multiple dozens of things that “NAF” might stand for; not obvious which might be meaningful in this context.

8

Perhaps a poltergeist?

9

Side note: In 2007, user Just Some Guy started a thread: Best Way to Survive Falling at Terminal Velocity (Need answer fast). The “need answer fast” caught on immediately—within fifteen minutes, garygnu posted

A Board legend was born. A quick Google search of intitle:“need answer fast” site:straightdope.com yields 2,390 results.

The house was built in 2003, so hopefully these aren’t ‘older’ conventional tanks. We’re in the northeast (downstate New York), so there hasn’t been any significant freeze; we’ve barely had a frost. Turned the main valve off (the plumber’s advice) and so far there is still no pressure in the tanks. He thought the timer was set up to run in the middle of the night, but I’m pretty sure from experience it run (ran) when pressure dropped (e.g. a long time ago someone left a hose on, leaving us with no water in the morning. We caught the error in the morning and had pressure by early afternoon at least).

Plumber should be here in the morning. Hopefully he’ll be able to test things quickly, find out that the timer needs a $3 part, and all will be well. Right?

(Oh, can we take a moment to enjoy the coincidence that my main project at the moment is a report on getting potable water to rural areas in the developing world.)
edit: just to be sure, we turned off all the televisions, instructed our Little Man to head into the light, and checked the swimming pool for unmoved bodies.

10

Your two basic low pressure situations are ‘pump isn’t turning on to make pressure’ and ‘pump is running but can not make pressure’

The first is generally an easy fix. It relates to the pressure switch, a relatively inexpensive part.

The second is more complex. If it can’t make cut out pressure it will continue to run trying. You may want to check your electric bill to see if it’s higher than usual. There could be a leak in the system or the pump could be worn out/plugged up.

A leak on the offset pipe could cause this issue as could a leak in the drop pipe. Their trouble shooting will likely start at pressure checking the drop pipe at the well head. If it can make pressure there, the problem is between the house and the well. If it is between the house and the well the most likely place for it to fail is right next to the well.

The combination of low pressure and heavy sediment is a failure normally seen with systems that have a PVC or steel drop pipe. The drop pipe cracks or rusts through right above the pump. The pump is then pumping water both up the drop pipe and through the leak. So it can’t make pressure due to the leak and sediment is stirred up at the level of the pump from the leak blasting the side of the well.

15 years is about the average for a major component failure.

11

Okay, got it!

12

Wanted to go to sleep, but before I did I trudged down to the basement muttering ‘why am I even bothering’. Grabbed a light, took a look at the tanks and lo, they’re both up to pressure.

It may not be dispositive of anything, but at least I’ll be able to catch a little sleep.

Which I won’t, because on top of this day, I just found a tick, pulled it like a thousand other ticks, but ended up leaving his head inside. Blech. What a day.

13

I don’t yet know what the physical problem is, but the metaphysical cause just dawned on me. My dad has had to work Thanksgiving for the past twelve years, so we’ve generally split the family Thanksgivings between weekends and the actual day. He just retired, so this was going to be our first ‘normal’ thanksgiving with a house full of people from both sides of the family. Ha. Haha. Hahahahahah! Nothing like having water issues the week before.

Plumber was out to take a quick courtesy look and couldn’t immediately tell whether the issue is inside or outside the house.

Pressure dropped again the evening he left, down to about 20PSI. The check was around seven or eight o’clock; I don’t know when it fell. The pressure was back up to about 50PSI around eleven PM or so.
Right now, the tanks are down to about 39/40PSI, right before the pressure switch is supposed to kick on and refill the tanks.

I’ve started keeping a log of time/activity/pressure to see if there’s a pattern. Plus, it gives me some sense that I’m doing something.

On his advice, I’ve been checking to be sure no taps are open/toilets running, going to the tanks and closing the main valve, then slowly re-opening it to see if I can hear water moving through the line. So far I haven’t heard anything, so that’s one strike against there being an internal leak.

We have a Water-Right Impressions sulphur air-injection system that has a recharge/drain line. It’s obvious when it recharges (which is timed to the middle of the night), but our plumber raised the possibility that a valve may be opening a small amount and draining the tanks. I haven’t heard it, but if it’s intermittent I just may not have been there when it did so. I’m going to turn its main valves to bypass for the time being to see if it has any affect. It’s probably a long shot, but the only other possibility I can think of is that there’s an intermittent leak somewhere in the house that is draining somewhere we can’t see. But that’s an absurd long shot.

So if I bypass the sulphur system and the tanks still drop below normal, then from what I gather the issue could be either the pressure switch, an issue with the pump or with the water source—which means a call for him to come back and do some deeper investigating/checking. Getting to the well head to pull up the pump means taking down a fence and driving over a significant portion of the garden, so hopefully there are some things he can do before he has to pull it.

It’s a very deep well given the area (~400’, hence the need for machinery to pull it up). Is there any chance that the periodic rise and fall of pressure makes it less likely to be a water source issue? I know anything is possible, but do underground sources (this is a drilled well, not fractured) tend to ebb and flow like that, or is it more typical that when levels drop they stay dropped?

Yeah. Happy Thanksgiving!

14

Unless it’s an unusually large pump the drop pipe would be some form or plastic. Systems with 3hp or larger pumps will use a steel drop pipe that absolutely requires equipment. Yours shouldn’t require machinery to pull it up, especially just to test it. Just to save my back I’ll use a small wheelbarrow size machine to pull wells over 300ft. 500ft is the cut off for me pulling pumps by hand. Static level(distance to water)certainly plays into my willingness to pull things by hand.

The natural water level in a drilled well does not change dramatically. If the static level is 15 feet one day I’d expect it to be the same 10 years from now. If the water level shows any type of day to day fluctuation undisturbed it’s indication of pretty serious issues.

When the pump runs, depending on the yield of the well it does draw the water level down. Properly engineered the pump can not out pump the wells capacity and there will be a balance between the pumps capacity and the wells yield know as the pumping level. On a typical well file we’d note the well depth, the static level, and the depth the pump is set at. Pumping level is not typically noted on domestic wells as it’s generally not cost effective to establish. Domestic well pumps are typically set x number of feet of the bottom of the well. X is based on the pumps size and the water quality. Pumping level is more important on a commercial well where we plan to run the pump 24/7.

There is a pressure switch on the system. If you are monitoring things it’s much more relevant to pay attention to it’s position. It closes when it reaches 40psi and opens when it reaches 60psi. When it is closed the pump is running.

Is there a check valve at the pressure tanks?

15

I *think *I know where the pressure switch is; I think it’s in a covered grey box where the electric lines and the water lines meet at the pressure tank. I’m not sure how to tell if we have a check valve on the pressure tank.

I think there may be an answer to all this, but my lack of knowledge keeps me from hoping too much.

I fixed an issue with the master bath toilet. Its fill valve had some debris in it that once cleared out stopped it from running constantly.

It seems as if the guest bath may have the same issue. I haven’t taken off the cap just yet to see if it’s caused by debris too (or is merely a coincidentally bad valve), but if both toilets were slowly and constantly drawing water, that could be a reason for the low pressure. Our plumber mentioned that even after drilling that deep they had a very poor flow, hence the two pressure tanks in the basement. So is it possible that two running toilets could deplete the tanks that much?

And where the hell is the water in the ceiling coming from? It’s directly below the guest toilet. The constantly running guest toilet. But I can’t find water on the outside of the guest toilet. Not on the floor, not down by the base, not around the tank–nowhere. Garrggh~

16

Yes the grey box is the pressure switch if you take off the cover you can see 4 contacts. If there is a space between the contacts the pump is off. if the contacts are closed the pump is running.

If the guest bath toilet is running the water is most likely leaking from the wax ring, how the toilet is supposed to seal to the drain pipe. Since it’s common to caulk around the toilet the water follows the drain pipe on the outside and leaks into the floor below. If you clean the valve and stop the toilet from running it will likely solve both problems there but the seal should be redone anyway.

Unless you have some type of re-pressurization pump the tanks are pressure tanks, they are not very good in terms of water storage. They are to control the pumps cycle. More pressure tank capacity makes for a longer pumping cycle which is good for the pump.

Two running toilets can certainly cause the well to be pulled down on a low yielding well and create this entire issue.