I moved in about a month ago to a 1920's duplex. Most of the plumbing was re-done when the house was gutted in the '90s, and there was an addition added (with PEX plumbing, incidentally) in 2001. When we bought the house the addition had been winterized. I've de-winterized it and now have a few problems. Firstly, the tub in the full bath will often sputter and spray air when you first turn it on. Also, the sink in the same bathroom will sometimes sputter and have grey, bubbly water come out of it. Now, even worse, there's -no- water pressure at all to the cold water in that sink. The hot is still flowing (and was sputtering air again tonight) but you turn on the cold and there's no air, no nothing. The other fixtures in that bathroom, however, are working fine currently. Any suggestions on what could be causing all the air in the lines, or what could be keeping my water from flowing tonight?

THanks,
Eric

Incidentally, I'm on city water, and the addition to the house (where the problems are) is on the ground floor, and gets its water from a line in the main part of the house (only 1 feed in from the street). There are -no- problems with the main part of the house.

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Originally Posted by efierke

I moved in about a month ago to a 1920's duplex. most of the plumbing was re-done when the house was gutted in the '90s, and there was an addition added (with PEX plumbing, incidentally) in 2001. When we bought the house the addition had been winterized. I've de-winterized it and now have a few problems. Firstly, the tub in the full bath will often sputter and spray air when you first turn it on. Also, the sink in the same bathroom will sometimes sputter and have grey, bubbly water come out of it. Now, even worse, there's -no- water pressure at all to the cold water in that sink. The hot is still flowing (and was sputtering air again tonight) but you turn on the cold and there's no air, no nothing. The other fixtures in that bathroom, however, are working fine currently. Any suggestions on what could be causing all the air in the lines, or what could be keeping my water from flowing tonight?

THanks,
Eric

Incidentally, I'm on city water, and the addition to the house (where the problems are) is on the ground floor, and gets its water from a line in the main part of the house (only 1 feed in from the street). There are -no- problems with the main part of the house.

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Hi Eric,
It's for sure you have a problem in the Pex system, I hope they installed a shutoff on the Pex branch to the addition. You may have two separate problems. Let me address the lack of water first.Turn off the water to the lavatory and open up the valve. One handle or two knobs? If one handle, shut the water off to the tap and dismantle the tap and pull the cartridge. Check the inlet ports for any trash or debris that may be built up. If two knobs, shut the water off to the hot side and dismatle the tap. Shine a light down in the open tap body and check the seat for any thing that may be blocking the flow. Now I want you to place a pan over the open tap to prevent splash and turn on the water shut off valves, (or if you have shut the entire house down, turn on the water, count to thirty and turn it off) there should be a full stream coming out of the open valve body.. What you are doing is flushing the supply line and the open tap body. Do that and see if it doesn't help get water back. Get back to me with the results. Regards, Tom

I pulled the supply line off and still no water, I went up into the attic to have a look around (yes, the lines are in the -attic-) found them, discovered that they were at least insulated. Came down and the water was working all the sudden. When I cleaned out the areater after the water came on it looked like there were a few copper filings in it. Not anywhere enough to cause a -complete- but, could have been a factor. I'm still wondering about the occasional air in the lines though - any help on that would be appreciated.

ERic

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Originally Posted by efierke

I pulled the supply line off and still no water, I went up into the attic to have a look around (yes, the lines are in the -attic-) found them, discovered that they were at least insulated. Came down and the water was working all the sudden. When I cleaned out the areater after the water came on it looked like there were a few copper filings in it. Not anywhere enough to cause a -complete- but, could have been a factor. I'm still wondering about the occasional air in the lines though - any help on that would be appreciated.

ERic

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Good morning Eric,
Glad you got your pressure back. About the air in your pipes, I came across this on the net that may be interesting.
Air in the Pipes
There are only two ways I know of to get the air out; push it out by increasing the water velocity (speed), or open the pipe and release the air.

To push the air out you need to temporarily increase the water velocity to the point the water "sweeps" out the air bubbles. To increase the velocity you need to turn on as many water outlets as possible. That creates a high water demand and the water velocity goes way up. As the water rushes through the pipe the trapped air is swept along with it and out of the pipe.

If the air is in the irrigation mainline (a mainline is the pipe upstream of the circuit control valves) you should be able to increase the velocity by manually opening two or more of the circuit valves at once. Most valves can be manually opened by twisting a lever under the valve's solenoid (the thing the wires go into), or by partially unscrewing a bleed screw on top of the valve. Do not remove the bleed screw, just slowly turn it until the valve opens. Open all of the valves at the same time if you need to. Let the water run for a while to give it a chance to push all the air out. When you close the valves close them one at a time. Closing them all at once can cause a pressure surge that can damage your irrigation system. Don't be surprised if the valves don't close when you manually tell them to, this is fairly normal when more than one valve is opened at the same time. If the valves won't close when you tell them to, slowly turn off the main water supply to the irrigation system, wait one minute, then slowly turn it back on. They should now be closed.

If the noise only occurs when an individual sprinkler valve (always the same valve) is opened the air may be in the lateral pipe (the pipe downstream of the valve.) In that case you will need to temporarily remove some of the sprinkler heads on that valve circuit in order to increase the water velocity. Remove the 3 sprinkler heads furthest from the valve and then open the valve to flush out the air. If that doesn't get it out try removing more sprinklers. After the air is flushed out, put the sprinkler heads back on. If that fixes the problem temporarily but it returns after the next time you irrigate, then the problem is that the water is draining out of the pipes through the sprinkler heads after each irrigation. This is probably because one or more sprinkler heads are lower than the others. When the water drains out, air gets back into the pipes. To prevent this you need to install "anti-drain check valves" at the inlet of each sprinkler head. The anti-drain check valve is a small spring-loaded check valve. The check valve holds back the water so it doesn't drain out. It does not effect the performance of the sprinkler head noticeably. Many sprinkler heads are available with this feature built-in to the sprinkler. Some brands also have retrofit kits available that allow the check valves to be easily installed in existing sprinklers. The built-in anti-drain check valves do not effect the performance of the sprinkler at all.

If the air is in your household pipes try turning on all the faucets in the house and then flush all the toilets. Again, give it a few minutes to push that air out. If you know where the water supply comes into your house turn off the faucets starting with the one closest to the water supply entry point, then close them one at a time moving away from the entry point. As you come to a toilet when you are moving through the house turning off faucets, flush it again, then wait two minutes before closing the next faucet. Don't forget the faucets on the outside of the house!

If the above procedures didn't get the air out...

If the air can't be pushed out you will need to find where it is stuck in the pipe and "open the pipe" to release it. Air rises above water, so the air is likely trapped in a high spot in the piping. Try to visualize how your irrigation system or house plumbing is laid out. Are there any obvious high points where air might be trapped? Often in house plumbing there is a high point right after the water heater. If you can identify a likely high point turn off the main water shut-off valve and open a faucet or valve to release the water pressure. Then cut the pipe at the high point and install a compression tee on it with a small valve on the tee outlet. A 1/2" valve, or even a smaller one if you can find one, will work fine. Do not use a gate valve! Gate valves tend to leak easily. Ball valves work good. See the drawing below. The valve needs to be on a short nipple, a few inches above the pipe as shown. (Stop snickering, in the plumbing business a nipple is the name of a short length of pipe. If you really like to giggle at odd names read the glossary.) Close the faucet and turn the water back on. The air will rise to the highest point which is the short upright nipple under the valve. You can then open the valve just a little bit to let the air escape. Some water is going to come out too, so be prepared for it to squirt! After releasing the air put a plug in the outlet of the valve for safety.




Sometimes you will get all the air out and everything will be fine for a while, then without warning, the air noise will return. This is because the water coming into your house sometimes has air trapped in it. Have you ever filled a glass of water from the kitchen faucet and noticed it was a milky white color? But after sitting for a while it turns clear. That white color most likely was caused by tiny bubbles of air in the water (at least I hope it was!) This air can get in the water lots of ways, it is fairly normal and doesn't by itself mean your water is polluted or not drinkable. But this air does tend to rise out of the water when the water is sitting in your pipes, and it can form an air pocket in the pipe after a while. This causes the wonderful air noise you enjoy so much to return. If this happens often you can add a "continuous venting" type air vent in place of the valve in the drawing above. The air vent needs to be the type that releases air while under pressure. The type of air vents that are made for most irrigation systems will not work. The type you want has a float connected to an arm that uses a lever to open and close a small valve that allows the air to escape. The correct vent type is often called an "air eliminator" or "air relief valve." Look for that term "continuous venting". Most plumbing supply stores will have one. A 1/4" size one should work fine.
Hope this helps, Tom