Where Is the Water Heater Pressure Relief Valve?
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If you&#;ve been noticing any issues with your water heater pressure relief valve, then you need to know where it is on your water heater. Usually, you can find it on the top or side of this appliance. The valve connects to a plastic or metal discharge tube that runs down the side of the tank.
The water heater pressure is already installed when you receive your water heater (or buy a home that has one already). It&#;s actually welded onto the tank; you&#;ll see a threaded inlet where it is.
You can&#;t replace or remove it. The valve itself has been screwed into the threaded inlet.
This is for safety reasons. Everything has been done according to standards that have been mandated by plumbing codes. So if you&#;re having any issues with the valve, you&#;ll have to call a professional to have it fixed.
This said, if you&#;re only having issues with the discharge tube, this is easy to replace. You won&#;t have to drain your water heater, and you can deal with it yourself.
This said, considering that there might be other issues causing discharge tube problems&#;issues connected to high water pressure or temperature&#;it&#;s safest to have a professional deal with this too.
Testing Relief Valves
If you suspect there&#;s a problem with your water heater pressure relief valve, you can do a test. This is actually a good idea if you don&#;t have any problems at all, as this type of maintenance will protect your water heater&#;and yourself.
Remember before you do the testing to change into closed-toed shoes so that you can avoid scalding.
To get started, identify where the relief valve shut off is. Usually, you can find it upon the cold water feed, which is on top of the water tank, on the right side where the inlet is.
Once you&#;ve done this, take a look at the discharge tube to make sure that it&#;s attached firmly. Then, take a bucket and put it under the discharge tube.
Now, pull the metal lever of the valve slightly, so that a small amount of the water&#;a quarter cup or so&#;discharges into the bucket.
Finally, release the level so that it quickly snaps into the original position. If it doesn&#;t snap quickly into this original position, then your water heater valve isn&#;t working and needs to be replaced.
Fixing Your Water Heater Pressure Relief Valve
When your water heater pressure relief valve isn&#;t functioning properly, it&#;s usually for one of two reasons. It either sticks so that it doesn&#;t properly open or close, or it has a leak, which means that it&#;s continually dripping, lowering your water pressure.
Fixing a Sticky Valve
If your valve is sticky, then it becomes stuck in a closed (downward) or open (extended position). If it&#;s closed, then the valve won&#;t be able to relieve the heat or pressure that builds up in the closed water heater system. There could be a rupture as a result.
If it&#;s open, on the other hand, then it will continuously leak water, which could end up flooding your home.
Sometimes, you can easily fix this problem by opening and closing the valve lever a few times. However, if it continues to stick, then you&#;ll need to replace it.
For more Pressure Test Valveinformation, please contact us. We will provide professional answers.
Fixing a Pressure Relief Valve Leaking
Your water heater is leaking? Make sure that it doesn&#;t come from the valve before replacing it. If your pressure relief valve is leaking, then this may be because it isn&#;t seated properly in the tank&#;s threaded opening. This is quite a common issue if you&#;ve recently replaced your old valve with a new one.
To fix this issue with this cause, you have to take several steps.
A Note on Safety
If a water pressure issue is what is causing the water heater pressure relief valve to not work, then it might be dangerous for you to change the valve yourself. Generally speaking, it&#;s a good idea to hire a professional to protect yourself.
Water heater pressure relief valve can leak and break your hot water tank.
The slanted seat check valve also offers enhanced resistance to water hammer. The valve has a double eccentric shaft position as well as an increased seating angle. This yields a shorter valve stroke, thus reducing the time taken for the door to close.
Hydraulic dampers are recommended, especially when the valves are installed on a pumping station where high frequency opening and closing of the valve is required. The valve disc closes quickly over the first 85% of its angular travel before meeting the hydraulic damper. The damper then dissipates the kinetic energy of the disc and forces it to open slightly. The disc closes until it contacts the damper again and this cushions the disc until it returns to its fully closed position, sealing the valve. This function greatly reduces the onset of water hammer due to the damped and controlled method of valve closure.Hydraulic dampers are recommended, especially when the valves are installed on a pumping station where high frequency opening and closing of the valve is required. The valve disc closes quickly over the first 85% of its angular travel before meeting the hydraulic damper. The damper then dissipates the kinetic energy of the disc and forces it to open slightly. The disc closes until it contacts the damper again and this cushions the disc until it returns to its fully closed position, sealing the valve. This function greatly reduces the onset of water hammer due to the damped and controlled method of valve closure.
For more details, please see our slanted seat check valve product information.
Nozzle check valves are designed with the valve disc connected to the stem which is guided on the central horizontal axis. A spring is positioned between the disc and the diffuser sleeve. When flow enters the valve, the hydraulic force exerted onto the front face reacts against the spring, causing the spring to compress and allow the valve to open. When the flow stops, the spring forces the disc to return to the closed position.
Due to the spring-assisted closure and the short linear valve stroke, the nozzle check valve is one of the quickest acting check valves available and is commonly used in pumped systems where water hammer is a potential concern. Because the disc is constantly in the direct line of flow, the head loss characteristics of this valve are higher compared to that of conventional swing check valves.
For more details, please see our nozzle check valve product information.
In order to choose the right check valve for your application, several selection criteria should be considered. First, however, there is not one type of check valves being the best choice for all applications, and the selection criteria may not be equally important for all cases. Some of the things you may need to consider are fluid compatibility, flow characteristics, head loss, non-slam characteristics and total cost of ownership.
All check valves referred to in this article are designed for water and treated wastewater applications, but using the valves for raw wastewater/sewage applications may cause some issues. When selecting a valve for these fluids, you should consider how the presence of solids may potentially affect operation of the valve.
If a check valve closes very fast, it may prevent slamming against upstream equipment such as pumps. However, the rapid closure will not protect against the surges caused by pumps being started and shut down. If the valve opens (and closes) quickly, the flow will change rapidly and thus increase likeliness of surge occurrence.
Head loss is, among other things, a function of fluid velocity. The head loss through a valve is determined by the internal design of the valve and the opening degree. When a valve is designed with a restricted (narrowed) opening compared to the pipeline, the velocity will increase through the valve, increasing the head loss as a result. Vice versa, if a valve is designed with less restriction and bore is equal size to the pipeline, the head loss will be smaller, and the valve will in practice not affect the overall head loss of the system. There are a number of values for head loss, amongst others zeta values, Kv and Kvs values.
The costs for your check valve consist of more than just the purchase price. For some installations, the most important costs may be purchasing and installation, but in other cases, maintenance or energy costs may be equally or even more important. Also protecting more valuable equipment such as e.g. pumps has to be considered, and looking at the valve performance will be crucial. When considering costs as a selection criterion for your check valve, the total costs over the life of the valve should be considered. In general, the simpler the valve construction is, the lower are the maintenance requirements. The higher the Kv value, the lower the energy consumption. The higher the performance, the better the protection ability.
Check valve slam can affect pressure surges in a negative way. First step of the process is when the pump stops, starting the pressure surge. Second step is, when the flow is reversed, slamming against the fully closed check valve. If the check valve closes too fast, the kinetic energy is turned into high pressure, stressing the pipes, and causing high noise.
A slam sounds like if the disc or the ball from the check valve is hitting the seat and can make quite some noise. However, the sound is not caused by the physical closing but by a sound wave arising from a pressure spike stretching the pipe wall.
To prevent the occurrence of check valve slam, the valve should close in a controlled way and slower when near closed position. For a check valve to close slowly, it requires additional ancillary equipment, such as hydraulic dampers, which act as a cushion to the valve door, as it comes into its seated position. This slower closure allows the fluid to pass through the check valve until it closes, causing less kinetic energy turning into high pressure, and thus less energy to feed and maintain the surge. Consideration must be given to the upstream pump to ensure that it is suitable for reverse spin and flow.
As swing check valves have the disc in the flow stream, helping with rapid closure, they have better non-slam characteristics. However, today many pumps are frequency converted, enabling them to adjust the start-up and closure time to avoid water hammer.
Contact us to discuss your requirements of Portable Globe. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.