[Wayada]

I’m on city water feeding a building with three units each having one bathroom, (two studio apartments on second floor and a 2 bedroom main residence on first floor). My static incoming pressure is 50-55psi but drops to around 35psi with any single appliance turned on. These measurements were taken from the only hose bib on the house which is located about 40ft from the incoming service line. This seems to tell me that there is a low volume issue with the incoming water, though I have yet to measure the flow. Would this be a reasonable assumption?

At least some of my neighbors (maybe all) have the same issue and one had the service line from the city main to the house replaced but this did not help. The city refuses to investigate on their end. City mains and service lines to residences are in the 75yr old range and the community is in Niagara County, NY. There is ¾” copper running into the building from the shutoff that is located outside, not sure what is running from the city main to that shutoff; I have been told it is either cast or lead? I believe that shutoff is completely opened. Inside the building is all copper and each unit is fed with ¾” copper with ½” running to each individual appliance from the ¾” feed.

My first thought was to also have the line from the city main replaced but after hearing there was no difference with my neighbor that has already had his replaced I did not want to spend thousands on a futile effort. Would a pressure tank and booster pump help or would I risk the pump running dry without a cistern? Assuming code will allow me to connect a pump to the incoming line either with or without a holding tank.

Any help or direction is greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
Mike

 

[redline]

When you turned on one fixture did this have a low flow head on it?
Or do all the fixtures have the older style flow heads?

I would start by replacing the shower heads, faucet aerators... to low flow.
I would also change the toilets to 1.28 gallon or 1.6 gallon if they currently use over 3-5 gallons per flush.

Another item that you could try is to connect a loop from the incoming supply to your farthest supplied line.

 

[Wayada]

Thanks redline, I appreciate the help.

The low flow issue is pretty much a whole house issue but is most noticeable at the shower heads when more than one appliance is running, which is what I would expect as I would think their GPM draw is a bit higher than the other faucets. All fixtures are fairly new. With that said I still went ahead and checked and cleaned all areators/screens/shower heads. Each unit already has a seperate 3/4" feed from the incoming line.

I have done the normal things like checking each appliance for restrictions, making sure all valves are fully opened. etc. even though I can't see how those issues would cause the drop in incoming psi when one appliance is running unless it was one of the valves on the incoming line not being fully open restricting the incoming flow, though I am fairly certain that is not the case as these have been checked.