Why Can’t I Use Multiple Fixtures In My Townhouse?
If you notice that you can’t use more than one plumbing fixture at a time in your townhouse, the simplest answer might just be that the water pressure is low at the street connection coming from your municipality. One of the things you can do to solve that problem is install a water booster pump. It boosts the pressure inside your home so that you’re able to use multiple outlets. The municipality is only required to provide a certain pressure at the street, and it probably does meet that requirement.
The next thing that comes to mind is the plumbing in the home itself. If you have a small pipe and you put water through it at 40 pounds of pressure, you might only get 2 gallons per minute. If you increase the pressure to 70 pounds, you’ll probably double that amount (4 gallons per minute). The higher the pressure, the more gallons per minute you’ll get. If the pipe that was put in your home isn’t sized appropriately and it’s too small, that can reduce the volume of water that you get at the outlets. If you have larger pipes with more volume, you don’t need higher pressure. If you have smaller pipes with less volume, you’ll need more pressure to get enough water. Sometimes the piping system in homes are designed and sized without any extra capacity. The plumbing code requires very minimal pipe size, and many townhouses are sized just at what’s needed to meet that requirement.
Sometimes there might also be a blockage or collapse of the main water line in the ground coming into the house. When the dirt settles and shifts, it can cause a pipe to pinch off and not provide very much water pressure in the home. In that situation (especially in a townhouse), I would suggest that you ask your neighbors if they are experiencing the same thing. If they are, then this probably isn’t the issue. It’s not the main water supply because everybody is using the same one. If your neighbors have good water pressure and you don’t, then it’s probably an issue that’s isolated to your system.
If you’re experiencing a similar water pressure issue in your townhome, contact us online or give us a call at 540-483-9382. We would make a service call and put a pressure gauge on the home to determine the static pressure (pressure before a fixture is run). With the gauge on the line, we would open up other outlets to see how much the pressure drops off. If it drops drastically, then there’s probably a blockage or something else that’s stopping the water from coming out. If there’s just a slight decrease in pressure, then it’s a water pressure issue that would require something like a booster or pump.
