Little-to-No Stock Tank Water Pressure?

Little-to-No Stock Tank Water Pressure?

I love problem-solving. Anybody else out there? I'm a nerd at heart, and I've learned to embrace that with age. Learning to love our quirks sure helps life be more fun. If I didn't laugh at myself, I'd cry. There can be a lot of things to cry about when sorting out a watering system!

The number of problems that can arise continues to give ample opportunity for Best Float Valve to provide solutions. Hearing how customers and dealers creatively work in their systems is delightful to me. Humans are incredible!

Today, I wanted to look at low water pressure for a moment. Many of our customers use city-water, and just as many use well or pond water to fill their stock tanks. Our standard best float valves will work with any type of pressure no matter the source. For pond and well water, we always recommend a premium float valve kit, though if there is sulfur in your water, the stainless steel kits will be your very best option.

Our high volume and standard 11/2" valves were tested by flowing water from about 3ft high into a 55 gallon barrel in the back of a pickup into a stock tank on a stand above the ground. Mathematically that should have been less than 2 psi but our gauge wouldn't even show it. Our valves still performed perfectly with that little pressure. There is no minimum pressure needed for Best Float Valves to function. 

Mark Wickerham from West Union Electric & Plumbing Supply Company in Ohio, provided me with these pictures and insight about a serious lack of water pressure. He is one of our trusted Best Float Valve dealers. I just had to share what he sent with you!

The valve body pictured below is the 3/4"premium float valve. The kit comes assembled. Mark just took it apart to show the effectiveness of Best Float Valve for him. He said, "We have used several different valves on our farm. I really like the fact that this valve will work with nearly no water pressure.

Low pressure filling tank

This photo shows the amount of water flow that I have available in the water tank. This is fed from our pond with about 3 lbs of gravity-fed pressure.

low pressure tank filling with poppet installed

This photo shows the same pressure with the poppet installed.

End of the Ridge Farms, West Union, OH

This photo is a tank with a Best Float Valve installed on End of the Ridge Farms, which offers grass-fed freezer beef."

Thanks, Mark for showing us how versatile our valves can be! Our regular valves will work with any type of pressure, as this picture shows. If you are going to rotate your watering holes and move your valves around to different pressures, then the regular valve kits are the way to go. 

If you are going to keep the float valves installed in one place, then we have another fabulous option. If you want to avoid agitated cows and have a faster infilling, we have high volume valves available as well. These valves have a larger fitting- 1 1/4" or 1 1/2"- and will fill up the tanks twice as fast as our regular valves. 

We have a stainless steel high volume valve kit that is 1 1/4" if needed. 
  • On a 1 1/2" pipeline with gravity flow at 5 psi, the standard valve will flow up to 13 gpm. The high volume valve will flow up to 26 gpm.
  • On a 2" pipeline at 45 psi, the standard valve will flow up to 50 gpm. The high volume valve will flow up to 110 gpm. 

Our valves can be mounted at the bottom of the tank, and we also have side mount kits that can attach to our high volume valves. 

However you choose to set up your tanks, Best Float Valve would love to serve you as you do so. Please contact us if there is any way that we can help you. 

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