I am about 4/5ths of the way thru replacing a metal water tank w/a black poly 2500 gallon tank. There is a jet pump, half horse, that should be supplying something like city pressure to our water heater and house plumbing.

The metal tank was collecting mineral sludge [ and delivering some of it to the house water system.

This is the part I need help with. In New Mexico there is plenty of hard water . and it was collecting on the metal tank walls. My house system is mostly pvc. I've been told that Muriatic Acid should dissolve the mineral blockages so we can flush the system. There is an out door faucet well below the rest of the system to evacuate the sludge if this works.

What should I be aware of so I don't do more damage than good. The new tank has a shut off valve, there is a check valve between tank and jet pump.

there is a schrader valve just above the rest of the system where we can introduce the acid solution....[ what strength?] then replace air valve and add some pressure with a small pancake compressor. There is a pressure gage at the pump and we can check pressure at the schrader valve. We hope to use the air to help clear the gunk from the pipes.

Any thoughts or advise would be very welcome.

Thank you all for being here.

Ron

 

If I understand this correctly, my first thought is that I would be very disinclined to introduce muriatic acid into the pipes that supply my drinking water. The water piping would (hopefully) flush out any remaining minerals through daily use. PVC (or CPVC) doesn't tend to build up minerals.

And if you're looking at a shrader valve, I suspect that you're looking at an expansion tank. If that is the case, there's a rubber diaphragm in the middle of it, and you won't introduce anything through it. Shrader valves are usually only for air.

I would put the new tank into the system, clean all the aerators, then determine if it still needs further attention. A water softener or other filtration might be worth looking into.

 

Yes, you were misinformed and will do more damage than good!

Firstly, muriatic, also known as hydrochloric acid in a concentration strong enough to be effective at removing scale will also attack and damage your piping.
There are acid types for this purpose such as phosphoric acid which will not damage metals but are circulated within piping or components and not just dumped in.
It would be far simpler to replace any blocked or partially blocked piping than to descale it.

I would just remove all the aerators when the work is complete and then just flush the lines with water.
Any lines with a noticeable pressure drop should just be replaced.
I also agree, depending on a water analysis that a water softener could be helpful.

 

Thanks Greg, the air valve was put there by me to introduce pressure to move
[ circulate ] the water and to have a `kind of' water hammer to help move and or breakup the mineral deposits. It did that very well in some cases. There is still some blockage tho, hence my line of questioning. The type of solvent [acid] in this case is easily changed and we use bottled water for coffee and cooking most of the time.

The water tastes fine. I just doesn't make the best coffee. A water softener in not an option. I never liked the idea of those or the amount of stuff you have to dump in them. Filters are possible but there should be little or no mineral deposits in the plastic tank. But I must add, some of the pvc, sort of plastic isn't it?, I removed had mineral deposits on the inner walls just very thin. It had been in place for 15 to 20 years. Tho at my age the figure could be very different. Thanks for the tip on phosphoric acid,

Ron

Ron