Cellular low water pressure alarm?

[daveswell]

Hi! New here. Looked for other posts related to this but no luck so here is my question: I have a well with a low yield along with the typical pump, pressure tank, etc. A few times a year, usually in the summer when there is plant watering going on, I wake up and the water pressure is 0. No water, nothing in the tank. I run outside looking for a garden hydrant someone might have accidentally left open (I have 2) and I make sure it is shut off tight. Then I go back in and shut off the valve to those outdoor hydrants and just wait until the tank refills. It can mess up the start of your day so why can't I have an alarm that sends me a text if the pressure drops too low? I have a pumpalarm that is a cellular alarm with real-time alerts for my sump pump. If the sump pump stops working and the water gets too high it sends me a text via cellular service. It works really well and not too expensive per month! Does someone make a similar alarm that is triggered by low water pressure? Thanks!

 

[Reach4]

Ideas:

1. If the water pressure gets to less than 10 psi, you simulate the sump being too full. The alarm then becomes ambiguous.
2. Replace the current alarm notifier with something that has more than one input... identify low water pressure, high sump level, freeze alarm, whatever.
3. Use a low-pressure cutoff pressure switch to shut down the pump until you manually reactivate with a lever. That is cheap.
4. Add another float switch to the tank to activate a valve to shut off yard water when the tank is less than 25% full.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Valveman]

Your just lucky you haven't melted down the pump. You need something to protect the pump more than you need to be notified. A low pressure cut off switch would do it. You would just have to go down and manually restart the pump after it happened. The most reliable way to protect against dry run is with low amperage like when using a Cycle Sensor. They will only let the pump run dry for ten seconds before shutting it off. However, they can be set to automatically turn the pump back on after a time that you set. So every 20 minutes of as long a 5 hours it will start the pump and try again. It can also be set for manual restart if you had rather. At least that way your well would have had time to recover, and when you restarted it there would be enough water that you wouldn't have to wait.

 

[daveswell]

Thank you for the great suggestions!

Reach4 #1 I'm not understanding- maybe I'm not too bright. How do I "simulate the sump being full"? #2 yes it would be great to have more inputs and if I did is there a pressure gauge that would close a circuit if pressure got too low and interface with the cellular alarm? #3- yes that would help and would even help more if it let me know via text the pump turned off. #4 can you actually put a float switch in the pressure tank?

valveman: good idea- I'm checking out cycle sensor.

 

[Valveman]

Use a 30/50 pressure switch wired to a leak sensor and get text or emails from a samsung smart hub. You could even make it turn off the pump off. Gotta have wifi.

 

[Reach4]

Reach4 #1 I'm not understanding- maybe I'm not too bright. How do I "simulate the sump being full"? #2 yes it would be great to have more inputs and if I did is there a pressure gauge that would close a circuit if pressure got too low and interface with the cellular alarm? #3- yes that would help and would even help more if it let me know via text the pump turned off. #4 can you actually put a float switch in the pressure tank?

What controls the alarm now? A float switch in the sump I expect. How you would wire in another switch would depend on the kind of switch you have now. Do you have accessible wire terminals going to the existing float switch?