How To LOWER Your Water Pressure (COMPLETE GUIDE) | GOT2LEARN

Too much water pressure at home? Your pipes are knocking? A "pressure reducing valve" is what you need. In this video, i'll show you how to install one, how to choose the proper one, how to adjust it and what to do if your old PRV is not working properly, enjoy!

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Time stamps
Why you would need a PRV - 0:00
Different model PRVs - 1:43
How to get a pressure reading - 2:07
Choosing the right PRV - 2:36
Installation - 3:22
Expansion tank - 6:56
PRV adjustment - 8:05
Troubleshooting PRV - 8:42

DISCLAIMER: Got2Learn is NOT responsible for any damage done to a property of which the plumbing wasn't done by a professional, I do not recommend doing your own plumbing if you are unsure about what you are doing, always hire a LICENSED contractor when doing any type of plumbing so you can be covered by insurances if something does happen, these videos are for entertainment purposes only!

[AZsmoothrider]

Just installed one between meter and service entrance..what a huge (nice) difference! City water over 80psi and over 100 at night! No more problems now at a relaxing 45. Awesome video!

[jmlcolorado]

Customers house I remodeled 3 bathrooms in.
Their pressure always seemed high to me and I always had a ad time with new shutoff valves leaking.
Turns out their PRV has failed. Their house had street pressure coming into it. 120 psi!
Once we started digging, found multiple solder joints failing throughout the house.
Now they have a mess on their hands because it is unknown how many kore were leaking slowly and potentially filled wall cavities with mold.
Be careful with water pressure.

[lenhanson]

Fyi any PRV that has a thermal expansion bypass feature will not release water back into the city system unless the downstream of the prv pressure reaches 10 psi ABOVE the street pressure. So if the incoming pressure from the street is 100 and your prv is set to 60, the pressure downstream would have to reach 110 psi for the bypass feature to activate. It could reach this pressure downstream when the water is heated by the water heater. When pressure builds this high downstream of the prv you will end up with excess wear and tear on all plumbing components in the home. Most notably the spring on any t&p valve on the water heater and eventually the spring on the prv. Bottom line is if you have a prv installed and a heat source downstream of it you need to control thermal expansion.

[sherrykaiser]

I have lived in a house with low water pressure for 20 years. I just figured I was stuck with it. Finally occurred to me to look up what causes low pressure on the internet and I learned about the water pressure regulator and discovered your video. Thanks so much! As the others said, this is a perfect video and very well demonstrated. So much so, I think that maybe even this 60 year old lady might be able to fix it herself!

[courtneymartinez]

I could not figure out how the orings were supposed to go while installing this. Thank you so much for the up close thorough video!!

[gordonmorrow]

Excellent video and tutorial. You are obviously a skilled plumber. Well done.

[Pedro-lgwz]

ALL YOUR VIDEOS ARE highly educational... I began with your soldering videos and have seeing most, keep doing videos, you explain things very well!!!

[rohitbhatnagar]

Not sure how you do it. You answer the correct questions and thoughts that most people with ask doing their plumbing... like a mind reader !!

[stevebabiak]

Expansion tanks can fail, filling the water lines with debris from the tank’s internal rubber-like bladder. I had this happen. Turns out that there is a reason the expansion tank warranty is only something like 5 years; chemicals used to treat public water and some mineral content in water both act to degrade the bladder within an expansion tank. If your faucet aerators are repeatedly getting clogged, check that expansion tank.

Testing the expansion tank is a painful exercise unless you plan in advance for being able to do testing without feeling that pain. You want to be able to put an air pressure gauge on the expansion tank when there is no water pressure on the tank, and at the same time you want to be able to see what the water pressure is. This means you in advance either had to plan to drain the expansion tank and easily get a reading on water pressure; or you have a bit more pain in draining the whole cold water line above the expansion tank while water is shut off. And in that case where do you get that water pressure reading at?

Another test is to see if the expansion tank has become waterlogged. Some do this by tapping their knuckles on the tank; I have my tank on a loop of PEX, supported by straps, so I can wiggle and shake the tank to check this.

Another thing is setting the air pressure on the tank. If your expansion tank’s preset air pressure is less than the water pressure out of the PRV, then the tank will always have water in it. So the air pressure has to be set right at or just above the water pressure, so that the tank has little to no water in it under normal conditions, only taking water in when the water heater has caused expansion and releasing the water that was taken in at the first use of water at a fixture. And since these expansion tanks are located high up, a battery powered air pump is a good tool to have in case you have to increase the tank’s air pressure. And remember that the tank’s air pressure reading is only valid with the tank empty of water and no water pressure being supplied. And if the expansion tank air pressure is much higher than the water pressure, then the function of the expansion tank (as far as taking in expanded water after a heating cycle) is defeated. If the expansion tank air pressure is set too high, the water heater relief valve can “pop” and you will have water dripping from the relief valve.

The last thing is setting the water pressure coming out of the PRV. In my area, code requires water pressure to fixtures to be less than 80 PSI; and if you go below something like 40 PSI you will probably complain about low water pressure. If you set water pressure on the low side of that range, you can actually save some water when showering (for example), since the amount of water that flows through the fixture over some specific time will be less than the amount of water that would flow over that same time at a higher pressure. The trade off comes in the amount of time needed to fill things like a bath tub or the laundry washing machine. So pick a reasonable pressure somewhere in the middle. I believe I set mine somewhere between 55 PSI and 60 PSI.

These are important details that most people do not come to realize until they are in some predicament. And most do not realize how closely the expansion tank and the PRV should have their respective pressures set. I think I have mentioned here most of the things that tend to be overlooked. And I am not a plumber ;)

[nelsonechevarria]

Great video, I feel that I should mention that now a days water companies are installing back flow preventers because according to them (the water companies) back flow may contaminate the water supply so back flow prevention is necessary.Before you buy a Pressure Reducing Valve check with the water company that services your area and ask if they use back flow preventers which they probably do if they have upgraded their water service lines.I don't think that installing an expansion tank upside down is so critical because the water in the expansion tank isn't likely to stagnate as in the case of an expansion tank for a water heater where the expansion tank's diaphram pushes the water out of the expansion tank when ever a hot water faucet is opened.If in doubt what I would do is to install a check valve where water will exit the water line but will not allow the water to back flow (return).Great video, God bless you and yours.P.S., I looked to see how much the PRV rebuild kits are and I was shocked to see that the PRV rebuild kits are almost as expensive as buying the whole PRV new.

[TomWhitakerwcs]

very informative- love your instructional vids. I worked with a plumber for a while and your knowledge is spot on.

[adamfrbs]

Man I'm so lucky this popped up in my feed. Got one coming tomorrow. Had no idea about the expansion tank. Thanks!

[stefanlewis]

Clean, Efficient, Great Tips, .. if only all places had the competence and understanding of this video. I've lived many placed and the property has horrible nightmare pipe setups and the management companies all are clueless of it all. scary.

[scottbellisle]

Thanks,

Mine was easy enough to see that it went bad as it was leaking water and air. Easy replacement and adjustment, Thanks, Scotty B

[edwardvanderhoff]

This is a great instructional video with a bunch of important caveats I haven't found in any of the videos I've seen yet. Great job, thank you!

[Africanbararian]

I know this video is 6 months old, watching this is super interesting, we do things much different in South Africa, like prvs are mandatory here, max 87psi, we work in kPa and not psi, our prvs come with a relief valve that screws directly into the prv, with built in shut offs, for roughly 80 usd.. I'd love to have a chat when I catch the next live chat

[justgonnagetbetter]

The one and only time I've soldered copper was installing a prv on 1". Couldn't use shark bites since it was roll copper pipe coming out of the slab. Pressure was spiking at 100 psi on urinal and toilet shutoff.

[joshcowart]

The thing I want to know is where do you get the PRVs with unions on both sides. The supply houses we use have I think watts with only one union and it always causes more digging than should be necessary. What funny to me as someone in Texas is saying that “you’ll probably be putting it in the wall”. We put ours a foot from the meter in the front yard.

[markleon]

you have the best videos for us beginners. thank you.

[tunafish]

I can’t wait for the pressure increase pump.