Choosing the Right Automatic Booster Pump for Your Home: A Practical Guide

What is an Automatic Booster Pump

You definitely don’t want to live in a place with low water pressure. Imagine yourself having to shower under a trickle of water that is barely powerful enough to rinse out your shampoo and body wash, it could be quite a hassle.

This is why an automatic booster pump, also known as the water pressure booster pump, is needed in every household. As the name suggests, an automatic booster pump is a water pumping machine that is used to automatically increase the water pressure and volume in the event of inadequate water pressure. An automatic booster pump is similar to a gas compressor, but is less mechanically complicated which often has only one single stage of compression, and is used to increase pressure of gas already above ambient pressure. Two-stage water pressure booster pumps are also available which may be used to increase gas pressure, transfer high pressure gas, charge gas cylinders and scavenge.

How Does an Automatic Booster Pump Work

A water pressure booster pump is filled with liquid first before it can be put to work. The impeller of an automatic water pressure booster pump is quick rotating blades that drive the liquid. As the liquid circulates, it flows to the outer edge of the impeller by inertia, and the impeller draws in the liquid from the suction chamber. The liquid then acts on the blades of the impeller as it flows through the blades. As a result, the generated force allows liquid energy to flow out of the impeller while both the kinetic energy and pressure energy of the liquid increase.

How Do I know If I need an Automatic Booster Pump

Low water pressure in a residence means that the taps have low water pressure and flow rate, which in turn affects anything involving water. This is when you should consider setting up an automatic water pressure booster pump for home domestically. Some of the indicators that may call for water pressure booster pumps for home include:

• Your tub takes way too long to fill. If your tube takes longer than 5 minutes to fill, it is a good indicator of the fact you may have low water pressure in your home. This also in turn affects water temperature as water has cooled by the time the tub is full.
• Your shower may suffer from low water pressure as well. As mentioned earlier, no one wants to deal with tricked showers as this is most likely a problem of low water pressure.
• You are not getting good laundry results. Laundry machines need to be filled with water to wash your clothes properly. Low water pressure and flow rate mean that your laundry machine will take longer to load and not do a good job cleaning and rinsing your clothes.
• You are taking forever to water your yard. When you notice insufficient water coming out of your spray nozzle or sprinklers, you may also be dealing with low water pressure. In this case, watering the entire lawn may become a tedious task for you as it may take more than 30 minutes to complete.

The tap flow rate is too little to rinse your dishes properly. Filling the sink will take longer, and washing dishes is no longer hassle-free because you have to constantly hold the dishes under running tap water.

Choosing an Automatic Booster Pump

First and foremost, you should primarily look out for the performance factor when purchasing an automatic water pressure booster pump. When assessing performance, the efficiency is to be measured, not power. Given identical hydraulic head and flow rate, high proficiency with low power is indicated as good performance. Automatic water pressure booster pumps have in fact the highest hydraulic head flow rate as most of them are marketed so. The standard power of an automatic booster pump is typically 80w and 120w.

When it comes to water pumps, vendors have the tendency of marketing the pump parameters beyond the actual functionality. Therefore, before buying an automatic booster pump, you should first learn about all the parameters and specifications of the product. Validate the actual flow rate with the seller so you do not end up buying a boasted booster pump.

Other factors you need to consider when selecting an automatic booster pump are: the length of the pipe, the size of the pipe, the number of elbows, the capacity of the water heater, the type of the water heater, the water output of the nozzle, etc. If you have a pressure-bearing electric water heater, you must complement it with an automatic booster pump that has slightly larger water output.

In a nutshell, there are many reasons for low water pressure, such as aging pipe, especially galvanized pipes, which will gradually rust through years of use, causing the pipe to clog and reduce water flow. This is when you know you need to buy a water pressure booster pump that will take care of such problem automatically with minimal manual assessment.