2 Bay Car Wash No HP soap or wax

[Randy]

I got a call this morning from the Army base. They have a couple of small car washes on base. At one the washes a 2 bay wash and they can’t get any HP Soap or Wax to come out from either of the bays. They have power to the solenoid valves and product to the valves. They E-mailed me a picture of their set up, a pretty simple system, a Cat 310 pump, a couple of inlet water solenoid valves, no water tanks, a zero pressure regulator to lower the water supply pressure and that’s about it. The system is Windtrax BPU-33-310 and is about 7-10 years old, this is the first time they ever had any problems with it. Could the problem be with the zero pressure regulators?

 

[MEP001]

Could the problem be with the zero pressure regulators?

Yup, they get washed out.

 

[Earl Weiss]

Product to the valves. What about on the exit side of the valves?

 

[PaulLovesJamie]

I'd disconnect the poly hose from the outlet side of the solenoid, & energize the solenoid. If soap/wax flows out, than the zpr is probably the problem, and yes they go bad.

A 3rd possibility - on the rinse cycle, if the water pressure is high it could push back through the soap/wax solenoid thus leaving a very diluted soap/wax solution on the input side for the next customer... basically gives the illusion that the soap isnt working. Cause of this would probably be a bad low pressure check valve - or maybe the solenoid has weakened over time which is why it just showed up now.
Or maybe not but more ideas never hurts

 

[Jeff_L]

Since both soap and wax aren't coming out, the usual suspect is the zpr. I keep a couple on hand, they don't seem to last very long sometimes.

 

[Randy]

Thanks for your replies. I ended up replacing both Zero Pressure regulators. They weren’t washed out, both of them the internals were broken. When I opened them up they came apart in pieces. Lots of soap and wax now.