Thoughts after the grinder pump information meeting

The recent Open House meeting was successful in making some valuable points. The most significant point was the observation that municipal waste water always requires pumping assistance to get to the central treatment facility. Traditionally, waste water was arranged to initially flow by gravity to the first pumping stage. The grinder pump starts waste water on the journey, but the cost is now on the homeowner for the required pumping.
As one of the 180 resident with a grinder pump, I appreciate the fairness of involving the Town in the maintenance costs of the pump on my property.
However, there is more than a homeowner financial benefit to involving the Town in pump maintenance.
The reliability of the grinder pumps is a big disappointment. While we do get prompt changeout service from Roto Rooter, the frequency and the cost of the serviced pump is far from acceptable. As an individual, I have no way of understanding why the pump performs poorly, nor can I go out and get a more economical pump option that will perform better without exposing me to service delays.
If the Town becomes involved in pump maintenance, things can change. The priority should be to understand the reasons for the poor performance so that changes can be made to improve reliability.
John Brookes has been rebuilding the pumps for almost 15 years now. The rebuild technician can usually determine why the pump failed, and make a note of this. The information was supposed to go back to Roto Rooter to be given to the customer. However, this was not happening. I did see one report for a pump owned by someone other than me - pump seal failure allowed water to enter the motor to cause electrical failure. Does this data still exist to allow failure trends to be determined?
The E/One is a Progressing Cavity pump. This type of pump will have a short life if it is pumping into an excessive back pressure. Some of the pump owners in the St. Davids area have suffered high rates of pump failure. Is there anything special about thee problem installations that causes high back pressure? An unusually long line length from the pump to the pressure main in the street comes to mind.
Industry experience with the progressing cavity pump as used by E/One is that the most common failure cause is the pump running dry. This would follow from a control malfunction that caused the pump to continue to run after pumping the basin dry. Could this be happening here? Perhaps cold winter temperatures could be allowing frost to penetrate the uninsulated cover of the E/One pump to cause control malfunction.
Speaking to the service technicians installing my fourth grinder pump, it was noted that the service pumps they were installing were not lasting as long as did the original pumps. So, what could be happening here? Possibly a loss of quality in the pump rebuild process, but perhaps more likely is a slow buildup of solids in the buried lateral or even in the street receiving line. Only the Town could answer questions like this.
I have reviewed the descriptive material provided by Barnes/Crane describing what they call an upgrade pump to the E/One pump. E/One has responded with what they call an upgrade to their own pump. Both manufacturers are now talking about solids buildup and line scouring. However, the E/One pump performance curve is unchanged, while the Barnes/Crane pump has 3 times the flow rate of the E/One pump with a 100 psi backpressure. The Town could do a test installation of the Barnes/Crane pump to see if the upgrade really gives reliability improvements.
To summarize, involving the Town in pump maintenance is much more than shifting costs from a few homeowners to the Town rate base. It is rather a chance to understand the problems affecting the E/One pumps and come up with solutions that will make pressure sewage systems a truly cost effective and reliable alternative to conventional gravity systems.
John Codrington79 Melrose Drive