Greetings:
I'm having problems with my residential submersible pump. About a month ago, the capacitor went out. The capacitor is in a box on the basement wall along with a relay with wiring coming from the pressure switch (going into the box and out to the pump).
There was no water pressure, I could hear a click coming from the box every
30 seconds or so, but the pump wasn't running. I opened the box and there was a small amount of fluid from the capacitor in the bottom of the box. I replaced the capacitor and water was back fine. (this type of Webtrol capacitor has a built in overload according to the diagram inside the box).A few times since, the pressure has dropped, sometimes to nothing. The pump will turn on and run for about 5 seconds, then turn off (though the contact points on the pressure switch are still closed). About a minute and a half later, the pump will turn on again for about 5 seconds, then off again. It will do this until the pressure builds enough to open the pressure switch. It has gradually gotten worse.
Today, I replaced the pressure switch because the contact points were pretty corroded, but that didn't take care of the problem.
I figure either the new capacitor had problems out of the box or there is something in the pump that is tripping the overload. I'm not really sure what the relay does or if that could be a problem.
Is there anything else I should be looking for? Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks! nan