Why Your Pump Won't Stop Cycling
A pressure tank stores a cushion of pressurized water so your pump doesn't kick on every time you run the faucet. Inside sits a rubber bladder holding air on one side and water on the other. When that bladder ruptures or the air charge leaks out, the tank fills entirely with water and can't cushion anything. The pump ends up firing on and off dozens of times a day instead of a handful, which wears out the pump motor years before it should.
Around Lake Livingston, we see this constantly on lake homes near Onalaska's shoreline subdivisions and on rural properties along the Goodrich side of US 59, where pressure tanks installed in the 1990s and early 2000s are simply reaching the end of a bladder's normal life. A tank that's ten to fifteen years old and starting to short-cycle isn't a maybe, it's due. Add hard water common to wells drawing from the Carrizo-Wilcox and Queen City aquifer systems that the Lower Trinity Groundwater Conservation District permits across this part of Polk County, and mineral buildup inside older tanks accelerates the failure.
What Replacement Runs
A standard 20 to 44 gallon bladder tank, sized to your pump and fixture count, installed and pressure-tested, runs $465 to $975. The range moves on tank size, whether we need to modify existing plumbing to fit a different tank footprint, and whether the old tank needs to be drained and hauled off the property (lake houses on tight lots sometimes have a tank wedged into a crawlspace that takes extra time to remove). If your pressure switch has also failed, which happens on close to half of these jobs since a waterlogged tank overworks the switch too, that's a separate item usually running an added $75 to $150.
How the Job Works
- We check the bladder first. A quick tap test and a pressure gauge reading at the tank's air valve tells us in under five minutes whether the bladder has failed.
- We size the replacement. Tank size depends on your pump's flow rate and how many fixtures might run at once, not just what fit in the space before.
- We shut down and drain the system. Water gets shut off at the pressure switch and the old tank drained before disconnection.
- We remove the old tank. Depending on age, this can mean cutting corroded fittings rather than unscrewing them.
- We set and plumb the new tank. Fittings, unions, and a shutoff valve get installed so future service doesn't require draining the whole system again.
- We precharge and test. Air charge gets set to match your pump's cut-in pressure, then we run water to confirm the cycling has stopped.
What Makes This Job Harder
Corroded galvanized fittings on a tank installed decades ago often won't budge without cutting, which adds time and sometimes a trip back for a part we didn't expect to need. Tight crawlspaces and pump houses built around the original tank, common on older lake lots where the wellhouse was framed in after the tank was already set, can turn a two-hour job into a four-hour one. And if the pressure switch and tank failed together, which is common, we're diagnosing two problems instead of one, so we check both before quoting a final number.
How Long It Takes
Most pressure tank replacements take 2 to 3 hours from shutoff to final test, assuming normal access and no major plumbing rework. Tight crawlspace installs or jobs needing new copper or PEX runs can push toward 4 hours.
One Thing We Don't Do
We stock two tank brand lines that cover the vast majority of residential setups here. If you want a specific boutique brand tank ordered special, you're welcome to buy it yourself and we'll install it, but we don't special-order tanks as a standard part of the job.
Common Questions
How do I know if it's the tank and not the pump?
Rapid cycling, where the pump kicks on and off every few seconds while running a single faucet, almost always points to the tank. A pump that struggles to build pressure at all, or runs constantly without cycling, points more toward the pump itself.
Can you just add air to the tank instead of replacing it?
If the bladder is intact and it's just lost air charge, yes, and that's a much cheaper fix we always check first. If the bladder itself has ruptured, adding air won't hold and the tank needs replacing.
Will a bigger tank fix low pressure?
A bigger tank extends the time between pump cycles but won't raise your maximum pressure. If your issue is genuinely low pressure rather than short cycling, the pressure switch settings or the pump itself is the more likely cause.
Do you haul away the old tank?
Yes, removal and disposal of the old tank is included in the quoted price.
This service covers Livingston, Onalaska, Point Blank, Goodrich, and the Lake Livingston shoreline. Call and describe what the pump is doing and we'll tell you honestly whether it sounds like a tank problem before we ever schedule a visit.