Valve problems
 

Been using mistking pumps and fittings to water my orchid boards. They all work really well, but the taps/valves are having certain problems. If you strip one down, the central part is a rotating white cylinder that has two soft rubber pads that slide over the input and output holes in the tap. These rubber pads are starting to abrade, as if the liquid (RO water with a low level of ferts) is causing the pads to swell into these holes so that the edges of the holes abrade and scar the rubber, causing a raised scar that stops the tap rotating. If I could strip the taps down, I could slice off the scar with a scalpel which would more or less solve the problem. (It wouldn't matter if a little seeped past the valves.). However stripping without breaking is quite a problem.

Any suggestions please?

I would write to the company.

Hello Bil
Can't be of any help, sorry, but just wanted to say how nice to see you on here. Hope all is well in your world (apart from the valve problem!). Best Wishes from here.

Thanks for the kind words. So far still in good health and growing orchids. Have moved to wall mounted Lavine Boards to house the orchids which is looking good.

---------- Post added at 02:56 AM ---------- Previous post was at 02:55 AM ----------

I did but apparently they have never heard of such a thing.

Looking at the issue from a material engineering perspective, it sounds like a solvent caused the polymer to swell, and I don’t see RO water or fertilizer having anything to do with that.

Thanks Ray. Where a solvent would enter the system beats me. The water is from a well, it is piped to the RO unit and then into the food grade water tanks. I add ferts are 2g per 5 litres and Kelpmax every month.

One odd thing, the black valves they sell so far aren't affected while the blue ones are a write off.

Obviously a different polymer...