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We live in an area with water service by other than the Boquete municipal water system. We had no recent outage. However, we are now hearing from friends that the entire Boquete water system was shut down for a long period on Tuesday last. Cannot attest to the veracity of that information, nor the reason, assuming it to be true. Is your water back on now?

In general we believe water accounts are rarely shut down, and certainly not without notice, for non-payment or late payment.

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Brisas Boquetenas:   Water has been in sporadic shut-down mode for approximately a month.   Rarely is there water flowing during the day.  Usually we get water to fill the reserve tank at night.  Our home is a lower altitude than those at the entry of the Brisas subdivision.  I was told that those homes at the entry had been totally out for 9 days.  Those homes as well had longer outages than we did in the same subdivision for the last month.  For several months now we have had periods of water pressure so high the water lines ruptured in the usual areas that always break.  So yes in Brisas there are problems that have yet to be resolved.  Some broken lines here have been broken and leaking for months now.   If the water is running down the road we know the water is on. 

We still use a children's plastic pool for extra water on hand.  

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1 hour ago, Brundageba said:

Our home is a lower altitude than those at the entry of the Brisas subdivision.  I was told that those homes at the entry had been totally out for 9 days.

Pushing water uphill to Cabo Ane during periods with little pressure isn’t very successful when it can free flow to homes at lower elevations. Also it doesn’t help that the valve which controls the flow in either direction is set by some residents to favor the lower end of the  Development. The only solution available to me was to install an additional storage tank with level monitoring.

At one point last month after a long outage, service was finally restored at 130 lbs PSI which blew apart my kitchen faucet and one of the toilet fill mechanisms.

Hoping the day comes soon when the new system is online and we have treated potable water service 24/7/365.

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16 hours ago, Frank Spitzig said:

Does anybody know whether the water service would be cut off without notice if one's waster bill isn't paid within a certain time?

The only way that could happen is if the authorities were to close the valve in front of your home which could easily be re-opened or even bypassed

Edited by Keith Woolford
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When I purchased my home I noticed small puddles of water behind one of the toilets and under the kitchen sink in the cabinet below every once in a while.  It didn't happen often but when I mentioned it to my neighbors they informed me that our neighborhood routinely experioences water pressures above 100 PSI which is in the danger zone for residential quality plumbing.  I had Grupo Aguas install a pressure regulator with my backup pump/tank system as seen in the attached photo and the problem never occurred again.  It's calibrated to only allow 60 PSI of municipal water to flow with my backup pump/tank system providing only 50 PSI in the event of a water outage which easily informs me (if I can't hear the pump turn on while it's raining) that there is low pressure or none at all as to warn me not to do laundry.  This differential in pressure is also noticeable during a shower indicating that there's an outage so that I know to conserve.

I recall the price of the pressure regulator being about $75 which of course is peanuts compared to the potential costs of repair due to dangerously high water pressures.  And I strongly recommend pressure regulators constructed of brass, not ones constructed of PVC.

 

 

 

 

mi casa water pressure regulator reducer .png

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10 minutes ago, Siempre Soluciones said:

 

When I purchased my home I noticed small puddles of water behind one of the toilets and under the kitchen sink in the cabinet below every once in a while.  It didn't happen often but when I mentioned it to my neighbors they informed me that our neighborhood routinely experioences water pressures above 100 PSI which is in the danger zone for residential quality plumbing.  I had Grupo Aguas install a pressure regulator with my backup pump/tank system as seen in the attached photo and the problem never occurred again.  It's calibrated to only allow 60 PSI of municipal water to flow with my backup pump/tank system providing only 50 PSI in the event of a water outage which easily informs me (if I can't hear the pump turn on while it's raining) that there is low pressure or none at all as to warn me not to do laundry.  This differential in pressure is also noticeable during a shower indicating that there's an outage so that I know to conserve.

I recall the price of the pressure regulator being about $75 which of course is peanuts compared to the potential costs of repair due to dangerously high water pressures.  And I strongly recommend pressure regulators constructed of brass, not ones constructed of PVC.

 

 

 

 

mi casa water pressure regulator reducer .png

Well worth every dime !   We have one.   Pressure here sometimes  is as high as Keith describes ...actually higher .   I have always wondered about the possibility of water pressure regulation inline in a subdivision such as ours (Brisas)  where both the lower houses and as well the ones on higher ground could receive equal pressure without bursting lines at the seams. The pressure here can be so high as to create leaks to the surface from below the storm drains in the street...when it's that high I know to run our hose in the yard to reduce pressure so we don't have a gusher inside the house.  When we leave for vacation we turn the water to the house off at the street. 

When we moved here 12 years ago, we knew that there was a large community reserve tank that supposedly supplied Brisas .  That tank we were told by the government could not be used for some regulatory reason.  It's now sitting empty...rusting.   It would be nice to define these water issue problems that have been repeating for over a decade, , solve them, and if necessary allow the Brisas community to assist in moving to a solution.  To date the problems repeat "as if" undefined as to their cause.  ( high , low pressure and outage..unannounced) 

Question:   I notice a huge subdivision built on the road to Caldera just before Boquete Canyon Village.  Looks like a hundred homes or more.  How will we ( in Brisas ) receive adequate water service once all those homes come on-line if issues unresolved remain.....unresolved for over a decade? 

Edited by Brundageba
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22 hours ago, Brundageba said:

Well worth every dime !   We have one.   Pressure here sometimes  is as high as Keith describes ...actually higher .   I have always wondered about the possibility of water pressure regulation inline in a subdivision such as ours (Brisas)  where both the lower houses and as well the ones on higher ground could receive equal pressure without bursting lines at the seams. The pressure here can be so high as to create leaks to the surface from below the storm drains in the street...when it's that high I know to run our hose in the yard to reduce pressure so we don't have a gusher inside the house.  When we leave for vacation we turn the water to the house off at the street. 

When we moved here 12 years ago, we knew that there was a large community reserve tank that supposedly supplied Brisas .  That tank we were told by the government could not be used for some regulatory reason.  It's now sitting empty...rusting.   It would be nice to define these water issue problems that have been repeating for over a decade, , solve them, and if necessary allow the Brisas community to assist in moving to a solution.  To date the problems repeat "as if" undefined as to their cause.  ( high , low pressure and outage..unannounced) 

Question:   I notice a huge subdivision built on the road to Caldera just before Boquete Canyon Village.  Looks like a hundred homes or more.  How will we ( in Brisas ) receive adequate water service once all those homes come on-line if issues unresolved remain.....unresolved for over a decade? 

 

Brundageba,

 

As you can imagine, a network of pressure regulators for an entire subdivision would be costly in addition to the costs associated with the required routine maintenance.  When I evaluated the Brisas subdivision years ago the realtor stated that within the year the roads were going to be repaved as well as the completion of a club house and pool too.  They also told me that they were going to expand the road to Lucero to four lanes.  Don't get me started on the realtors here in Boquete!

 

As for adequate water service for that new subdivision on the road to Caldera, well, I think they're still trying to figure out how to supply water to Ricardo Perez's new 1,200 home subdivision in El Frances.  Your guess is as good as any ones!

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Well we have had the water on then off (with most days off)  and water coming in at night.  Those here without tanks are waterless most of the time during the day.  Today the water is on and the pressure is very high (off the Richter) .  That said, we love life here in Boquete and do not regret for a nano-second our 12 years here in Brisas.  We just deal with the situation as best we can .   Subdivisions like ours have no home owners association dues for common maintenance.  We all contribute voluntarily to the upkeep.  That said, our ability to pave roads or install fancy water regulation systems is beyond the budget of most resident here.  We all need to do our own research on where we decide to live .   Water issues here have not changed much in the years we have been here.   BTW,  I seriously doubt Realtors have an inside scoop on Municipal projects that are not even on the horizon .

Brisas Boquetenas.

Edited by Brundageba
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