40/60 pressure swith is turning on at 20 and off at 40. What's going on?

[JEG in Raleigh]

My pressure tank is in a utility room in my house. I have a 44-gallon Well-X-Trol WX-250 pressure tank. The pressure tank was installed in 2012 while I was building the house, but did not come into use until 2016 when we moved in. I have a Cycle Stop Valve on my system immediately before the pressure tank. I have a 40/60 Square-D pressure switch on the system. A new well pump was installed 3 years ago and I installed the CSV, a Cycle Sensor electrical control, and a new pressure switch and gauge at that time, and our well system has worked perfectly since then. Also, FYI, at the time that I installed the new pressure switch and CSV, I also checked and slightly topped up the air in the pressure tank, because it was slightly low per the specs.

Anyway, today I happened to glance at the gauge on my pressure tank and saw that it was down to close to 20 PSI, but not quite at 20 PSI yet. I was pretty certain that I had installed 40/60 pressure switch and I took the cover off and verified that indeed, it is a 40/60 switch. So, I turned on a faucet and watched the pressure in the tank slowly drop to 20 PSI and the switch kicked on and filled the tank, and shut off at 40 psi.

Can someone explain to me what is going on?

QUESTION 1. If the pressure switch is a 40/60 switch, what would cause it to be acting like a 20/40 switch? It is maintaining a 20 PSI spread between switch-on and switch-off, but if it was factory calibrated at 40/60, I would think if it were broken it would not be working at all. I'm completely baffled.

QUESTION 2. Do I need to re-check the air pressure in the top of the tank, and would that have anything to do with this?

QUESTION 3. Is there something broken that I need to replace?

I just don't understand at all what is going on with this and hope someone can explain. We are not having any problems with our water pressure, but maybe that's because the CSV is kicking in and camouflaging a problem associated with the pressure tank or pressure switch. Thanks for any help.

 

[Twowaxhack]

You sure the gauge is correct ?

 

[JEG in Raleigh]

You sure the gauge is correct ?

I'mmmmm not....It's a high-quality, fluid-filled gauge and only a couple of years old, so I was presuming it's OK,......but I don't know that for sure. Thinking about it now, since the gauge is right at the pressure tank, the water passing through the gauge does not go through my 2 backwash filters or my pleated sediment filter, so maybe it could get clogged. I guess I could check that by waiting for the tank to be full and then test the air pressure of the tank and compare that to the gauge.....and if they were way off, I guess that would tell me that the gauge is bad, is that correct?

 

[Twowaxhack]

I'mmmmm not....It's a high-quality, fluid-filled gauge and only a couple of years old, so I was presuming it's OK,......but I don't know that for sure. Thinking about it now, since the gauge is right at the pressure tank, the water passing through the gauge does not go through my 2 backwash filters or my pleated sediment filter, so maybe it could get clogged. I guess I could check that by waiting for the tank to be full and then test the air pressure of the tank and compare that to the gauge.....and if they were way off, I guess that would tell me that the gauge is bad, is that correct?

I don’t work on well systems.

 

[cliffyk]

I'mmmmm not....It's a high-quality, fluid-filled gauge and only a couple of years old, so I was presuming it's OK,......but I don't know that for sure. Thinking about it now, since the gauge is right at the pressure tank, the water passing through the gauge does not go through my 2 backwash filters or my pleated sediment filter, so maybe it could get clogged. I guess I could check that by waiting for the tank to be full and then test the air pressure of the tank and compare that to the gauge.....and if they were way off, I guess that would tell me that the gauge is bad, is that correct?

 

[cliffyk]

Gauges are relatively inexpensive on Amazon, just get a new one to use as a reference...