Water Department
Fire Hydrants
Maintenance
We maintain in excess of 600 fire hydrants in The City of
Kendallville. This includes flushing, painting, greasing,
installing, replacing, pressure testing, flow testing and any
other task connected with fire hydrants.
Flushing these hydrants has several purposes. It is a great
way to make sure that the hydrants are still in working order.
While we are flushing a hydrant, we also grease them and check
the caps to make sure the Fire Department can easily access them
in the case of an emergency. If we find a faulty hydrant, we
mark it with an “out of service” tag and quickly replace it. We
place fire protection at the top of our list.
This service also keeps the main lines clean and fresh. If
water stands in a line for too long, it may become unhealthy. We
make it our business to know the areas that need extra flushing
to keep the water safe and fresh. We also take daily tests in
our system to ensure proper chlorine residuals for safe water.
Fire Hydrant maintenance is an ongoing and never-ending
process. We flush every hydrant in Kendallville at least one
time per year. Some hydrants require more attention, especially
hydrants located on dead end water mains or in low usage areas.
We divide these hydrants by twelve and try to flush an equal
amount in each of the twelve months. This relieves the demand on
our treatment plants by dividing the production demand as
equally as we can.
We flush about 60 of these hydrants twice per year and
another 60 four times per year. These are the hydrants in the
low usage areas.
Many times however, weather or problems in the distribution
system change our schedule. We may have to flush January’s
hydrant in February, for example. In any case, we are very
faithful to flush them the proper amount of times per year to
keep the main lines clean and fresh. If you happen to turn on a
faucet while we are flushing, you may get a little rusty colored
water. This is normal and can be taken care of by running your
water for a few minutes until it clears up.
We maintain good records of our flush dates and water usages
during this process. If you would like to know when the last
time a hydrant was maintained or if we are currently flushing in
your area, contact us and we would be glad to get this
information to you.
We also try to paint as many hydrants as we can in a given
year. If you notice a hydrant that is especially in need of
paint or repair, please contact us and we will place it on a
higher priority. We appreciate you patience in this matter.
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