Kitchen mixer tap is slowing down!

[alibob1982]

I wondered if anyone had any advice for me.

I moved into a new home a few months ago, and have noticed over the past few weeks that the mixer tap over the kitchen sink has started to lose its pressure. About a week ago, it got too low to trigger our combi boiler to fire up when we had only the hot running through... and now it has reached the point where it takes about 30 secs to fill a mug with water!

I looked through our combi boiler manual when this first started to be a problem, and saw that it mentioned a flow restrictor valve. I have no idea what one of these would look like, nor where to find it. The flow through all the other taps in the house is fine, so I assume that I need to take apart the kitchen tap - any words of wisdom, or pointers to a website which could help me with this??

Many thanks Alison

[John]

Could be the tap filter?? Does it have a wire gauze filter at the spout? This will screw off with the aid of some thin-nose pliers - take it off carefully 'cos there's a spring loaded filter behind that; have the washing up bowl for things to fall into. Disassemble, rinse all the parts out, wonder where all the crap is coming from, reassemble, try again.

I've done this a couple of times with mine over the years, but in fact my pressure is low all the time: this group enlightened me just a few weeks ago that my problem is to do with the fact that my tap is supposed to be pressurised -- I don't think this is your problem though.

John

[The Medway Handyman]

Your mixer will either be a ceramic cartridge jobby which goes from on to off in a half or quarter turn - or a 'turn it several times' rubber washer jobby.

If the latter, remove the top and you should see a splined stem. At the base of this is a circlip. Likely its come adrift. If so just push it back into its groove.

IMO once they start coming adrift they keep doing it - replace the jumper assembly - available in B&Q.

[John]

The gauze is there to aerate the water and give a smooth flow - well worth cleaning.

The Combi will have a flow restrictor at its input end - could this be a cause of the problem - are all hot taps effected?