Re: mains flow rate in york

[Andy Hall]

Had the plumbers round to quote for a combi system. The British Gas

>man takes out his flow rato-meter and gives me about 10l/min flow rate >for the mains. What? The local plummer didn't even check for the flow >rate, said it was no problem, but how can he know? The BG man said >something about maybe finding the stop tap and opening it to the full >might help; also that I might do something to the mains connection to >increase the flow. Friends who live close by have a collossal mains >pressure in York, why does ours suck?

It could be because the stop tap in the street is turned down, or perhaps your one in the house.

You could try turning on the kitchen cold tap and then seeing whether you can adjust the one in the street. Quite often, there is grot that collects at the street tap which you can dislodge this way.

If you aren't comfortable with doing this then contact the water supplier and ask them to visit. Don't mention that you have had the flow tested because legally they are only required to deliver 9 litres/minute

Beyond this, it's possible that there is a blockage somewhere or that the pipe is too small. You could do a sanity check with an immediate neighbour.

>Shouldn't there be an experimental shower room somewhere where you can >check out showers with 3l/min (my current setup - old tank system), >10l/min and maybe 15 or 20l/min? It's hard to tell in theory whether >8l/min is good enough for me.

If you have had a system with a tank, then this flow rate will be very disappointing. You really need to get to about 20lpm for reasonable results.

>Cheers, > >Fred

.andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl