Can anyone show me how to convert static head of water pressure into delivery of water at the tap - or even better, please do it for me because I never was any good at maths :-(
First the numbers, then the explanation - it was taking 58 seconds to fill a 1-litre jug, so how many metres static head is that?
Explanation - United Utilities have fixed a problem on their "communication pipe" (whatever that is) that was causing us to have very low water pressure. According to their 'standards of service' (as pointed out to me by their own inspector), we may be eligible for 50 quid compensation and, given these tough economic times I thought "great", whereas in the past I may not have bothered. Anyway, I digress...
There wasn't enough pressure to open the solenoid valve of the shower and because there's always a slug of cold water in the pipes that has to come through first, it was taking seven minutes to get enough hot water from the combi boiler in the loft to fill the bathroom wash basin. We then had to stand in the bath and scoop the hot water out of the basin with a jug and pour that over ourselves every morning for 10 days.
So their 'standards of service' wording is:
"If the water pressure in our communication pipe falls below 7 metres static head twice within a four week period (each time for longer than one hour) we will automatically pay you £50 once per annum"
From first reporting low water pressure to UU, it took 5 days for an inspector to come out and have a look, and then another 5 days before the guys arrived to dig the hole and fix the problem - a total of around
240 hours.Having just rung UU to see about this compensation, they first tried to weasel out of it by saying that we'd only had one period of low pressure within four weeks but to qualify for compensation we need two periods of more than one hour each - seems that one continuous period of 240 hours doesn't qualify, or so they are trying to say!!!