The cold tap to our bath has stopped working. The header tank has one pipe coming from it which splits, via a T-piece, into two. One pipe from this goes to the cylinder to be heated and the hot water tap flows without problems. The second pipe goes to the cold water tap.
Water flows freely from the loft down the pipe to the airing cupboard where there is a gate valve and the blockage is somewhere between the gate valve and the bath. I know this because I have taken the gate valve apart and the water is running up to that point and I have taken the tap apart and there is no water going to it.
So what's the best thing to do now? Should I use some curtain wire to try and move the blockage? Or is there a better way? Any idea what might be blocking it?
Uncouple the gate valve and turn on the cold tap to the bath, blow down the gate valve end, there's probably a dead mouse or some such stuck in the pipe, probably at the bath tap. don't suck.
It could be blockage, or it may be an air-lock. Can you get mains water to the non-working tap - maybe using a hose-pipe connected to the kitchen tap? If so, you can use mains to back-flush the pipe between the tap and tank - which should clear any blockage or air-lock.
You'll need an assistant. Connect a hose between a mains tap and the outlet of the bath tap. Turn on the bath tap. Get the assistant to *gently* turn on the mains tap. Don't run it for long, or you'll overflow the header tank.
I was trying to do this but the gate valve is quite inaccessible by mouth as it is at the back of the airing cupboard. I tried to blow from the tap but it didn't help.
I'll try the hose suggestion next.
In answer to the other poster, I suppose it isn't technically an emergency since there's no water pouring through the ceiling, so I apologise if I have broken the netiquette of the group with my title.
I ask because these things have a habit of failing in just this way - the spindle breaks inside and they appear to open, but nothing gets through becasue the gate is no longer attached to the tap!
I still like the trick (if you can, of course) of unplumbing the washing machine and shorting the hot to the cold then open both taps to reverse-flow the (presumed mains) cold back through the hot supply and into the loft tank. Needs mains cold at the machine of course.
I never knew that (but then again, I've never looked at header tanks until the last few days!) Has it always been standard practice to have two feeds from the tank? I presume this is the original plumbing and the house was built in the 1970s. Was this the way it was done in the
70's or were they cowboy builders/plumbers?
Perhaps they thought drilling two holes in the tank doubled the chance of a leak or them splitting it?
What is the point of having non mains cold water? I understand it's to balance the pressure if you fit a shower, but since no shower is fitted (at least not in that way), why not fill the cold from the mains? Or is it to stop you flooding the bath with fast flowing mains water and cooling the bath to stone cold?
That's the strange part. My girlfriend went to run the bath and no water came out. We had not done anything to the water. The pipes from the tank have gate valves on them in the airing cupboard. I see the point of isolating the hot water but I'm not sure what purpose having one on the cold water does, other than allow you to change the tap washer.
To answer the other posters' questions as well:
First I took the tap apart and checked the washer was firmly attached; it was.
I disconnected the gate valve in the airing cupboard and water gushed from the tank, so I knew the top section of pipe was ok.
I looked at the gate valve and when I turned it, I looked inside and it did open and close the gate, so I knew that was working.
I took a hose and connected one end to the basin (mains) and connected the other end to the pipe in the airing cupboard. When I turned the basin tap on water gushed from the bat tap. So I thought I had cleared whatever it was.
I took off the hose, fitted the gate valve, and nothing happened!
I took it all apart and repeated and with the hose attached, water flowed from the basin via the hose, through the pipe and out into the bath, but when it was re-connected nothing happened.
I then tried it in reverse and connected the hose from the basin to the bath and after blowing the air from the pipe, it has fixed the problem. The gate valve is back on and water flows from the header tank to the bath perfectly.
It seems that the only thing wrong with it was that the section of pipe between the airing cupboard and the bath was full of air.
Thank you to everyone for your help.
What I do not understand is why wasn't the pressure from the tank/gravity sufficient to push the water through the air filled pipe?
The pipe from the airing cupboard drops from the gate valve under the floorboards and comes back up under the bath to attach to the taps. It doesn't go any higher than the bath or the gate valve, so why did I get an airlock in the pipe?
Two feeds from the cold tank is common (and to be strongly rcommended) when you are feeding a shower. Typically you would place a the outlet for the dedicated cold feed to the shower a little lower in the tank than that for the hot. That way should you exhaust the cold tank the hot water will stop flowing first, which is safer.
The setup you have is not optimal, but quite common for feeding taps only.
For use with a shower, and "tradition" are the answers to that. These days many new properties would be built with mains to all the cold taps.
There are a some advantages (but plenty of disadvantages also) of using tanked water for the bathroom (continued supply of water during a supply interruption), quieter cistern filling in the loo, and less condensation on it (tank water will be a bit warmer). Not so good to brush your teeth in though!
Seems odd I will admit. Are you sure there is not some loop of pipe you have missed along the route that does rise higher?
Without lifting the floorboards I don't know, but I think the pipe just goes from the tank to the bath via the airing cupboard; I don't think it goes anywhere else so I would expect it to be flat. It obviously isn't. Perhaps it goes up and then down a bit? Perhaps the holes in the joists are at different levels?
No, it only rises from the floor boards to the bath tap: probably less than two foot. That's what has confused me, why hasn't the head of water from the loft tank been sufficient to blow the air out of the tap?
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