I recently came home to find that my toilet was overflowing and that the Torbeck bottom entry valve was not turning the water off when the cistern was full. I fiddled with it but could not even understand how it works. We later discovered that there had been a pressure surge and all the water was turned off in the village for the next few hours (not sure if this is relevant?). I purchased the same valve but it does not work either - can anyone help with a suggestion?
The old fashioned Portsmouth ball valve closes off the main water jet by brute force of a pad pushed over it as float rises. They are relatively reliable but noisy.
If you take the Torbeck apart, you will find a black diaphragm with a small offset hole. This fits over a needle projecting from the rear body of the valve. Some older models had a little captive plastic peg in the hole. The purpose of this is to allow a tiny flow of water from the rear chamber to the front one.
On the front cap, there is another small hole which allows water to leave the front chamber into the cistern. Notice that on the float arm, there is a little pad which covers this hole when the float rises.
When the float is down, the water pressure forces the diaphragm forward allowing flow into the cistern. The needle valve at the diaphragm limits the flow through that path such that the pressure in the front chamber is lower than the back one because of the escape of water through the front pin hole.
WHen the float rises and the front hole is finally covered, the pressure in the fron chamber becomes equal to that of the rear chamber. The design of the diaphragm is such that under these conditions it is slightly springy towards the back and shuts off the main flow of water. It is arranged that this is done quite gently. Because of the pressure equilibrium not a lot of force is required, unlike the Portsmouth valve.
There are a couple of problem areas. The first is that the mains pressure is too high - often there is water hammer as well. This can be addressed by fitting the HP flow restrictor.
The other is that crud can be caught in either of the small holes. This can be cleared with a piece of very fine fuse wire (not a needle). Other than that, I would look for a manufacturing defect. You can check whether the flow from the small hole at the front stops when the arm is lifted. If it doesn't, thn the valve won't close
They also shut off gently, which can be an advantage if you can't be arsed to take the whole house apart to find the loose pipe that rattles every time the valve shuts.
Where did the crud come from ? Could the "pressure surge" have been related to a crud-dislodging incident ?
My parents live close (few hundred yards) to a rural water treatment works and sandbed filters. Until they installed large filters of their own, they were continually plagued with sand in the water. Washing machine valve seats wore out in no time, and Torbecks were certainly a non-no.
New Torbecks usually fail because they didn't have the right restrictor installed.
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