Whilst on the subject of Plumbing

In my friends house all taps leave behind a green/blue residue overnight if one of the kids or a visitor fails to turn the taps off completely. (The taps "will" turn off properly but have "fashionable" small smooth handles so a good grip is required to make sure there are no drips.)

All the plumbing system is High pressure with no loft storage tank and the stain comes from both hot and cold taps.

See photo

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It is a hard water area with one of these disposable cartridge conditioners (similar to but not exactly this)

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fitted in the rising main near the stop c*ck.

My house is less than 400 yards away so I assume it has the same water supply, it does not suffer this problem, but I do have a low pressure feed to all except the kitchen sink.

Is this anything more than a minor irritant or is something seriously wrong.

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news
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Green stains are associated with copper and nickel compounds (remember your basic inorganic chemistry from school?)

I suspect the hard water (or aggressive cleaning agents) has taken off some of the chrome from the taps (inside maybe) and the staining is coming from there. Maybe your taps are newer or the lower pressure and correct use turning off fully means that you don't see this (yet!)

Also being close does not mean you have water from the same treatment works. In the town where I live there are two water sources and somewhere near neighbours are bound to be on different supplies.

Reply to
Bob Minchin

Dissolved CO2, SO2 and even H2S in the water attacks the copper pipes forming copper carbonate, copper sulphate etc. This gives the green stains. (Like outdoor copper roofs.)

Common in water from wells, springs and boreoles. I had a spring at my last house. Rotted away the copper pipe like fun. Plastic pipe was the only answer. (Plus an open tank)

The copper salts are slightly poisonous, you should run off the overnight standing water before drinking every morning. Eg flush the toilet.

Open water tanks give the dissolved gasses chance to escape. Water softeners sometimes release CO2 into the water so your cartridge may be contributing to the problem/ CO2 is also released into the water as limescale is formed.

Reply to
harryagain

Thanks to both for the responses.

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news

That looks like a classic case of aggressive water reacting with copper components of the system. A common problem with private supplies, but less common with public ones. Some private supply users even need to go so far as to have ph balancing systems to does the incoming water into an acceptable range.

Might be worth consulting with the local water supplier and explaining what is happening.

Reply to
John Rumm

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