Query about weak earth wire situation?

[JOB6]

Hi and thank you to everyone for the input and there are some good points which I need to look into. The guy who did the PAT testing stayed for about 3 hours and when he left said that he would have to return after the landlord agrees to what needs to be done in regards of the earth wire assessment.

MikeinLondon you made a lot of valid points and the following I do know of:

The flat didn’t have a combi boiler up until 4 years ago and it has never been serviced by a gas engineer.

The water to the hot water taps is fed via the mains supply but the cold water in the bathroom is fed via a communal tank in the loft of the building.

Something is definitely contaminating the hot water supply but I can’t figure it out, it could be holes in pipes, heat exchanger, or something else which is faulty but the landlord is adamant that the water is fine and he won’t give me any details or help of the installer even though I said I would pay for it. For the last 8 months of living here is when the skin issues began.

The rash doesn’t start as a rash, whenever I use the hot water it burns my skin even when using cool water, it becomes red, itches and tiny blood filled blisters appear which only get worse with time and begin to peel like sunburn, the hot water dries my hands then cuts appear which are incredibly painful. My G.P prescribed all kinds of medication and nothing worked at all, he himself has never seen anything like this.

I moved out for 6 weeks didn’t change detergent, diet or anything else at all to see if anything changes and within the second week I was healing and within 6 weeks all my skin had healed especially my eyelids, ears and hands.

I really don’t know what step I should take next and who I can ask to check out the boiler, any advice who would be able to diagnose the problem as it is coming from the hot water supply. If I can’t get help, then I will need to move out and risk losing my deposit for breaking the tenancy but my health is the most important and this is the last straw as the landlord isn’t cooperating and the agency who lets the flat never seem to help.



Thanks

 

[endecotp]

The flat didn’t have a combi boiler up until 4 years ago and it has never been serviced by a gas engineer.

There is a legal requirement for a landlord to carry out annual gas safety checks.
Are you saying that no safety checks have been done, or are you saying that the safety check didn't ammount to a "service"?

Regarding you rash, I'd consider moving. I don't think anything you can do to the plumbing will resolve your problem.
If you don't want to do that, see if you can find somewhere that will do chemical tests on the water. Google found me https://feedwater.co.uk/laboratory-analysis/ . I know nothing about them, but it does look like a proper lab.

 

[stillp]

Might be worth asking Public Health England if they would test a sample of the water.

The water to the hot water taps is fed via the mains supply but the cold water in the bathroom is fed via a communal tank in the loft of the building.

This doesn't make sense. If the water to your hot taps came from the mains supply then it would be a)uncontaminated, and b)cold!

 

[endecotp]

Means surely that it's from a combi at mains pressure.

 

[stillp]

Ah yes, I'd overlooked the combi.

 

[Mikefromlondon]

Well explained Job6, so I take it you are saying the cold water to your bathroom comes from a storage tank, which can now explain your problem, and is more to do with it than your boiler issues or other issues. In my own house when we first moved in, it used to have a cold water storage tank that fed the bathroom, then we installed a combi boiler CH that also provided us with hot water directly and before that just had the MAIN gas water heater in our bathroom which provided hot water for our bath and sink, no it was not a HW storage tank. I remember how filthy the cold water storage tank was, made of galvanised steel, it was full of filth green and black algae, and small dead creatures, horrible, we used to always get coughs and colds and throat problems, so thanks to our new combi boiler we got rid of that filthy cold water storage tank, as well as the ugly bathroom gas water heater above our bath tub. In the kitchen we had a seperate multipoint heater that vented directly into the kitchen!

therefore your cold water tanks may be badly contaminated with possibly dead mice and birds and what not, you may want to look into it with a torch.

So since installing a combi boiler you are now getting hot water directly via your combi boiler, which would be connected directly to your incoming cold water feed, but your landlord may not have bothered connecting cold water directly to your bathroom fittings.

So after all issues may be with your cold water storage tank rather than hot water from the boiler, or any earth currents causing electrolysis.

Your hot water can only get contaminated if your had any issues with its DHW heat exchanger, where a tiny perforation may cause chemically contaminated CH water getting into your hot water supply and it may cause some of your symptoms.

(When you take a bath/shower preasumably you are not using hot water alone and would be mixing some cold water from the tank to get the comfortable temperature)

If your DHW Heat Xchanger was leaking, yes it could open your blow out valve, (PRV) you may not even notice it might not even have to drip, or gushing out water, since most incoming water pressure in many areas don't even go past the PRV threshold, many a times you will have a job filling boilers to more than 2 bars, the mains pressure is so low in most areas most of the times, especially in heavily build up areas, I live in London where the pressure never rises above 2.5bars, so how the heck can a for PRV blow out which are normally set to open at 3+ bars?

you said you won't mind paying, so one thing you could do is to get a plumber to plumb cold water directly to your bath, sink etc, I presume
your kitchen is already plumber to mains incoming and not fed through a storage tank! but you never know there are so many idiots about.

 

[Mikefromlondon]

I'm all ears - I'm excited to hear the explanations of how water can"react electrolytically" caused by fault currents travelling through the water and may be causing the OPs rash or how the PRV hasn't yet blown as the heat exchanger perforates to allow mains pressure water into the CH loop.

Looking forward to your detailed explanation of the physics and chemistry that I clearly don't understand.

1. Perforated DHW heat exchanger can leak contaminated water back into cold water supply as well as mix with your hot water supply, why do you think we have a filling loop with a cold water supply, to prevent cross contamination.

2. Why would you think that a blow out valve (PRV) will open when most populated towns don't get enough water mains pressure and in some towns the pressure is kept purposely low to prevent victorian water mains pipes from bursting out. Where I live the most i get is 2.5 bars and is most commonly fluctuates between 1.5 bars and 2.5bars, If I wanted to test my PRV, I can open my filling loop all night and the presure would not have gone past PRV's opening threshold.

3 So I take it you have never experimented with electrolysis, and produced Hydrogen and Oxygen, to experiment with, the two highly lethal gas combinations, probably 100 times more potent than natural gas, but any way, electrolysis leaves some black brown and green scum, which is the product of minerals present in water, it is this scum that can cause rashes.

4. Never heard of hydrogen in your radiators? agreed it is mainly caused by reaction with solder fluxes etc, but electrolysis can take place under certain given conditions, and all that sludge etc, how do you think that is produced?
( A while back, in an immersion heater, the element corroded so bad and became open circuit such that water was only getting Luke warm, there was no RCD fitted to electrical installation, so power did not trip off, the owner complained about water not getting hot and just luke warm, and complained about some other dark matter turned up from time to time, this was electrolysis scum, even if you have AC flowing you will still get this scum, why not just experiment. In an installation where weak earth is suspected, any faults currents may flow through copper pipes instead of the proper earth, and where sections of the pipe work is in plastic push fit joints, the earth discontinues and electrolysis can occur through this area if fault currents are present.

 

[JOB6]

MikeinLondon thank you what you have said makes a lot sense but I have a few questions which I hope anyone can help me out with and thank you in advance.

• A gas person checked the gas meter (received a gas safety certificate)and said it was fine but a gas engineer has never checked or serviced the boiler since its installation 4 years ago is what I should have said.
• I live in a old tenement building therefore the water tank is in the loft which none of the tenants have access to but I did hear a few years ago the tanks had flooded the top floor woman's flat and the council had to sort it out.

Maybe I am wrong about the water supply connections but this is how they are:

• The cold water in the kitchen sink is from the main supply and smells of bleach when left in a cup but I was assured it was safe to drink.
• There is a stopcock under the sink and when I turn it off it turns off the hot and cold water supply in the kitchen and in the bathroom but the taps which work are the cold water tap in the bathroom sink and bathtub.
• One more stopcock next to the toilet but it does not work, the toilet does have a grey colour around the bowl even though I flush it.
• I only have a mixer tap in the bathtub, the bathroom and kitchen sink have single taps .
• The old empty black water tank in the storage cupboard is turned off as there is no need for it anymore since getting the combi boiler installed.
• Maybe the landlord used someone who probabaly wasn't 100 per cent legit in installing the combi boiler because he isn't giving me any information at all.
• There was a cyclinder hot water heater which was originally in the flat and gas fireplace in the living room, so he decided to update the flat by getting rid of the old hot water system and installing a combi boiler, the pipes also look old and some cut off with a seal on them.
• The flat has old radiators (original ones) in the rooms which are terrible in winter as they don't heat the rooms up, he only installed one new radiator in the living room which makes the room warm, they are all controlled via the combi boiler.
• Even though the boiler is working the stand-by light is always flashing green maybe that means nothing.
• How does this look where the filling loop connection is:
  The pipes under the boiler:
  To the far right the cold water inlet valve (stopcock) which turns off the water when turned fully clockwise and full on pressure of hot water when turned fully anti clockwise: Is the cold water inlet valve stopcock (PRV) meant to be turned fully anti-clockwise as maybe the combi boiler cant handle the pressure of the the hot water flow?
  
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[JOB6]

How does this look where the filling loop connection is:
The pipes under the boiler:
To the far right the cold water inlet valve (stopcock) which turns off the water when turned fully clockwise and full on pressure of hot water when turned fully anti clockwise: Is the cold water inlet valve stopcock (PRV) meant to be turned fully anti-clockwise as maybe the combi boiler cant handle the pressure of the the hot water flow?

 

[Mikefromlondon]

You really need not worry about your PRV (Presure Release Valve) and it has nothing to do with cold water filling or filling loop, because I was trying to answer someone else as well about why PRV didn't blow out, ( blow out does not means as in real blowing things out) but in other words why did it not open to release excessive pressure in your system since I said your DHW heat exchanger may have developed a tiny perfortaion, in which case mains cold water would start filling up the CH radiators through this breach (perforation) to 3 bars and excess pressure would then be seen to escape via PRV., this would discharge any access water pressure to outside of the wall your boiler is fixed to. This can only happen if the incoming mains has enough pressure to open the PRV valve seat if perforation keeps allowing cold water filling the system through this perforation) (Indeed you need not worry, but there are number of other reasons too when this valve will open and start discharging access pressure)

Your filling loop connections are there, you can see one on left with a black knob, and one on the right again with a black knob, so the filling loop a flexible braided pipe that would be connected between these two and then you would open one of the black taps first and then the other one, whilst watching the pressure gauge, and fill your system (pressurise) to the right minimum required level.

In many installations now this loop is left is left disconnected. If you had any issues with your boiler pressure, give your landlord a call, don't do anything you don't understand. I do not think you have any issues with your boiler. It has to be your cold water from that loft tank.

Get someone to plumb it directly to mains water incoming.

Toilet pan being greyish is a scaling issue from hard water. Using Harpic regularly will dissolve it. Flushing alone does not get rid of water scale.

If you are renting, it is the duty of your landlord to have a Gas safe engineer each year to have it serviced and safety checked and issue you a copy of it. By law.

 

[Newboy]

1. Perforated DHW heat exchanger can leak contaminated water back into cold water supply as well as mix with your hot water supply, why do you think we have a filling loop with a cold water supply, to prevent cross contamination.

Providing that the pressure in the closed loop is higher than the incoming mains water pressure, yes it can. However a corroded heat exchanger will have evidenced itself in the way that the boiler operates. We have a filling loop to, as the name suggests, to fill the closed circuit with water. The reason the filling loop is not left open is to prevent over-pressurising the boiler circuit. The prevention of cross contamination is dealt with by having a double-check valve built into the filling loop.

2. Why would you think that a blow out valve (PRV) will open when most populated towns don't get enough water mains pressure and in some towns the pressure is kept purposely low to prevent victorian water mains pipes from bursting out. Where I live the most i get is 2.5 bars and is most commonly fluctuates between 1.5 bars and 2.5bars, If I wanted to test my PRV, I can open my filling loop all night and the presure would not have gone past PRV's opening threshold.

The PRV on most sealed systems will operate at 3 bar. The incoming mains pressure is used to charge the closed loop to approx 1.5 bar. As the water is heated (in the closed loop) it expands. Charging a boiler loop to above 2 bar will usually result in a PRV discharge as the expansion takes the closed loop pressure over 3 bar. If you'd like to check then please open your filling loop and run the boiler all night - remember that your filling loop has a non-return valve incorporated so the closed loop pressure will rise to match the incoming mains pressure before expansion takes over and can only exit via the PRV

3 So I take it you have never experimented with electrolysis, and produced Hydrogen and Oxygen, to experiment with, the two highly lethal gas combinations, probably 100 times more potent than natural gas, but any way, electrolysis leaves some black brown and green scum, which is the product of minerals present in water, it is this scum that can cause rashes.

Yes I do understand electrolysis and, for the record, the energy value of hydrogen is 9.9 MJ/m³ versus methane at 32.6 MJ/m³ so in fact methane has a higher energy value than hydrogen by a factor of three (rather than your statement of hydrogen being 100 times more potent than methane). Within a heating system, there are a number of ways in which hydrogen can be produced - mainly as a result of corrosion and, occasionally, by galvanic action. The scum is usually an assortment of copper and iron compounds most of which are inert.

I refer you to my previous answer - stop talking utter twaddle and stop alarming people with your hypothetical clap-trap

 

[Newboy]

since most incoming water pressure in many areas don't even go past the PRV threshold, many a times you will have a job filling boilers to more than 2 bars, the mains pressure is so low in most areas most of the times, especially in heavily build up areas, I live in London where the pressure never rises above 2.5bars, so how the heck can a for PRV blow out which are normally set to open at 3+ bars?

A quick lesson in basic physics - a fluid when heated expands. When a fluid is heated in a closed system the pressure increases.

you said you won't mind paying, so one thing you could do is to get a plumber to plumb cold water directly to your bath, sink etc, .

The OP is a tenant and needs permission from the owner of the property to alter any of the systems. In addition, were the tank fed supplies to be replaced by mains fed:

1) The appliances need to be checked that they will tolerate mains pressure
2) If any cisterns are tank fed and converted to mains fed then the jets will need to be changed to HP rather than LP
3) Any redundant pipework needs to be removed back to source (in the common roofspace as advised by the OP) to remove deadlegs

therefore your cold water tanks may be badly contaminated with possibly dead mice and birds and what not, you may want to look into it with a torch.

Any concerns about the condition of common cisterns should be referred back to the owner or managing agent for the entire building.

there are so many idiots about.

Never a truer word was spoken!

 

[Mikefromlondon]

MikeinLondon thank you what you have said makes a lot sense but I have a few questions which I hope anyone can help me out with and thank you in advance.

• A gas person checked the gas meter (received a gas safety certificate)and said it was fine but a gas engineer has never checked or serviced the boiler since its installation 4 years ago is what I should have said.

So he did not actually look into your boiler, and issued a safety certificate, which don't sound good.

• I live in a old tenement building therefore the water tank is in the loft which none of the tenants have access to but I did hear a few years ago the tanks had flooded the top floor woman's flat and the council had to sort it out.

Maybe I am wrong about the water supply connections but this is how they are:

• The cold water in the kitchen sink is from the main supply and smells of bleach when left in a cup but I was assured it was safe to drink.

That could be chlorine or rather high levels of it, or your sense of smell may be more enhanced so you notice it more.

• There is a stopcock under the sink and when I turn it off it turns off the hot and cold water supply in the kitchen and in the bathroom but the taps which work are the cold water tap in the bathroom sink and bathtub.

So that is right, your both hot and cold water in kitchen is direct, your bathroom cold water is from the cold water storage tank, should really be connected to mains cold.

One more stopcock next to the toilet but it does not work, the toilet does have a grey colour around the bowl even though I flush it.
Irrelavent to your rash, just some inconveniece for a plumber when replacing parts in the cistern.

• I only have a mixer tap in the bathtub, the bathroom and kitchen sink have single taps .

Not much of a relevance, though a mixer tap having high pressure feed from boiler and low pressure from cold water storage tank can cause other issues. (not relevant now)

• The old empty black water tank in the storage cupboard is turned off as there is no need for it anymore since getting the combi boiler installed.

Should have been removed to give you more storage space in a cupboard. I hope he emptied the tanks.

• Maybe the landlord used someone who probabaly wasn't 100 per cent legit in installing the combi boiler because he isn't giving me any information at all.

Most likely he used someone who is not fully qualified and registered.

• There was a cyclinder hot water heater which was originally in the flat and gas fireplace in the living room, so he decided to update the flat by getting rid of the old hot water system and installing a combi boiler, the pipes also look old and some cut off with a seal on them.

so it seems you had a back boiler usually fitted in the fire place and a gas fire in the front, and hot water storage tank as well as it did your CH radiators. (Irreverent now)

• The flat has old radiators (original ones) in the rooms which are terrible in winter as they don't heat the rooms up, he only installed one new radiator in the living room which makes the room warm, they are all controlled via the combi boiler.

May be the installer did not balance the system, so much of the CH flow is through the new radiator, and little through the old rads, or they may even be partially blocked, or valves full of sediments restricting flow.

• Even though the boiler is working the stand-by light is always flashing green maybe that means nothing.

Probably means OK, All tenants should be left with basic user manual on boilers and other white goods. Where you can find out if all is OK and how to top up pressure if need be etc.

• How does this look where the filling loop connection is:
  The pipes under the boiler:
• Looks OK.
• To the far right the cold water inlet valve (stopcock) which turns off the water when turned fully clockwise and full on pressure of hot water when turned fully anti clockwise:
• That square knob top right seems your hot outlet water stop valve, should be left fully opem (anticlockwise)
• Is the cold water inlet valve stopcock (PRV) meant to be turned fully anti-clockwise as maybe the combi boiler cant handle the pressure of the the hot water flow?
• No this is not PRV. and it is a cold water inlet to the boiler and should also be left fully open and closing this would also stop your hot water flow. This is Not a PRV which stands for Pressure Relief valve, which i said you need not worry about this at the moement.
• Get your bath re-piped from mains cold feed, and see if your rash improves. good luck
  
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[Mikefromlondon]

A quick lesson in basic physics - a fluid when heated expands. When a fluid is heated in a closed system the pressure increases.

Oh really? does it I never knew that thanks for letting me know that! Now I know water expands at ****ing 4 degrees too when cooling. (BASIC PHYSICS)


The OP is a tenant and needs permission from the owner of the property to alter any of the systems. In addition, were the tank fed supplies to be replaced by mains fed:

1) The appliances need to be checked that they will tolerate mains pressure
2) If any cisterns are tank fed and converted to mains fed then the jets will need to be changed to HP rather than LP
3) Any redundant pipework needs to be removed back to source (in the common roofspace as advised by the OP) to remove deadlegs

Yes, but if his landlord is not prepared to spend money, OP can with his permission, when did I quote he does not require permission? And OP has been advised to seek a professional plumber who would know what to do,


Any concerns about the condition of common cisterns should be referred back to the owner or managing agent for the entire building.

He hasn't got a common cistern, what the hell I have never heard of such rubbish.


Never a truer word was spoken!

That Includes you too,

 

[Mikefromlondon]

Providing that the pressure in the closed loop is higher than the incoming mains water pressure, yes it can. However a corroded heat exchanger will have evidenced itself in the way that the boiler operates. We have a filling loop to, as the name suggests, to fill the closed circuit with water. The reason the filling loop is not left open is to prevent over-pressurising the boiler circuit. The prevention of cross contamination is dealt with by having a double-check valve built into the filling loop.




The PRV on most sealed systems will operate at 3 bar. The incoming mains pressure is used to charge the closed loop to approx 1.5 bar. As the water is heated (in the closed loop) it expands. Charging a boiler loop to above 2 bar will usually result in a PRV discharge as the expansion takes the closed loop pressure over 3 bar. If you'd like to check then please open your filling loop and run the boiler all night - remember that your filling loop has a non-return valve incorporated so the closed loop pressure will rise to match the incoming mains pressure before expansion takes over and can only exit via the PRV



Yes I do understand electrolysis and, for the record, the energy value of hydrogen is 9.9 MJ/m³ versus methane at 32.6 MJ/m³ so in fact methane has a higher energy value than hydrogen by a factor of three (rather than your statement of hydrogen being 100 times more potent than methane). Within a heating system, there are a number of ways in which hydrogen can be produced - mainly as a result of corrosion and, occasionally, by galvanic action. The scum is usually an assortment of copper and iron compounds most of which are inert.

I refer you to my previous answer - stop talking utter twaddle and stop alarming people with your hypothetical clap-trap

DID YOU GOOGLE FOR THOSE FIGURES? What a twaddler and you stop alarming people, I have no idea why your anus is on fire? cool down. You need any ice cubes let me know.