dirty green water from taps

Hello all,

An unusual problem has surfaced after moving into a flat, every tap, the toilet flush and shower all seem to have green/yellow water with tiny flakes of what looks like paint (which disintegrate on touch).

Could someone please shed some light on what this may be and how to deal with it..

Thanks in advance,
Worried.

sounds like the plumbers never flushed the hot and cold supply out. Easiest thing you could do is turn all the taps on and leave them till clear. Dont drink it as it sounds like flux in the pipes

Thanks eaton, I hope its as simple as that. The tiny flakes that come out of the taps made me think of some rusting water tank (the building is quite old despite the flat being newly refurbished - new water heater, taps etc).

TIA

luckybob said:

Hello all,

An unusual problem has surfaced after moving into a flat, every tap, the toilet flush and shower all seem to have green/yellow water with tiny flakes of what looks like paint (which disintegrate on touch).

Could someone please shed some light on what this may be and how to deal with it..

Thanks in advance,
Worried.

Click to expand...

it will most likley be corrosion from a non plastic tank get checked out but your kitchen tap should be fine

if you have a cold water tank in the loft, go and look at it. see if it has dirt, algae or a dead pigeon inside, if so, clean it and empty it out through the cold bath tap. If it is a rusty steel one replace it with plastic.

If it has no lid, fit one.

If it has no insulating jacket, fit one.

Otherwise it is probably just old pipes that have been worked on losing disturbed scale, or green from copper pipes recently cut or soldered. It will wash out, and if you are in a hard water area, they will soon line themselves with a layer of limescale.

run plenty of cold water to rinse out the pipes. Once the pipes are clean look in the WC cistern and remove any particles that have collected at the bottom.

you may find you get green staining under taps or in the WC pan, until the pipes scale up. You can use a bathroom cleaning spray that says it removes scale but you may need a white nylon kitchen scourer as well.