draining down

[wittoner]

whats the best way of draining down the water from the upstairs water pipes without a drain cock,

 

[KillingTime]

1. Turn the supply off from the header tank (between the tank and the radiators).

2. Turn all the valves on your upstairs radiators off. Count the turns on your check valves so you can re-open them correctly when finished.

3. Place a bowl / bucket under the pipe to cut and go through it with a pipe slice. When the pipe slice starts to cut through, water will start exiting under pressure (initially), so have a towl ready to cover the pipe slice so you can channel the water into the bucket.

After 10 mins or so, the pressure will drop as the top part of your system drains down. Go through the rest of the pipe with the slice and let the rest of the water out into the bucket.



I used to use the downstairs drain cock, but getting all the water out from the upstairs piping without drainign the whole system is a real pain. You have to open all the bleed valves on your upstairs & downstairs radiators to let the air get in. Remember, the more water you get rid of, the more you have to replace, and the more rust inhibitor you have to add to keep te solution at the right strength.

By closing all you upstairs rads, you keep the water in them. When you go through the pipe, the only water that comes out is what's left in the upstairs piping.

This is all I ever do now when working on the ff system.

 

[Softus]

wittoner - what job are you trying to do?

KillingTime - stop talking b*llocks.

Firstly, very few systems have a valve installed on the outlet of the F&E cistern. There's a good reason for this - it could get turned off and thereby be a hazard.

The best way to drain a system that has no DOC is to disconnect one rad (after shutting its valves), empty it, connect a hose to one of the valves, and open the valve. That way you have full control over the situation.

 

[Rob]

You can buy self cutting drain offs and fit a permanent one after if your rads are too big to lift off.

 

[wittoner]

sorry people ,what im trying to do is just drain down the water from the bathroom basin and bath if i need to solder any new joints, not the central heating system

 

[namsag]

Eh. Turn water off and open all hot and cold taps upstairs and down stairs and flush the toilet.

 

[wonderb0y]

sorry people ,what im trying to do is just drain down the water from the bathroom basin and bath if i need to solder any new joints, not the central heating system

you will have to leave the hot tap open until it drains the tank unless youve got a bung kit, or if the gate valve coming from the tank works turn that off if it has one

make sure pipes are dry before trying to solder otherwise use compression

 

[wittoner]

thanks for that chaps