im about to be fitting a new bathroom but as its quite old, theres no service valves on any of the pipework. Is there an easy way to do this without having to shut off the water to the house? If I do this, will it affect my central heating at all?
New Bathroom
- Thread starter scottpetrie
- Start date
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No service or iso valves then you may need to shut off the mains at least for the cold water. It depends on how your cold and hot water is delivered.
If the bathroom is fed my mains water, i.e. cold mains hot combi then a least for the cold you will have to shut the main down, just for as long as it takes to cut the pipe and stick a few valves on though. Hot could probably be isolated at cold mains in @ the boiler
If it's fed by a cold water storage cistern in the loft and you have a hot water cylinder, then switching off the heat to the cylinder and bunging up the cold water cistern feeds to hot ad cold will isolate the hot and cold
This would not normally affect the central heating (radiators), no
If the bathroom is fed my mains water, i.e. cold mains hot combi then a least for the cold you will have to shut the main down, just for as long as it takes to cut the pipe and stick a few valves on though. Hot could probably be isolated at cold mains in @ the boiler
If it's fed by a cold water storage cistern in the loft and you have a hot water cylinder, then switching off the heat to the cylinder and bunging up the cold water cistern feeds to hot ad cold will isolate the hot and cold
This would not normally affect the central heating (radiators), no
Ive had a look in my airing cupboard. There is 2 pipes coming from the loft with shut off valves on them. One goes straight down under the floor,(its a bungalow so would this maybe be the main water coming in?) and the other goes into the bottom of the wtaer cylinder. If I shut these off would this isolate water to the bathroom? Im hoping this would also let me isolate the water but not empty the tank in the loft, so hopefully avoiding any air locks when I open it back up
The red headed valve on the pipe running into the hot water cylinder will shut off the hot water, but not sure about the cold. The other pipe may be the cold running down to the bathroom, shutting it off will test that theory. If that doesn't work then only way to isolate the cold is go up into loft and bung the cold outlet from the tank with something, this will stop the cold feed.
This won't work though if the cold is fed from the mains of course.
This won't work though if the cold is fed from the mains of course.
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Lube up those valves before trying them.
Thanks Ill give it a try. As Im going to be putting in service valves am I right in saying that I need flexi connectors that are 15mm to 1/2” for the taps?
Usually 15mmm sink and loo and 22mm for any bath.You can get flexi with built in iso valve.
If i bought flexi with built in valve, what would I need to fit on the pipe end for it? Just a nut c/w olive? Or maybe push fit?
D
durhamplumber
Guarenteed to leak
They are available as push fit or compression fitting.
Okay thanks. Im also replacing the shower. Its an old round handled thermostatic with a seperate outlet for shower hose. The water pressure is quite poor but I e been told it could be because its old and could be scaled up inside. I noticed today if the showers running and I turn the hot tap on, the shower pressure pretty much stops. If I turn the cold tap on, nothing happens to shower. The bath taps have quite high pressure. Does this mean the taps are mains fed and the shower is gravity fed from loft tank? If so, I dont want to tile the bathroom and fit new shower to find its the same. Could I tee off the bath cold pipe for better pressure?
Hi pressure and high flow are 2 different things. If you have a hot water cylinder and a cistern in the loft then that feeds all your hot water. The bath will have low pressure taps usually with 22mm pipes feeding them so the flow will be great but the pressure won't be. The shower needs more pressure to be effective especially as the shower head is closer to the loft tank (cistern) and hence why the shower's crap (no real distance from the shower head to the take so no real head of pressure, 0.1 bar for ever meter the tank is above the shower head), especially when the hot tap is on.
Teeing off the bath taps is fine but chances are you will have the same issue with low pressure at the shower. Time to get an experienced bod in to take a look and advise would be my advice.
Teeing off the bath taps is fine but chances are you will have the same issue with low pressure at the shower. Time to get an experienced bod in to take a look and advise would be my advice.
Thanks. Would teeing off the bath taps not be better as the cold is fed from the mains water supply? Every tap in the house has decent pressure, its only the shower thats low
If the cold is mains fed you’ll get unbalanced feeds and the cold will out-do the hot... even pushing the hot back up the supply if it’s a cheap n nasty valve or it goes defective.
Again Scott, you may be confusing pressure with flow.
If you have a tank (cistern) in the loft, that may be supplying the cold as well as the hot to the bathroom, so if you have a vented hot water cylinder fed from the attic cistern, then all your hot water would be classed as low pressure. Are all the taps separate/single taps?
You will have at least one mains cold, usually the kitchen.
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