I shut off the pump gate valves so that I could service my central heating pump last night. These stop the water as removing the motor assembly splits the wet part of the pump in half? Did the valves work? Did they heck! So questions for anyone who does this more than the once that I have then...
- Why are these valves so bad at shutting off the water?
- Just how hard are you supposed to have to tighten them to completely cut the flow?
- What tool do people normally use to shut them (to get anywhere near enough torque to shut I used a long adjustable spanner) and why do they have a tiny little square heads to tighten rather than something more useful?