Shower pressure of cold, leaky sink! Help please :)

[boxrick]

I have two problems I would help resolving, I recently paid a plumber who didn't resolve my issues and if anything made it worse but perhaps pointed me in a better direction of my problems.

Problem1:

The water pressure in my bathroom is fine, the sink hot and cold water pressures are OK. However the pressure from the shower has been gradually getting worse. The plumber removed the tap (pictured) from the front and cleaned out some gunk from the filters. This seems to have resolved the hot water pressure, however the cold water is still a trickle. When leaving the tap removed and turning the hot and cold pipes on individually the hot flows well and the cold is a trickle from the wall.

He poked his screwdriver in and some orange gunk came out but this didn't resolve the problem. The pipes are not easily accessible due to being tiled in and under the bath is simply a metal sheet blocking access ( pictured ).

So is there any easy way to 'flush' the cold side out to remove any potential blockage, or is this simply going to be a big job of pulling off tiles ? Any advice to getting this resolved is appreciated!



Problem 2:

The same plumber replaced my tap which has been leaking slowly below, it turned out the leak was not coming from the tap but a joint near the top of the waste ( I have circled this in one of the pictures below ). What is the easiest way to resolve this, is it just a case of buying that plumbers tape unscrewing it placing on top and screwing back up?

 

[Burnerman]

Regarding the shower, Id consider removing the shower mixer bar completely and seeing how good the flow was there.....at the same time you could poke a spiralling sink unblocker contraption up the cold pipe as far as possible - they are about a metre long.
As for the basin leak, the waste really needs to come off for resealing......Toolstation do a ‘basin mate’ gasket which is really a tapered rubber plug that seals the sink ceramic outlet and they are very successful.
Just a point, one of the flexible sink supply pipes seems to have been stressed at some time.
John

 

[boxrick]

Hey thanks for the reply!

Regarding the shower, Id consider removing the shower mixer bar completely and seeing how good the flow was there.....at the same time you could poke a spiralling sink unblocker contraption up the cold pipe as far as possible - they are about a metre long.

The plumber did this, and the flow was poor even without any mixer for the cold.

Do you mean something like this https://www.screwfix.com/p/rothenberger-pipe-drain-cleaning-coil-1-32m/65766 ?

I also noticed this little device, I wonder if this will help...

https://www.screwfix.com/p/sink-bath-unblocker/13894

As for the basin leak, the waste really needs to come off for resealing......Toolstation do a ‘basin mate’ gasket which is really a tapered rubber plug that seals the sink ceramic outlet and they are very successful.

Something like this?
https://www.toolstation.com/basin-mate/p37534
Does this replace or simply go over the existing unit somewhere?

Just a point, one of the flexible sink supply pipes seems to have been stressed at some time.
John

I have the pipes off the new tap... the plumber didn't fit them because of a 1/4 fitting on the wall and 3/4 fitting on the pipes. Any idea of the sort of adapter I would require?

 

[Burnerman]

As your pipes are tiled in, I’d give anything a try......the Rothenburger is indeed what I meant, and I’d also consider a wet vac, with a suitably taped nozzle to fit on the exposed pipe.
The basin mate is what you need, and it is inserted up into the basin and secured with that back nut - cleaning all of the grot away first to give it a best chance. Any temporary repair will be
I would have thought the flexy had a 1/2” and a 3/4” ends, and they should be available.....yours won’t be unique!
John

 

[HERTS P&D]

Is the shower feed from a tank in the loft or mains pressure?

Andy

 

[CBW]

Could be a washer or spindle/headgear wants re-greasing if in the style of fully open and close type. Regards the basin washer I think burnerman has answered that one?

 

[HERTS P&D]

See below:

https://www.toolstation.com/basin-m...MI9tSFlKax5wIVi7TtCh2I7QxjEAQYASABEgLoGPD_BwE

Andy

 

[boxrick]

After purchasing one of these https://www.toolstation.com/waste-pipe-cleaner/p80592 and a water pump I pulled off the tap in the shower and started attacking the pipe, sadly the 6mm waste pipe cleaner could not get further than about 20cm after hitting the first real bend. The water pump also did nothing.

I am potentially using this an excuse to replace the bath we never use with a nice dedicated shower unit. But it seems a little overkill for the problem.. I resorted to turning down the hot water pressure in the bathroom to basically nothing to allow us to shower without getting scolded for now.

 

[HERTS P&D]

Check the non return valve in the mixer to see if the cold side is working correctly.

Andy