System water pressure

[agibson]

I wonder if anyone has any suggestions.

I have just re-tiled an ensuite bathroom floor. I turned off the water at two clearly marked gate valves in the airing cupboard and removed the WC and WHB before tiling. I also replaced the mixer tap on the WHB before refitting.

Having completed all this I then turned the water back on and there is very slow flow both in the WHB and the WC. Water does flow but slowly. WC takes some time to fill.

The bathroom in the house is fine and has good pressure at both hot and cold.

I put in service valves for the tap and if I test the pressure without the tap there the reading is zero.

I don't think I have done anything to the system except turn the water off and on again.

Any ideas where the pressure can have gone. Both hot and cold are affected.

I didn't check before I switched the water off for comparison. Note to self - must do that in future!!

 

[Bahco]

Check there is water in the tank and if so does the ball valve drop when you turn a tap on.

 

[TicklyT]

Is the new brassware you have suitable for the water pressure you have available?

Gravity systems typically run at between 0.1 and 0.5 Bar, which will hardly register on many pressure gauges. They achieve good flow rates with very little pressure by using relatively large pipes and large waterways through the valve bodies.

Many (most?) taps on the market these days are designed for use on mains pressure systems, usually running at 2 Bar or more - that's about ten times the pressure in a gravity system. These pressures allow adequate performance from taps with very restricted waterways.

Either the packaging, or the blurb in the brochure should identify the working pressure range of your chosen taps.