What’s my water tank made of?

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Hi,
I’ve got a pretty manky cold water tank in my loft that I’d like to clean up and fit/make a lid for. But after I started reading about tanks I found out they can sometimes be made of asbestos.. Now I don’t think mine is, it feels like plastic/fibreglass and it bends and flexes with a bit of pressure. Can anyone confirm from the pictures?

Thanks!


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As there is often a bit of splash in that area, a plastic product is a good idea.
Something slightly more rigid may be better but Im sure you’ll conjure something up!
John :)
 
Make it from GRP! You'll have to make up a basic mould first.

Nozzle
 
O ! ;) You could use the Wickes Black cover sheets - next item along - should be rigid enough.
From what I can see it’s the same as I linked only almost double the size (which I don’t need) and black? Another idea was some sort of waterproof sheeting/membrane then a sheet of wood sat on top.
 
So off the back of this I cleaned out the tank on Sunday. I scooped any loose debris out as best I could before draining down the tank via the upstairs taps, scrubbed the tank using a washing up brush and got it to the a stage where I’m happy for us to drink out of it. I untied the ballcock and refilled the tank and now I have little to no water upstairs..

Both the bath and sink have mixer taps, hot seems ok in the bath but cold barely trickles and hot and cold in the sink are just trickles.The toilet fills but very slowly band I suspect not all the way (concealed cistern)

I assume I either have an airlock or some crap has got in the pipe work from the tank even though I was quite careful not to let that happen.

Any ideas on how to fix!?
 
1: do not drink water from the tank.
2. Use the mixer tap in the kitchen, with your hand over the spout to slowly force water from the cold side up the hot side... Palm of Hand over spout tightly > open hot tap > open cold main slowly > let cold main push up hot pipe for a minute or two to clear air/debris back up into tank. You can also get someone to open other hot taps while you do this to eject air/debris out of those outlets.
When you have the hot running freely, you can then try using the hot taps upstairs to do the same to the tank fed cold supplies. If that fails, you'll need to rig a hose up from cold mains to tank fed cold outlet(s).
 
Do as above first then if you can not get the hang of it, you could always use a wet vac on each tap and suck the air out. Just make sure all other taps are closed while you are doing each tap.

Andy
 
An airlock is quite common in the low-pressure pipes after draining. In my house, it sometimes clears overnight, or it can be done by leaving the cold water bath tap dribbling, or turning it on and off intermittently. The cold is not the same pipe as the hot water, so forcing water up the hot tap has no effect on the cold
 
1: do not drink water from the tank.

Why is that? I appreciate it’s not mains supplied but surely everyone would have been told from years ago not to drink upstairs water?

Thanks for the suggestions, I’ll give it a go tonight.
 

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