Water pressure

[VonSpud]

We live on a ground floor flat (of a 3floor building) ever since we have moved in, the water pressure of all of the hot water taps has been terrible, it varies from been really poor but flowing to just dribbling from the tap. there is no fixed pattern to when the pressure varies either. Has anybody got any hints or tips to what we can do to fix it? (the pressure on the cold taps in our flat is really really good)

[MollyMalone]

I had a similar problem when I moved into a 2nd floor flat in an old mansion block. What I discovered was that because the flat was so old, all 8 flats were sharing one water supply. So, the only thing we were able to do was to get our own water supply from the mains. This involved getting the Water Board - in this case Thames Water, to give us our own pipe from the mains and cost a huge amount - it was about 15 years ago, and I seem to remember it cost something like �800, but that didn't include the cost of my own plumber who then had to bring the supply in from the boundary of the building and up to my flat. Having said all this, once we got our own mains supply, our water pressure was fantastic.

This may not be the reason of course, if your flat does have it's own mains supply.

But, hope it helps.

[joko]

it usually means the tank is on the same level as your flat rather than the floor above, which would be ideal.

I have this problem but mine is caused by an airlock in the kitchen hot tap, which causes a trickle in the bathroom.

when you get a trickle go to the other hot tap in your flat and turn it on for a few seconds to remove the airlock. (leave other one running) it should then run better if thats the problem

[pegasusbath]

You have two problems here which are interrelated. Firstly your tank will be within the confines of your flat and therefore will not give you alot of 'head' needed to provide a good flow of water. secondly this low head of water combined with hot water will result in occasional air locks occurring. the problem can be solved with a peripheral/regenerative pump being installed on your hot water system. It would need to be a "Negative head"pump if you want to use it to have a shower as the shower head will probably not be 6 inches below the bottom of the tank which is what a stand pump with flow switches requires. Have a look at this pump Vertix PE50 Bronze peripheral pump with Brio on this website: http://www.pumpexpress.co.uk/acatalog/Water_Supply_and_Pressure_Boosting.html

The other thing to look at is whether you have contninental taps as these often need a greater head of water than you currently have. Alot of kitchen taps are rated at 0.5 bar which is the equivalent of raising your coldwater tank 16 feet above the tap!!!

Hope this helps.