Hello,
Up to a couple of weeks ago I would have my central heating / hot water switched on for a few hours in the evening, this would give me enough hot water for that evening and into the following day.
One morning I turned on my bathroom tap and found that I had no hot water. Upon further investigation I noticed the sound of running water through the pipe supplying my hot water cylinder which is located under my airing cupboard upstairs. I went up to the loft and found the water supply into the header tank was constantly running. By turning the plastic refill part of the ballcock slightly, it reduced the flow considerable but it was still running. The only way I could stop the tank from filling was to lift the arm to the float slightly, this I did and then tied it up. After a few hours the feeder tank and the hot water cylinder were empty, I therefore assumed that I must have a leak somewhere. I checked the hot water cylinder and there was no leak there, and there’s no other hot water outlet upstairs. There’s a shower in my bedroom, but that’s a cold water supply.
Most of the downstairs is solid flooring, there are hot and cold pipes to the mixer tap in the kitchen, and in the bathroom to the bath and sink. In the bathroom the flooring under the toilet and sink is concrete but under the bath area it's floorboards (don't know why, it was like this when I moved in). I had to fit boarding to the floorboards in the bathroom to raise it to the level of the concrete floor so that I could lay vinyl tiling, so to access underneath the floorboards is going to be a bit of a job. I am prepared to do this, as if there is a leaking pipe I can't see anywhere else it could be.
I'm not at all knowledgeable about plumbing so I thought I would post this to see if anyone could suggest I look at something else that might be causing the problem. The only thought I had was a faulty ballcock in the header tank as it’s fairly old, but would this cause the tanks to empty? Although I can refill the hot water cylinder and use my heating I am reluctant to do this for fear of flooding, but I’m also worried about burst pipes if we get a freeze. I’d like to resolve this problem asap, so any help would be most appreciated.
Thank you
Neil
