On 27 Sep, 23:47, "clot" wrote:
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On 27 Sep, 18:13, "clot" wrote:
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On 27 Sep, 17:49, "clot" wrote:
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On 27 Sep, 17:34, "clot" wrote:
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On 27 Sep, 17:08, "clot" wrote:
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On 27 Sep, 16:17, "clot" wrote:
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On 27 Sep, 00:16, "clot" wrote:
None wrote:

snip

Hi clot,
Yeah I didnt actually check your name either, lol. Anyway,
would an air scour involve much disruption to the road? Our
neighbours are very closely all around us too, so I don't
really think that there would be much difference in our
chlorine content tbh. The water depot doesn't accept that we
have a problem, saying our test results back in June were
'clear.' The chlorine tested very, very low, and that was no
surprise as you can never smell or taste it really.

Would it even be possible to air scour our individual service
pipe though?

Hi,

I honestly don't know I'm afraid. Might be time to do some
googling for "air scour"/ plumbing contractors and the like.
I've just been googling for chlorine guidelines in E&W and
could not find anything - must admit I didn't go into every
crevice. It does not appear that the chlorine issue has not
moved on since I was involved in the potable supplies side of
things.

I seem to remember that we set a standard of either 0.4 or 0.6
mg/l leaving the treatment works and from samples in customers'
taps would expect a concentration of 0.1 mg/l as a minimum. At
the level you are quoting, I would be concerned about the
potential for bacterial growth. What did the water dept. say
about 0.02? Do they have internal target minima? I would be
leaning on Dublin's water dept. with that sort of
concentration.

They dismissed my notion of introducing a chlorine booster in
the area, didn't even comment on it really. We have no water
votes or laws here it seems. It depends where you live I
suppose. It seems I got spectacularly unlucky on this one. What
is strange is that the quality can be good, but only after I
turn off the outside stopcock, pull out the washing machine
hose in the garden shed, go back out front and open the
stopcock again.

Can you explain this bit in more detail? The washing machine is
in the shed - how is it fed? Length and diameter of pipe? Do
you mean the flexible cold supply hose? How often is this used
and any other details that seem relevant.

The washing machine is fed from the mains, is the last point of
use for the water downstairs, and is used at least once a day. It
was only installed there back in February, and we were having the
same problems beforehand. Yes, Im talking about a flexible cold
supply hose attached to the main line.

Back in December, I was replacing the old washing machine, and a
load of dark crud came out of the inlet cold pipe feed to it. It
was then that I began flushing out this pipe (originally into the
kitchen sink, when it was located beside it), now I flush it out
into the flower bed in the garden.

It helps to do this more when the water pressure is at its
highest, late at night. I suppose this doesn't make much sense in
the grand scheme of things though!

Good, you've eliminated that as an issue! I just wondered whether
this was a significant deadleg that could be a cause of the
problem. It's frequency of use seems to eliminate it as well. I can
appreciate why you get the best flushing effect when the pressure
is high - that makes sense. You will be able to slough off a
greater amount of film that may be developing in both the main and
service pipe.

I guess the neighbours have got used to your midnight capers in the
garden!

Any opinion on whether I should go the 'disinfecting of service pipe
route?' It seems as if it is possible to do this, hard work, but not
expensive. With the plentiful amount of houses around the
neighbourhood and the road, the main surely gets enough flow to
clean it pretty well.

You are only going to get temporary relief, I'm afraid. It might
attract the interest of the Water Dept., if they thought that
backsyphonage from your activities into the main might affect the
quality of water to your neighbours! Could be double edged - "we'll
have to do something about his supply before this gets out of hand"
sort of thing and also a stern warning not to affect the quality of
water in their main! Have you googled plumbers/ water engineering
contractors re air scour. I really think that would be the way to go
if possible. Could be a solution for several years - but not
permanent.

But if the neighbours arent experiencing these problems(and our
neighbours to our left have their stopcock right beside ours!) surely
either fully disinfecting the pipe, or replacing it would have a good
effect?

Now that's something I don't recall in previous dialogue! Are your
houses of a similar age? Has your neighbour had his service pipe
replaced? Might not be so obvious in that it might have been replaced if
a new driveway was put in at some stage in the past as a result of a
burst when doing the work!

I don't want to jump to conclusions. What is the length of your service
pipe? Is it significantly longer than your neighbour's? This is
beginning to suggest that you might get relief from replacing your
service pipe, but let's be careful. I can't recall, did you tell me what
it is made of and how old it is? Are you certain that the stopcock in
the street only services your house? I don't know the layout and if you
are in a "town house" situation, you might be on a common feed to two or
three other houses.

All the houses in the general area were built at the same time,
between 35 and 40 years ago. There are two stopcocks outside the front
gate; one that belongs to our house and one that belongs to theirs.
Our service pipe is of the black plastic variety, would have been put
in at the time when the house was built. As far as I know they have
the same pipe, but I could check. Our stopcock only serves us, I am
sure of that.