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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.

Hmm. This is a puzzler! You didn't mention whether your service pipe is
particularly lengthy by comparison with the others in the
neighbourhood - I'm guessing not. Your neighbour's connection to the
main is right beside yours so that whilst you my be on a balance point
in the system, if your neighbour is not experiencing the same problem,
it sounds like the issue does relate to your plumbing. Has there been
much re-plumbing in the house, are there dead legs of redundant pipework
that are filled with water?