In message , John
Rumm writes
On 04/09/2016 17:56, lardconcepts wrote:
The black half inch class C pipe which feeds into the concrete water
holding tank in garden started leaking where it screws on, as the
ground shifted and the pipe got pulled out of the connector.

The mess you see in the photo ( http://i67.tinypic.com/bg61eh.jpg )
is half a day's digging through stone, mud and water to get to the
pipe, which I managed to cap off via a connector and short length of
garden hose (to top up with manually for the time being).

Its a bit hard to see the detail of what is going on there...

There was no way of shutting off the pipe before, so float valve
servicing was a job for a pair of goggles, freezing hands, and lots
of spare split-pins and swearing! Now I've got access to the pipe,

The trick with fitting an isolation valve to a live pipe it to fit it
when its fully open - so water can continue to stream through it with
little back pressure until you have it properly fitted. Then you can
turn it off!

Can you use the *squeeze* technique to shut off the alkathene supply?
Easy with blue poly but I've never tried with the black stuff.

I've used a strong G cramp with two bits of halved broom handle to
protect the pipe.

--
Tim Lamb