Outdoor taps!

[Nicos]

Just a reminder....

Now that the winter weather is upon us and depending on your local climate...

Remember to turn off your outdoor taps at their stopcock and leave them open to let it drain.
(might save you some expensive plumbing later )

* tootles off to turn ours off having forgotten to do it yesterday!

[vixylix]

what if you don't know where the stopcock is? Or even what one looks like?

[Nicos]

I can't post a piccie at the moment...but Google stopcock on images and a selection will come up.
Try following the pipe inside.
If your tap is near your sink, there is often a little tap under there?
Sometime they look like little red wheels

[Nicos]

We have 4putdoor taps...2 don't have stopcocks...so we bind them in insulation...but we really should get round to fitting them.

[scarey55]

Thank you Nicos for the reminder. I have just had to have mine replaced because I didn't turn them off last year!

[Mr Bones]

Found a burst fitting on an allotment tap today, spraying everywhere it was but luckily hadn't been going for very long. I got a right soaking getting in there to turn it off.

[Nicos]

Ha!...I bet you sort of enjoyed getting in there and turning it off...until your shopping clothes got cold?

Well done for spotting it!..and sorting it out ...

[Nannysally99]

Hubby has just done ours, thanks for the timely reminder Nicos

[Ms-T]

Done, thanks for the reminder

[lottie dolly]

why oh why,i keep seeing it as traps,not taps,which emediatly got me thinking,have a tidy up of regular walk ways,before any snow hides them,stay safe,sorry for the piggy back Nicos

[happyhumph]

The stopcock for our outside taps is in the outside loo & handily has a section of pipe leading to it which is also outside. So have to turn stopcock off & lag the pipe

Mind you, this is a house with concrete skirting boards & the power circuit for the kitchen linked to the lighting for the attic..... really don't know what the previous owners were thinking

[Potstubsdustbins]

Remember the old days when most had outside loo's. Every one had a paraffin hurricane lamp sat at the bottom of the pipe which was just enough to keep the frost off.

Thankfully there were still enough numpties who never bothered, to make a frosty period a very busy time for us back then. I used to finish on the gas board at 4-30pm and set off repairing the burst pipes and filling my pocket with dosh..............

These days we get very little in the way of frozen water pipes it's usually the condensate pipe from the high efficiency boilers. This trickles condensate when every the boiler is burning and if not properly insulated is very likely to freeze, the condensate then backs up filling the trap and locking out the boiler.

So if you have a modern high efficiency boiler that suddenly stops work when its frosty with no obvious cause check if you have a exterior condensate pipe (usually 3/4" plastic). If you do, attack it with several kettles of boiling water slowly pouring the water over the pipe. If it's the problem the boiler will usually kick in automatically when the condensate trap empties. Give yourself a pat on the back and spend some of the £80 call out fee you saved on thick pipe insulation and the rest on a glass or two of vino.

[Nicos]

Interesting bit of advice there Pots...thankyou!

[Jay22]

I have an insulated cover on my outdoor tap in the winter.

[Nannysally99]

Great bit of info Potty, just about to get our old back boiler replaced with a new fangled one.
Any tips as to what is best?