Mixer Tap regulations

[aidan.f]

I once had dead pigeon coming out of the bath tap.  Bird Flue?

One cottage in Wales had so many dead bats in the header tank that I had to back-flush with a peice of hose between cold and hot bath tap. I then cleaned the header with a wet n dry vacuum. Many years ago when I had a younger  persons  immune system. Apparently the children were getting sick - but they did actually drink the bathwater.

[matthew]

I am aware of one situation where a sampler was sent to a house because there were repeated complaints about the taste of the water. Previous samples from the kitchen tap had been fine. This time the sampler was a little more switched on and asked which taps they were drinking from? They then went into the loft to look for and inspect the header tank. On showing the wife the state of the header tank she apparently packed bags for her and the children and went to a local hotel until her husband had resolved the issue of muck and animals.

Apparently the husband only ever drank water from the kitchen tap, so he hadn't had the taste issues or illness that the rest of the family experienced!

[Cudzoziemiec]

That reminds me of our physics teacher, who loved to go on about how German regulations were so much more advanced (this was early 80s, so not a Brexit thing) once expanding this into plumbing (not part of the physics syllabus!). He definitely had a rant about header tanks but I can't remember precisely what. I think they might be banned in Germany?

[Kim]

Water from non-kitchen taps not being drinkable by default seems to have fallen from BRITISH consciousness much faster than the rise of the combi boilers would account for.

Or maybe it never was, and people were drinking pigeon soup all along?  I know my upbringing was unusual, with tales of Legionella and Pseudomonas from a formative age.

[orienteer]

In my youth drinking from the hot tap was forbidden, on the grounds that metal from the lead piping was more easily dissolved into the water.

[Cudzoziemiec]

I don't remember ever being told either of those. I suppose now something similar would apply to plastic piping. It was all much simpler in India, where all taps were fed from from the roof tank, and mains water could be assumed to need boiling in any case. Simpler isn't always better!

[Wombat]

Cudz, your stretching my knowledge of the regs to the very limit.

I would say that hot water might be potable or 'wholesome' under the terms of the regulations, but because mains tap water shouldn't be tepid as that would potentially be unpaletable there is a requirement to prevent mixing. See here for the fluid categories https://www.waterregsuk.co.uk/guidance/backflow-protection/backflow-protection/backflow-protection/what-is-a-fluid-cate/

With my water treatment hat on the other reason I wouldn't want to mix in hot water is the residual disinfectant (chlorine or chloramines) that are there to suppress any microbiological contamination after treatment that might make the water unsafe. Heating the water will reduce this residual and will therefore mean that the water once cooled could easily become a viable media for biological growth, see legionella's etc.

Er, chlorine?  Don't have any of that stuff in my water... Yes, I know most folk do, but I don't.

[matthew]

Cudz, your stretching my knowledge of the regs to the very limit.

I would say that hot water might be potable or 'wholesome' under the terms of the regulations, but because mains tap water shouldn't be tepid as that would potentially be unpaletable there is a requirement to prevent mixing. See here for the fluid categories https://www.waterregsuk.co.uk/guidance/backflow-protection/backflow-protection/backflow-protection/what-is-a-fluid-cate/

With my water treatment hat on the other reason I wouldn't want to mix in hot water is the residual disinfectant (chlorine or chloramines) that are there to suppress any microbiological contamination after treatment that might make the water unsafe. Heating the water will reduce this residual and will therefore mean that the water once cooled could easily become a viable media for biological growth, see legionella's etc.

Er, chlorine?  Don't have any of that stuff in my water... Yes, I know most folk do, but I don't.

Based on your timezone you are either on a private supply and reliant on the short time and distance between the UV unit and the tap to prevent recolonisation or you are in one of the areas of the Netherlands that operates a chlorine free distribution system.

[Auntie Helen]

That reminds me of our physics teacher, who loved to go on about how German regulations were so much more advanced (this was early 80s, so not a Brexit thing) once expanding this into plumbing (not part of the physics syllabus!). He definitely had a rant about header tanks but I can't remember precisely what. I think they might be banned in Germany?

My chap cannot understand why our taps in the UK are so weird (and why we don't have washing machines in the bathroom but in the kitchen, which is another topic).

They always have mixer taps and think two separate taps is bonkers.

I have seen occasional separate taps in Germany and they usually have a "hot" and "cold" text on them, so they are quaint English design ones.

[Wombat]

Cudz, your stretching my knowledge of the regs to the very limit.

I would say that hot water might be potable or 'wholesome' under the terms of the regulations, but because mains tap water shouldn't be tepid as that would potentially be unpaletable there is a requirement to prevent mixing. See here for the fluid categories https://www.waterregsuk.co.uk/guidance/backflow-protection/backflow-protection/backflow-protection/what-is-a-fluid-cate/

With my water treatment hat on the other reason I wouldn't want to mix in hot water is the residual disinfectant (chlorine or chloramines) that are there to suppress any microbiological contamination after treatment that might make the water unsafe. Heating the water will reduce this residual and will therefore mean that the water once cooled could easily become a viable media for biological growth, see legionella's etc.

Er, chlorine?  Don't have any of that stuff in my water... Yes, I know most folk do, but I don't.

Based on your timezone you are either on a private supply and reliant on the short time and distance between the UV unit and the tap to prevent recolonisation or you are in one of the areas of the Netherlands that operates a chlorine free distribution system.

The former!  Borehole in the garden, and an effing great pump about 40 metres down it.  Brave assumption about the UV unit, though.  Its only had that for the last 7 years, just before we bought it.  Its a 1985 bungalow, and the initial residents are still alive and well after drinking the totally untreated water.  Its in a very rural area of Powys, mid-Wales.  Hopefully all the sheep wee has been filtered out of it by the time it reaches the level of the borehole intake.  Comically the UV unit was installed on the feed up to the tank in the roof space, not the downfeed.   Its lovely water, and we haven't died yet, or I think I'd have noticed.

[Kim]

That reminds me of our physics teacher, who loved to go on about how German regulations were so much more advanced (this was early 80s, so not a Brexit thing) once expanding this into plumbing (not part of the physics syllabus!). He definitely had a rant about header tanks but I can't remember precisely what. I think they might be banned in Germany?

My chap cannot understand why our taps in the UK are so weird (and why we don't have washing machines in the bathroom but in the kitchen, which is another topic).

They always have mixer taps and think two separate taps is bonkers.

I have seen occasional separate taps in Germany and they usually have a "hot" and "cold" text on them, so they are quaint English design ones.

Somewhere, probably now lost to the bit bucket, there's a video of a Finnish stand-up routine about BRITISH plumbing, and how we'll fit a high-current water heater inside a shower rather than using a Y-shaped pipe.  Which neatly segues into bafflement at our toilet cubicle doors opening inwards, ostensibly so it's easier to hold the door closed when the lock is broken.

(click to show/hide)

In Finland, they fix the lock.

To be fair, civilised BRITONS do install mixer taps, but this is often thwarted by landlords and other penny-pinchers who don't have to actually use the tap.

[Cudzoziemiec]

It seems there's no legal requirement in UK to replace lead piping. Presumably introducing such an obligation would cause Daily Mail share price cancer.

[matthew]

It seems there's no legal requirement in UK to replace lead piping. Presumably introducing such an obligation would cause Daily Mail share price cancer.

Lead piping is another issue entirely. The water companies will replace lead pipes as they find them, up to the customers external stop tap as that is their limit of ownership. They have no powers to compel the home owners to replumb their houses, so instead they have to add ~1mg/l phosphate to the drinking water to control the solubility of the lead.

The crazy part is that the sewage works are being compelled to spend fortunes to upgrade the processes to remove phosphate (which comes from detergents and other sources as well as the drinking water dose) to reach environmental standards and prevent eutrophication. A little joined up thinking and long term investment in the lead removal rather than a simple to install dosing rig might reduce some of the pressures at the sewage works.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Yes, I meant within properties. 54 years since it was legal to fit it but a lot of it is still there.

[matthew]

And the homeowner responsibility to replace but the water companies responsibility to mitigate until they do.

I will say programmes to install water meters have been a great way for the water companies to find which houses have lead service lines (connection from the main to the house) and gain valuable insight to where the risk exists, because like the household that was built 54+ years ago so was the pipe laid 54+ years ago and good luck finding any record of the pipe material used that long ago for anything smaller than about 12" in diameter, if it hasn't been dug up since.

[chrisbainbridge]

We had all our lead replaced. I knew from our builder that had found lead at the boundary in our 1927 building. The deal was that Severn Trent would excavate and replace if they found lead and it would all be free. No lead= me paying for the excavation.
As I already knew it was a no brainer.