MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
Sorry for the convoluted post...
A couple of weeks ago, I posted a query about fitting a thermostatic shower in place of an electric power shower as part of a bathroom refit. At the time, a couple of people advised that the cold water header tank in the loft was unnecessary with a combi boiler, and I should bypass it and run the mains cold water feed directly into the bathroom.
Started the job today, with existing suite duly gutted out and the pipes capped off with isolation valves. I've spent a couple of hours identifying the mess of pipes in the loft, and managed to identify the mains cold water feed, which actually runs up through the bathroom via a 15mm copper pipe. It then enters the loft, links into a tangled mess of redundant pipes and goes into the header tank. from there, it comes back down to the bathroom via a 22mm pipe to the bath tap, and then reduces to 15 mm for the supply to the sink and toilet.
The mains feed in the bathroom, and the toilet feed (which is the end of the line as it were) are about 18 inches apart, so I'm wondering if it's okay to connect the mains to the toilet end of the pipe - 15mm to 15 mm, and have the supply terminate at the bath on the 22mm pipe. That would make all the pipe work in the loft redundant and I could then remove the whole lot and the header tank.
Is it okay to do this?
Yes.
When feeding a shower, I generally T off somewhere near both the hot and cold pipes at the bath tap end, channel out behind the bath, then run them up to the shower tap.
When tiled over looks neat with no pipes showing.
Alan
Aren't there some regs which prevent the direct connection of a shower without some form of valve to prevent back flow? I may be talking nonsense, but I thought I'd read it somewhere.
That only applies if you have a shower hose which you can drop into the toilet pan 😯 Why anyone would want to put their showerhead in the crapper is beyond me, but there you go. You can read about it here[url= http://www.wras.co.uk/PDF_Files/WRAS%20note%20compact%20bathrooms%2011-06.pdf ]Backflow Prevention Regs[/url] but in essence, if you keep your shower hose short enough to keep it out of the toilet pan, you're okay.
and just remember to check which side your hot and cold supplies on you shower are before running pipes mostly hot is on the left but there are a few with it on the right.
that is a top piece of trivia and obviously a grave concern for the DIY bidetists.
The pictures on that linked document are superb.
Good tip from showerman.
(i may have fell foul of this once)
(ok, maybe twice)
I'd always worked on the idea that if the shower head could be immersed in anything (bath, basin, WC or shower tray) then backflow was possible and check valves should go on. Didn't think it was limited to WCs. Contents of a bath often contain contents of a WC if there are babies/incontinent around.