Changing/fixing a bunch of seized imperial and metric valves

[oscarwplumbing]

Hi everyone, I'm new here!

I've bought my first house - needs a fair bit of work doing to it, including the plumbing. I'm keen to do stuff myself rather than getting contractors in, wherever possible, not just for cost, but also because I want to learn (a useful life skill surely!)

I'll probably post a few questions over the coming months, but here's the first one.

In my upstairs cupboard I have five seized water valves: 1x 1", 3x 3/4", 1x 15 mm.

I've already tried penetrating oil and tapping, even a bit of external heating, but no luck so far. Some of them look ok externally but others are in a bad way (especially the 15 mm)

My question to you guys is: what would you do next? Once I've shut off the water and drained the tank, I can think of a few options:

Open them up and try to unstick them some more

Assuming this is possible (ie the nuts aren't seized too) this would surely be easier and cheaper than replacement. But then I'm still left with old hardware?

Replace the valves completely

Hopefully I can unscrew to remove them, if not I can cut them out. However, if the new valves I put in are slightly shorter, then I would need to extent the pipe length somehow so that it fits? Also, would it be ok to use ball valves here, or would I need to stick with tap-style valves?

I've attached some pictures of the valves here

Thanks!

 

[king of pipes]

The simple answer is change them for new valves ,if your pipework is imperial pipe your will require imperial olives . Kop

 

[oscarwplumbing]

Ok so these are compression fittings right? So hopefully they'll budge. If not, I can cut them.

If the new valve is shorter than the old one, what's the easiest/best way to make up the lost length? Bearing in mind this is mostly imperial copper pipe.

Thanks!

 

[king of pipes]

Yes compression fittings , the easiest would be a compression coupling with a imperial olive in one end and a short length of new 22mm copper pipe , but you can get 22x 3/4 solder adapters if you have the tools and skills. Kop

 

[oscarwplumbing]

Super thanks, this sounds doable.

One thing I'm confused by is why I have such massive 1 inch pipework here. The 1 inch pipe is just the water supply into my upstairs hot water tank, from the loft tank. Is there really any need for such large diameter? Would it matter if I used converters to reduce the size down to, say, 22 mm or 15 mm for a 1 meter stretch or so (which would allow me to use smaller valves and maybe pex pipe, reducing cost?).

Thanks again, so helpful!

 

[ShaunCorbs]

15mm one replace the red wheel one replace

The others should be fine just need turning get some grips and they should free off

There decent valves and the cold water London one is brand new

 

[king of pipes]

Please stick with like for like replacements adding PEX pipe into your system is gonna cause you a whole lot of aggro later down the line. Kop

 

[oscarwplumbing]

Ok thanks guys, I'm gonna replace the 15 mm one tomorrow. That will enable me to shut-off to the tanks in the loft. Then I can more easily drain upstairs and replace or fix the other ones.

I'll stick with copper pipe.

Just to check - ball valves should be ok for everything here right?

 

[ShaunCorbs]

Blue handle lever valve I’m guessing you mean

If yes that’s fine

 

[oscarwplumbing]

Yes talking about made4trade lever ball valve from toolstation, 15 and 22 mm variants. Will use red handle for the hot water pipe when I change it

 

[king of pipes]

Check to see if you need imperial 3/4 " olives usually a indication on the stopcock body , 1/2 " and 15mm are compatible . Regards kop

 

[oscarwplumbing]

Have successfully change the first one. Threads from the previous valve were compatible with the new valve so I just swapped it out, and used the olives that were already on the pipe. Hopefully that's ok. I added lots of Fernox jointing compound to protect the threads. Seems completely watertight so far!

Now I can isolate the tanks in the loft which will be very useful when changing the others. Thanks again!