Help Installing Shower Pump and Shower.... | Showers and Wetrooms Advice | Plumbers Forums

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Help Installing Shower Pump and Shower....

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Discuss Help Installing Shower Pump and Shower.... in the Showers and Wetrooms Advice area at Plumbers Forums

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danny2

hi, just wondering if anyone could help me with a bit of a problem im having. I will try to explain as well as possible but as i am not a plumber myself, certain things may sound a bit daft or simple to the experienced ones out there :eek: i will just try to explain everything i can but anymore info u need, please ask away...

Basically, iv been getting a shower pump and mixer shower fitted, now the pump was a uesd watermill wasp 50 1.5bar and the shower a mira atom. my cold water header tank is in the loft and my hot water is coming from a hot water tank in the airing cupboard in the bedroom. the pump has been fitted at the bottom of the airing cupboard next to the hot water tank. so the cold supply is coming from the header which is 1.9m from the bottom of the tank to the pump and the hot is supplied from the hot tank with a flange also fitted at the top of the tank. the outlets from the pump are then plumbed back into the loft, across about 1.5m and then down to the mixer tap of the shower. now, when i put the pump on, there is no noise at all! basically like it was not on. there is also no water coming from the shower head, i have also unscrewd the shower and there is no water coing from the hot/cold pipes anyway. i have spoke to watermill and they have said, even if the pump was broken, i should still be getting some water out of the shower :confused: they explained that there might be a block in the pipes somewhere causing this. now i know there is water going into the pump, i have also lightly unscrewed the outlets of the pump and seen there is water there too. what i am wondering is, i believe there has to be a flow of water to trigger to pump to start, would there be enough pressure anyway to make the water travel from the supply of hot and cold, back up to the same level of the header tank and and then across and back down for the shower to even create a flow?? i hope i have explained this well enough and i am aware its a bit of a big question for a first post, its just im a bit up the wall with it all as my plumber is saying the pump must be broke and buy a new one (the person i bought the pump from insists that it is working 100%).

any help here is much appreciated

thanks again in advance
danny
 
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yes it is plugged in and a new fuse too just to make sure. the fuse spur is also new so, fitted the iron into it today to make sure that is all working fine which it was. thanks for taking the time to read too.
 
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dont have a wet and dry vacuum sorry, is there another way to check this? wont be nice but maybe sucking the end of the shower? just to let u know, i have 2 shower head, a fixed large one at the top and a movable normal sized one.
 
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try putting the movable one down into the bath or tray to lower try to get flow by siphonage. last resort would be sucking! you could be very careful and use a normal vacuum cleaner. rig up a length of clear tube so that you can see when the water starts to come through then you can pull the vacuum away sharpish.
 
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steveb said:
try putting the movable one down into the bath or tray to lower try to get flow by siphonage. last resort would be sucking! you could be very careful and use a normal vacuum cleaner. rig up a length of clear tube so that you can see when the water starts to come through then you can pull the vacuum away sharpish.
Click to expand...

tried lowing the movable hose down for a bit, no joy. tried sucking for a couple of mins, no joy just very dizzy ha. may try using the normal hoover when the missus is out tomorrow, if not may try and hire a wet and dry hoover. would an airlock stop the hot and cold coming through, with them being seperate pipes, i thought it maybe strange to get airlock in both, or im just dumb as i have no idea what im going on about sorry ha.
 
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Has it never worked since installation ? Or is it a fault thats just happened ?
If its never worked then surly the plumber who installed should be sorting it?
 
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Try getting some push fit pipe and a couple of elbows, with some valves on the end ,connect to the hot and cold out of the pump, open valves and see what happens, ( dont forget the bucket). If it works then you have the wrong pump or an airlock, if it doesnt work then there is a problem with the pump
 
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it has never worked, when it was installed, we just presumed that the pump must be broke and thats why no water was coming out, it was only when i spoke to the makers of the pump and he said that even if it was broke, there should still be water coming from the shower, even is its very little. can anybody else confirm this for me? judging by the distance and height the water has to travel to the shower and the positioning of the header tank, should the water still be able to make it to the shower? thanks
 
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barryplumb said:
Try getting some push fit pipe and a couple of elbows, with some valves on the end ,connect to the hot and cold out of the pump, open valves and see what happens, ( dont forget the bucket). If it works then you have the wrong pump or an airlock, if it doesnt work then there is a problem with the pump
Click to expand...

will get the plumber to try this when he hopefully returns tonight thanks.
 
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also, i have lowed the movable shower head as low as possible and still no water at all, only just reading up on negative heads and am i right in thinking, that water should now come out even if i did need a negative head?
 
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do the pipes that go back into the loft travel above or below the height of the cwsc. if they travel below, then you should get some flow, though minimal. This would then suggest a blockage or airlock on the pipes leading from the pump
 
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i don't think you need a negative head pump. we have the exact same arrangement as you, hot off the cylinder cold off the loft tank. pump at base of cylinder pipes back up into the loft along and then down into the bathroom no problems at all. i still recon you have an air lock.
 
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Check the ends of the hoses coming from the pump to see if they are fitted with isolation valves, alot of them are black plastic push fit ends & the isolation valves(just a small circle with a slot thru the middle) are not to clearly visible unless you know what they are. If you do find these, insert a srewdriver into the slot & turn a 1/4 of a turn, the slot should run in line with the hose.
Failing this & assuming the pump definately works, i would say it is airlocked. Can the pipes that run back up into the loft be disconnected easily, if so...switch off the pumps electrical supply & break a joint in the loft to release the air, do not take fully apart, just enough for air to escape hopefully folllowed by a drop of water. If you can get it this far, switch the pump back on & you should have enough movement to trigger the flow switches & get the shower working..you may have to do this to both hot & cold pipes.
 
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thanks for all the replies so far everyone, plumber came out last night and had a quick look in the loft and a play with something, think he said his pipes were running slightly up when going along loft which he changed but did nothing. he said he was coming again on monday to insert 2 automatic T junctions (i think that he said anyway) which would release and air in the pipes in the future. hope this does something cos could really do with getting the shower going...
 
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