Low water pressure

[jamille]

Hello,

Trust everyone is well and keeping safe. Apologies in advance for the lengthy post but I could really do with some advice as I'm mid renovations and noticed the kitchen tap ,upstairs bathroom basin and shower are suffering from low water pressure whilst the downstairs WC basin tap seems fine as does the rear garden tap.

Here's the setup in the diagram

• According to Essex and Suffolk water 4-5 properties are serviced using a double connection shared supply off of the mains.
• There is a shared external shut off valve for the same properties.
• Comes into my backyard and tees off again and feeds stopcock valve in rear garden (faulty as won't close fully, but does fully open) Labelled 1, think it's 25mm galvanized iron pipe.
• This feeds the new internal stopcock valve 22 mm labelled 2, this is connected to 22mm flex hoses for the water softener labelled 3 (currently in bypass)
• The water softener then connects to 15mm copper pipes, One teed off to the kitchen, one to the boiler, one for the WC and then finally to the upstairs bathroom.
• The water pressure in the WC labelled 6 is fine, in fact had to reduce the flow from it's isolator valve
• The rear garden tap labelled 5 measured by the water company was 15l/m and 2.1 bar, this is teed off the same copper pipe that feeds the kitchen tap labelled 4
• At the kitchen tap even after removing the aerator it was still only 6 l/min with poor pressure, it does have an Abode swich connected but that was set to cold and not filtered.
• Upstairs basin cold supply also feeds the front garden tap and also the shower. The front garden tap (labelled 7 ) measured 15l/m and 2.1 bar which is teed off just before the upstairs basin.
• Basin with aerator removed in-case there was any blockage still only measured 5l/m
• The shower is just about usable measured 8l/m
• The bath filler tap (labelled 9) off of the same shower column (labelled 10) only measured 2l/m

Essex and Suffolk water said they only guarantee 1 bar of pressure and they can only run a dedicated blue poly pipe from the front to the rear at a cost of £2400 if they do all the work internally as well or £1350 if they just connect up to the property boundary and I cover the remainder of the cost privately which includes digging a trench, running pipe under living room floorboards, digging rear garden existing supply and capping it off too. Even then they won't guarantee it will solve the issue.
I also spoke to my neighbor and the previous owner who both mentioned the pressure isn't great, you can barely have a shower at first floor, anything higher you're looking at getting a shower pump installed.

I did think the kitchen tap may be at fault or the Abode swich but the exact same kitchen tap (minus the Abode swich) is being used at my parents house on the second floor kitchen and has way more pressure than I get with it on the ground floor. Also, the teed off garden tap has greater flow than the kitchen tap...

Had a couple of plumbers also come in and they couldn't find anything wrong with the plumbing and suggested I bite the bullet on getting the dedicated supply.

I am wondering if the isolation valves should be changed to full bore for the shower column, kitchen tap and upstairs basin or look into a home pressure booster such as the salamander home boost which can be installed directly on the mains but restricted to 12l/m, or Grundfos Scala2 which requires a break-tank for which I do have space inside but not for the break tank, it would have to buried underground in the rear garden.

Any advice or guidance is really appreciated.

 

[ShaunCorbs]

Best thing you can do is test what you get from your mains supply also this will change depending on if your neighbours are using water

 

[jamille]

Best thing you can do is test what you get from your mains supply also this will change depending on if your neighbours are using water

Good shout, I could disconnect the 22mm flexi hose from the water softner inlet and a do flow test. Will that suffice?

 

[ShaunCorbs]

Yep into a 5l bucket and time also do this while you have a tap open eg outside tap this will simulate a neighbour using there’s

Do you have a pressure gauge ?

 

[jamille]

Yep into a 5l bucket and time also do this while you have a tap open eg outside tap this will simulate a neighbour using there’s

Do you have a pressure gauge ?

Would something like this do?

Mains Water Pressure Test Gauge 11 Bar - https://www.toolstation.com/mains-water-pressure-test-gauge/p75711

The flow test is straightforward, but for the pressure gauge would I do it with a tap running using a tee or just check mains pressure on it's own?

Never mind, it will go on the washing machine inlet valve DOH!

 

[ShaunCorbs]

Yep perfect fits onto an outside tap or washing machine port

 

[Timmy D]

Something to consider, you maybe able to mile a new supply pipe (no lifting floorboards etc).

A mains water accumulator may also be beneficial but it needs an on site visit to determine.