Vacant house drain down

[rocketmanbkk]

Hi Friends

I've been asked to drain down a vacant 3 bed detached house.

Firstly, I was going to turn off stopcock & run taps. Then look for a drain valve in the airing cupboard & open the valve to drain tank.

Then I was going to drain from lowest Rad.

Is this all I need to do? Never done this on all systems before?

Lastly, in Slough area, any thoughts on cost? £100?

Cheers all.

Rct

 

[T & H Plumbing]

You wanting to drain water supply too? If it's only heating side you wouldn't need to isolate stopcock, make sure boiler is turned off and drain from lowest point, when it comes to re filling make sure you add inhibitor as for price I wouldn't know I'm a northerner and work for pork scratchings

 

[rocketmanbkk]

Whole house. All systems drained.

 

[nysk2008]

i would just turn stop tap off (in kitchen or whereever), drain all hot and cold and drain heating from lowest point - £100 aint bad just to drain down in my opinion (remember if there is a 3-port put in the open position before you drain)

 

[Centralheatking]

Ok we do this alot as we have holiday lets in Cornwall
1 Yes turn off mains water
2 yes open all taps h & c AND LEAVE OPEN
3 C/h drain whole system from lowest point leave air bleeds open
4 Find the mt on boiler esp if a floor standing and drain
5 Cylinder -often forgotten use mt on the bottom to drain down
with a hose pipe
Bluntly its better to sell your customer a Froststat hook it into the centralheating
controls set it at 3 deg + and leave the the house on CHK

 

[AlexGas]

Hi Friends

I've been asked to drain down a vacant 3 bed detached house.

Firstly, I was going to turn off stopcock & run taps. Then look for a drain valve in the airing cupboard & open the valve to drain tank.

Then I was going to drain from lowest Rad.

Is this all I need to do? Never done this on all systems before?

Lastly, in Slough area, any thoughts on cost? £100?

Cheers all.

Rct

You got it. Open all the bleed valves on the rads too, starting from the top. Hope every rad drop has a drain off. When you are done, close all the bleed valves, taps and drain offs you’ve opend. You just don’t need any hassle if someone opens the stopcock…
100 quid sounds good, unless you are planning to spend the whole day there.

 

[mountainman]

Once water is off and drained, flush the toilets to empty the cisterns.

 

[jonnyswamp]

All of the above, but also explain in writing that you cannot guarantee that every last drop of water is drained as you dont know if pipe runs are sagging under floor boards and still holding water, therefore could (theoretically) still freeze and split pipes
£100 to drain
£200 to fill back up and service/recommision boiler

 

[SimonG]

Pour some antifreeze in the pans as well.

 

[Ollieg]

That seams a lot of work for £100 Unless you got 2 hoses. The cylinder could be a pain and take 1.5 hours.

 

[hammers4spanner]

That seams a lot of work for £100 Unless you got 2 hoses. The cylinder could be a pain and take 1.5 hours.

Disagree
easy money for not doing a lot

 

[tamz]

Remember to label everything as drained and stick some do not use tape over everything.
Some idiot might come along and try to turn the heating on.

Easy money less than an hour.

 

[lame plumber]

Remember to label everything as drained and stick some do not use tape over everything.
Some idiot might come along and try to turn the heating on.

Easy money less than an hour.

beggar turning on the boiler its dumping down the bogs I hate!

 

[tamz]

beggar turning on the boiler its dumping down the bogs I hate!

Especially when you break the skin having a **** and the smell hits you like a brick :lol:

 

[Best]

Switch off all electric switches to boilers & heating etc plus immersion heaters. Then remove fuses from their spur switches. Label the electrics as off.
Houses that I see that have been repossessed have labels on back boiler fires (solid fuel), oil boilers etc & copper & unvented cylinders, saying "Warning - drained off water, do not use"
I would also turn stopcock off at street, personally. House in severe weather turns into a freezer & anything will burst.

 

[rocketmanbkk]

I did it today, hwsc took about 45 mins.

Old ch system with no drain tees do I put a bit of copped in the hose & cracked the valve nut & swapped it for my hose. All ok, opened vents etc.

I was quite proud of myself, no floods!!

Use my new spanner!

Charged £125. Pleased with that.0