Replacing water supply pipe

[thias]

Our house has an old lead water supply pipe on our side of the meter. We're going to replace it to get rid of the lead, but to also to hopefully improve the flow rate (currently only 10 l/m to the kitchen sink) as we want to install an unvented cylinder.

We plan to run 32mm from our side of the meter, to the house, tee'd off to a 25mm MDPE feed for the garden. The house feed would be terminated using a 32mm full bore lever ball valve, DCV then drain tap and then tee off to 2x 25mm feeds; one for the boiler and one of the cold water supply.

Does this sound ok? Should this set up give us the best flow possible from the supply? Would you recommend anything else?

 

[JohnD]

sounds very suitable to me. There is no point in scrimping on pipe sizes or stopcocks, if you're going to all the effort of digging a trench and laying it. I replaced lead in an old house and the improvement in flow was remarkable.

Professionals sometimes use smaller stopcocks because they are cheaper, but it is a hundred times more work and expense to change them once they have been fitted and buried, than if you did it right the first time.

Any underground joints avoided wherever possible because they will be hard to find and access. I would include a stopcock on your garden tap leg, at the Tee, and in a pit with a non-hidden lid so it can be accessed in winter or in case of fault.

Sometimes you can get a lead-replacement subsidy, or maybe free connection, so ask your water co to test your drinking water for lead content BEFORE YOU START WORK, and soon, as there may be a long delay.

 

[thias]

sounds very suitable to me. There is no point in scrimping on pipe sizes or stopcocks, if you're going to all the effort of digging a trench and laying it. I replaced lead in an old house and the improvement in flow was remarkable.

Professionals sometimes use smaller stopcocks because they are cheaper, but it is a hundred times more work and expense to change them once they have been fitted and buried, than if you did it right the first time.

Any underground joints avoided wherever possible because they will be hard to find and access. I would include a stopcock on your garden tap leg, at the Tee, and in a pit with a non-hidden lid so it can be accessed in winter or in case of fault.

Sometimes you can get a lead-replacement subsidy, or maybe free connection, so ask your water co to test your drinking water for lead content BEFORE YOU START WORK, and soon, as there may be a long delay.

Makes sense, thanks. Yorkshire Water don't advertise any help for replacing lead, but they are coming out tomorrow to test for it, so we'll see what they say...

 

[JohnD]

I have an idea the water is soft, is that right?

more likely to pick up lead than in hard-water areas, which build up a protective layer of limescale.

 

[Hugh Jaleak]

Have you checked the Meter size? May be a fruitless exercise putting in larger pipework if the meter is going to dictate the supply capability.

 

[Deleted member 267285]

Makes sense, thanks. Yorkshire Water don't advertise any help for replacing lead, but they are coming out tomorrow to test for it, so we'll see what they say...

https://www.yorkshirewater.com/your-water/drinking-water-standards/ Quite a bit of the way down, but mentions under the lead section they’ll replace free of charge.

 

[JohnD]

Have you checked the Meter size? May be a fruitless exercise putting in larger pipework if the meter is going to dictate the supply capability.

I'm sure there is a way of calculating it, but I found that changing all the small old lead pipe from just beyond the meter made a tremendous improvement to flow, despite constriction at the meter.

 

[thias]

Yorkshire Water came out, they measured at 16 litres per minute using their cup, which is odd. The guy did say there was something wrong with the meter on the footpath so he's painted that blue (??) and has scheduled for it to be replaced, and he said that might give us another couple of litres per minute - I won't know the new meter size until it's fitted though...

I was planning on getting;

50m x 32mm MDPE
50m x 25mm MDPE
1x 32x32x25mm MDPE tee
1x 25mm below ground MDPE stop cock
1x below ground chamber

For terminating the feed in the house, should I get a 32mm MDPE stop cock, or reduce down to 28mm copper and get a full bore lever instead?

Can anyone recommend a cheap place online to buy this stuff?

 

[fezster]

Have you checked the Meter size? May be a fruitless exercise putting in larger pipework if the meter is going to dictate the supply capability.

Shouldn't matter. The larger bore pipework either at the start or the end will result in a smaller pressure loss due to pipe resistance.

 

[thias]

New pipework's in, plumber measured the flow again - we went from 10l/m to 18l/m. Which is an improvement, but not as much as I was hoping for.

Turns out the connection to the meter is only 1/2 BSP, but Yorkshire Water are coming out to replace that (apparently the external stop tap and chamber are an "old style" that needs replacing) so we'll see what, if any, difference that makes. Who knows, maybe they'll replace it with a 3/4 BSP connection!?

 

[Bullet-Proof_Biscuit]

Should be 1" mdpe & plastic meter I expect, how did it go? Realise this is an old post sorry just interested...