Cistern condensation

dampdaveski

Seems like your existing extractor fan might not be up to the job, a 10 minute over run with a reasonable sized bathroom is not enough. Particularly if it is cieling mounted and has ducting before it gets to the outside.
One option might be to upgrade your extractor fan to one of the nuaire genie X range, this type of fan runs continously, ie when you 'switch it off' it goes onto trickle mode, so you still have a bit of background ventilation.
Another good fan is the envirovent filterless extractor fan, they are a lot more expensive, unless you buy one off ebay, but the price they get sold for on ebay means that it is quite likely (allegedly) they have been nicked from somewhere.
I fit both regularly and they work a treat.
One customer of mine said they connected the toilet up to the hot water!! and it worked a treat. I have never tried it or recommended it to anyone, but they reckoned it worked every time!!
you could try filling the cistern up with warm water and see what happens??

Hope this helps
DD

keystone

I am not 100% clear if you think you have a leak or a mixture of that and condensation TBH. Could you clarify? Thanks.

Cheers

keystone

dampdaveski wrote: »

One customer of mine said they connected the toilet up to the hot water!! and it worked a treat.

:rotfl:Funnily enough I was going to suggest that as a possibility if the condensation is that bad but its prolly a better plan to use the cheapest blending valve you can and just give it warm water rather than hot. Saves on the old gas bills a bit. However the volume of water that the OP talks about suggests that it might be more than just condensation - hence my clarification question above.

Cheers

Confuzzled

dampdaveski wrote: »

Seems like your existing extractor fan might not be up to the job,...

you could try filling the cistern up with warm water and see what happens??

Hope this helps
DD

thanks for the ideas, the bathroom doesn't have an extractor and it's never been a problem before it really is because it's now constantly dripping freezing cold water into the cistern, as for the hot water, i live in a rented flat so i can't be mucking about with all that... i'm just hoping i don't have to call the letting agent about it, they are so slow about repairs sometimes and i don't want them trying to pin it on me and try to make me cover the plumbers bill but thanks again for the ideas they might help some one else with a similar problem

Confuzzled

keystone wrote: »

:rotfl:Funnily enough I was going to suggest that as a possibility if the condensation is that bad but its prolly a better plan to use the cheapest blending valve you can and just give it warm water rather than hot. Saves on the old gas bills a bit. However the volume of water that the OP talks about suggests that it might be more than just condensation - hence my clarification question above.

Cheers

the OP is a very very old one, i brought this up again in this thread vs starting another one (tired of people jumping down someones throat for starting a new thread on something that has been covered before they don't seem to care if it's 3 years old!) i suspect the OP has had their issue solved...

does anyone know how to stop the leaking? it's where the water flows back into the tank, after you've flushed and it's all settled if you lift the lid off you will see a big ole drip then a pause as another big drip forms etc etc, the water is about 1/2 inch over the fill line too, this constant freezing cold water going in is what is causing the condensation, what i need to know is how to fix the drip

Confuzzled

keystone wrote: »

I am not 100% clear if you think you have a leak or a mixture of that and condensation TBH. Could you clarify? Thanks.

Cheers

i'm fairly certain it's the leak, i mentioned the other stuff because it might be temporary and could effect how fixing the leak is solved, i read in several places that when it's really cold for a long time the pipes move slightly and that could be causing my leak so i felt the information was relevant, sorry if i confused anyone

MX5huggy

Basically it sounds like either the fill level is set wrong on the cistern or the valve has failed so would need replacing.

There are several different cistern internals designs see here http://www.screwfix.com/cats/100996/Plumbing/Toilet-Fittings

Which one is most like yours? Does it have a float valve http://www.screwfix.com/prods/19902/Plumbing/Toilet-Fittings/Round-Ball-Float

Often in orange?

MOCB

Things are not always what they seem! I had this problem only to find that it was not condensation - it was a leak, and was easily solved.

What I did was:

5-minute, easy temporary solution:
- Place plastic sandwich/takeaway tray under cistern – large one if going away.
- Wipe cistern at night with cloth (if indeed condensation is the problem)

For diagnosis:
- Wipe the cistern dry at night and see if it cures the problem.
- Wrap kitchen paper or toilet paper around all pipes going into & out of the toilet, securing with sellotape. Check later for any dampness.

When I did the above diagnosis, I discovered that the former did not cure the problem, and the latter showed that I had a leak from where the overflow pipe exits the base of the cistern. All I needed to do was to replace the washer.

Solution was simple (and I am awful at DIY):
- Turn off water at mains.
- Flush toilet.
- Remove top of cistern to access the internals.
- Lie thin piece of wood or similar along cistern, raise ballcock and use garden wire to tie the two together. (This stops cistern from refilling when water is turned back on).
- Turn on mains water (simply because I didn't want it off for any longer than necessary, for convenience).
- Siphon water out of cistern (into bath or toilet). Or remove with sponge but that is a pain in the neck - like being a gynaecologist (no room), & sponge drips everywhere. Siphoning got 90% out within minutes.
- Mop up remainder of water inside cistern with sponge; then kitchen paper to make it completely dry.

Now to take apart the overflow piping:
- Unscrew plastic nuts that hold together overflow piping (underneath the cistern). (I had to do this to get piping inside cistern out).
- Unscrew plastic nut where plastic piping attaches to base of cistern.
- Now you can go into the cistern and remove the overflow pipe along with the washer
- Replace washer

I was advised to add silicone sealant to the washer. I didn't and it worked fine.

Reverse to assemble. Do not overtighten nuts – you don’t want to strip the thread. Better to be conservative and keep a close eye on the join when you fill the cistern.

If you aren't familiar with siphoning:
- There is no need to suck or put anything in your mouth! Use a piece of hosepipe or tubing. Immerse tube in water (e.g. in basin or bath) so tube fills with water. Put thumb over both ends; now place one end in cistern & other in the receptacle (bath/bucket/toilet basin etc).
- For the siphon to work, the receptacle end MUST be lower than the end in the cistern. I.e. the net flow of water must be downhill - water will travel uphill providing the overall movement is downhill.
- Remove thumbs.

An alternative to immersing tube in bath (to fill it) is:
- Place length of hose beneath tap and let water simply fall into it (no need to stuff it against tap). When water exits hose, seal that exit with thumb & wait for other (higher) end to overflow. When it does, seal that end too with thumb. You now have a tube filled with water, ready to act as a siphon.

---

That’s what I did and it cured a major problem.

I put the plastic tub back beneath the cistern, and put kitchen paper back around the pipes, to avoid being cocky – there was no guarantee that I had solved them problem. The kitchen paper got damp (heart sank) but it turned out to be from the condensation on the cistern. I now wipe the cistern with a cloth before I go to bed - never had the problem since.

If you found this post useful, please say so – it will encourage me to write posts more often.

MOCB

Confuzzled,

I am not sure if that helps you. I posted it partly because someone will google it and find out that they have the same problem as we had.

I find the kitchen paper & sellotape method very useful at identifying leaks - it may help you identify yours. Leaks aren't always coming from where you think. For example, I came up with the idea when trying to find how water was entering the boot of my car. It had been foxing me for ages - I could not for the life of me find the source of the leak. I put kitchen paper around the only obvious entry point but it remained as dry as a bone. So I put the kitchen paper further around the boot. It showed that the leak was coming through, of all places, the rear light cluster - the rubber seal around it had perished. I would never have guessed.

Bilbo44

Interesting posts here, I see!

I'm visiting this forum because we have condensation dripping from the cistern in our new, indoor toilet. I suppose I could take it apart and line the cistern with foam, but that makes me wonder why it's not already lined. Given our climate, it would surely make sense, and be more economic all-round, if manufacturers sold insulated cisterns as a matter of course. I don't think I saw any insulated cistern in B&Q.

The problem we have here is not about ventilation, it's entirely the inevitable result of the cold water direct from the external mains supply (obviously colder in winter than summer), being stored in an un-insulated container (the ceramic cistern) in a relatively warm house. The problem has to be worse in winter because of the bigger difference in temperature, between indoors and outside.

Thanks to the guy who posted that detailed explanation of his own "cistern-insulation project". Yes, that expanding foam is the messiest stuff ever to work with.

I think I'll look around for a pre-insulated toilet cistern, before going down the DIY route!