Help - tap won't turn off

akh43

We have a shower that comes straight from the combi boiler and through a tap similar to this but brass and not so fancy, approx 10 years old, before I was in the house.

DD has just had a shower and when she went to turn off shower she said the tap just kept turning and did not turn off the water. We have got it down to a large trickle if we switch between the shower/taps but fills a bucket in approx 5 mins.

I was going to turn off the water at the mains but dont know how this will affect the central heating. Plus having a combi and no tank we would have no water other than what we can store before we switch off.

Don't know any plumbers in the area and am worried of being ripped by ringing one of these emergency type numbesr off as its still technically a Bank Holiday.

Don't know where to start - any suggestions appreciated?

akh43

Update, worse than first thought, I have tried to turn off the water and although it turns off the water downstairs it does not affect the taps upstairs, no idea why. There does seem to be a red tap near the water which we thought would be the supply upstairs but that does not stop the taps either.

Any suggestions much appreciated.

G_M

Turn off the boiler. Cutting off the water and leaving the boiler on will cause serious damage.
Cut off water to the boiler. This will cut off water to the shower.
Dismantle and repair/ replace the faulty tap.

Several plumbers advise on this forum here.

akh43

G_M wrote: »

Turn off the boiler. Cutting off the water and leaving the boiler on will cause serious damage.
Cut off water to the boiler. This will cut off water to the shower.
Dismantle and repair/ replace the faulty tap.

Several plumbers advise on this forum here.

Boiler was switched off on the boiler and have now uplugged as well. Made no difference to the water in the bathroom, still running as before, no idea what to try next. Have spent time since last post looking for another stoptap in the bathroom but despite removing the bath panel and the boxing around the pipes have found nothing yet. Can't look at fixing till we can turn the water off.

Will check out the links you have posted, thanks for the reply.

akh43

I have managed to turn off the water so panic over for now. I rang a local plumber in the end and he talked me through how to turn the hot water off. Not fixed but he can come tomorrow to fix, won't know the damage until he comes but at least have stopped the water and know how to do this if ever needed again.

ormus

if you have a combi boiler and no storage tanks, then turning off the main stopcock will not affect the heating system.
the CH can operate as normal.

akh43

We now have the heating on and have cold water, I could not believe how I was told to turn the water off, it was a screw one one of the pipes leading to the boiler which the plumber talked me through which I just had to 1/4 turn, I would never have found it without his help and am very grateful to him. We took the bathroom apart expecting to find a stoptap in there!

I am to try and get the day off work tomorrow and ring him back in the morning if I can get time off and he will come around tomorrow. The plumber said not to buy a new tap as it may be fixable and looking at this below I am hopeful it is. He gave me a rough quote of £80-£90, but obviously without even looking he can't give a proper quote yet.

With the water now off decided to see if I could tell what the problem was. I found under the bath the original taps from the bath, which were never fitted by the looks of it as they put the mixer tap on instead. I tried disassembling the spare tap to see if there was anything I could use to fix the mixer tap. It is the tap handle that is the problem and on googling I found it is the tap head gear that seems to be faulty. When I tried disassembling the spare one I seemed to get stuck where you remove the head gear (4) from the tap on the spare one, don't want to even try with the faulty one until I have done a dummy run. So I think I will leave for the plumber tomorrow.

update

Plumber came and even he could not undo the tap head gear on the spare tap so used one he had on his van. Tap fixed and surprisingly he only charged me £45, he spent around 30 mins in all fixing the tap. He is now in my telephone book in case I ever need a plumber again.