Leaking hot water cylinder - Essex Flange

snm123

Hi all

Just after a bit of advice. I've got a leak on my hot water cylinder, which I have identified as coming from the fitting of the Essex Flange, the hot water feed for the power shower pump.

It's not leaking a massive amount, but will no doubt get worse. My personal opinion, from what I have read up on this fitting, is that it can be removed, replaced and resealed. The cylinder is not massively old, my guess would be no older than 20 years.

Had a plumber look at it today, one I've used before, but he's not my preferred one, but unfortunately my 1st choice is on holiday. He took one look at it, identified it as an Essex Flange, and said I will most likely need a new hot water cylinder!! No mention of a repair.

I asked him if it could be replaced and resealed, he said it could be, but was unlikely to succeed. And obviously he wouldn't know until he had replaced it and then refilled the cylinder to be sure it had worked. Fair comment, as this is generally going to be the case with any repair, plumbing or not!!

Anyway, he estimated about £380 including labour, for the replacement cylinder, which seems to be quite a reasonable price for the job.

We left it that he would price up the replacement for a more exact quote, and let me know tomorrow, and then come and sort it on Thursday, on the basis that he would attempt the repair first, and if it doesn't work he would then replace the cylinder!

The alarm bells are ringing now! I'm semi-competent with plumbing myself, having tackled a few things successfully in the past (such as replacing electric showers in previous houses, including the need to put in additional copper piping and working with solder joints etc etc)! So I am tempted to take a look myself, only reason I called the plumber in on this occasion is that my last attempt to fix a leak I came across a bodge by previous occupants and I had to get a plumber in anyway at short notice, as I then don't have the tools to do the job! Not to mention the sheer destructive nature of water leaks in houses always scares me a little bit!

In this case, this plumber doesn't really have a motivation now to ensure a good refit of the existing fitting! I can't get the day off work, only my wife can, so he's in an ideal position to not make an effort with the repair, say it hasn't worked, and get my wife to commit to the job of replacing the cylinder, something we can't really afford anyway. In short having us over a barrel, as I presume a failed repair will leave us unable to use the hot water cylinder.

I guess I'm just after opinions really, am I right to now be suspicious of this plumbers advice and motives? He's local to me, lives in the next road to mine. I am going to ring round a few more local ones tomorrow, I've asked the wife to ask around at her local slimming world group tonight to see if anybody knows good lumbers in the area.

In terms of the fitting itself, any experts in here who can give advice, and confirm whether this plumber is talking sense or rubbish? Is it an easy DIY job, and is it something that should be repairable?

Thanks guys for any help you can offer.

Si

1984ReturnsForReal_2

Part drain the tank & refit another one & cap it off.

£20-25 for the part & about 2 hrs labour max. So £100ish would be about right.

& they aren't the easist things to fit & getting out will be fiddly also.

Its not hard but requires patience & strong fingers without butter on them.

mikey72

Depends on too many things.
What the age of the cylinder is.
How long you're staying there.
A lot of old cylinders are so rotten it's not worth doing anything to them other than replacing them.
Twenty years isn't young.
Most of them didn't have drains on them, so by the time I've put one in, drained the tank, cut the pipes, and replaced the screw on drain with a permanent one, you may as well be paying the extra labour to put in a new tank.
£380 is a good price for something that'll last another twenty years.

keystone

If the cylinder is rotten theres a fair chance he won't get the old flange out without tearing a hole in it and that won't be his fault if it happens. He's been professional and given you the worst case scenario if the "repair" doesn't work.

This:

In this case, this plumber doesn't really have a motivation now to ensure a good refit of the existing fitting! I can't get the day off work, only my wife can, so he's in an ideal position to not make an effort with the repair, say it hasn't worked, and get my wife to commit to the job of replacing the cylinder, something we can't really afford anyway. In short having us over a barrel, as I presume a failed repair will leave us unable to use the hot water cylinder.

is rather paranoid and untrusting of you. If you feel this way get another couple of quotes and see what they say.

Budget for having to replace it then get a pleasant suprise when he fixes it.

Replacing a cylinder is notifiable work so make sure whomever you select to do the job can self certify.

Cheers

jblack_2

keystone wrote: »

Replacing a cylinder is notifiable work so make sure whomever you select to do the job can self certify

Isn't that only for Unvented cylinders?

I don't know what the problem is? It seems the op is being a little paranoid and almost expects the plumber to rip him off. He asked for a diagnosis of the fault and a quote for possible solutions. The plumber gave him this information.

Now the diagnosis has been made the op is thinking of repairing it himself. Fair enough but it sounds like he just wanted instructions on what the problem was and how to repair it.

keystone

jblack wrote: »

Isn't that only for Unvented cylinders?

Yes you are correct in this situation - sorry. Notification would be required for a new vented but not for like-for-like replacement. As long as a new one in this scenario would fall under a like-for-like replacement definition then it would not require to be notified.

Cheers