Help! Bath shower mixer problem

[Shibees]

Hi everyone,

New to this forum but really could do with some advice........

Just had new bathroom fitted. Bath has been moved lengthways so tap end is now on the opposite wall to where is was before.

We have had a Tavistock Cruz bath shower mixer fitted. Initially, the diverter valve would only stay up with the cold tap on when wanting a shower - as soon as the hot was turned on, the diverter valve would pop down again.

We called the plumber who has been out today thinking it was an air lock in the system. He has drained the system and appeared to have fixed the problem by discovering that the diverter needs to be turned a quarter turn to stay up in shower mode.........however, when hubby and I tested it ourselves, it does work (its a bit fiddly) but the cold seems to overide the hot so you can only have a cold shower.

The taps are for low pressure systems 0.5 bar and above so we know the taps are ok.

We have a gravity fed system......prior to the bathroom being done, when running a bath, the hot was always stronger than the cold. The shower mixer we used to have worked very well with a lever moving left to right to chnge to bath/shower mode. Shower was always a ery good pressure....

Hubby has lost faith in the plumber as he can't seem to fix it.........the only thing we can think of is that he has extended the pipes to move the taps to the other end of the bath. Could this be the cause?

Is it worth us calling another another plumber to see if someone else can fix it? Seems strange that it all worked before.....

Any advice or guidance would be gladly accepted.

Thank you.

 

[Phil]

You say you've lost faith in the plumber?

I take it there's more to it than just him not been able to fix the divertor?

Are you happy with the rest of the work he did?

 

[Shibees]

Yeah, happy with the rest of the work.......he did the painting too which is a bit patchy in places especially around the spotlights on the ceiling.....

Hubby had to tinker with the push button cistern as the plumber kept saying he couldn't get the two buttons to work separately as he thought there was a part missing - hubby discovered he had fitted it the wrong way round and did it himself which was easily secured and now works as it should.

The plumber is a member of check a trade, has good reviews and is a nice chap but we just want our shower to work!

 

[PlumbBobBob]

did you have gravity fed cold as well as hot on the old bath? sounds like the cold feed has been hooked up to the mains and is forcing it's way back up the hot feed. have you noticed the overflow running after trying to have a shower? if this has been done you will have to get a check valve fitted to the hot feed just below the tap to prevent this from happening.

steve

 

[Shibees]

Thanks steveb - will check to see if overflow is running..... going to call the plumber in a mo and see he he can come and have a look.

Could it also be because he has used flexi pipes? I have read on other forums that they can reduce water pressure

 

[PlumbBobBob]

yes flexi pipes have a reduced inner bore get the plumber to replace with copper to get correct flow.

steve

 

[Plumbstar Tom]

i wouldn't say 0.5 bar is low pressure thats 5 metres head from the bottom of your water tank!

Try turning a few other cold taps on and then having a shower as this will reduce the cold mains water pressure if that is the problem

Flexis do reduce the flow but not by too much

 

[Shibees]

Thanks Plumbstar Tom and Steve B.

Just spoken to the plumber. He says that he was able to get the diverter to stay up with just the hot tap on yesterday - we can't seem to do this. We have to have both taps on full blast to get the diverter to stay up in shower mode.

I asked him about flexi pipes - he has used them but said he has used 22mm copper pipes for the remainder of the pipe extention under the bath and that the flexi pipes shouldn't affect the pressure.

He has agreed to come round tomorrow morning - just worried he is getting a bit annoyed with us!