Professional Property Maintenance

How To Locate Flow and Return Pipes

How To Locate Flow and Return Pipes

The Basics:

Over the years one of the more frequent questions that homeowners ask me is how to locate which of their radiator pipes is the flow pipe and which is the return pipe. The question usually revolves around the need to install TVRs (Thermostatic Radiator Valve) at each radiator. In most cases TVRs are unidirectional. In other words it doesn’t matter if the valve installed on the flow or the return side of the central heating circuit.

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Bad DIY Advice Could Kill You!!

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD

Bad DIY

I offer this piece of advice for all those who have a friend, work collegue, mate, uncle or cousin who loves to dish out DIY advice with no actual training in the field. DO NOT blindly take that advice without using a bit of common sense. Case in point!

We found this serious fault a few weeks ago when asked to repair an apparent burnt out bulb in a bathroom we had fit about a year earlier. When we entered the loft space to change the transformer we found the burnt piece of plastic pipe waste pipe as shown in the photo. The plastic pipe was resting DIRECTLY ON TOP of the halogen light! Read the rest of this entry »

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ISOLATE before you INVESTIGATE

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD

Cowboy Heating Engineers

Always ISOLATE before you INVESTIGATE. Why? As shown in this weeks photo the heating engineer decided that running 240 volt down an earth cable was acceptable. What’s that mean to you?

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Walk Softly - VERY Softly!

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD

Cowboy Electrician

We were re-adding two double sockets to a bedroom which had been removed when some walls were recently rearranged.  When we pulled up the floor boards we found signs of faulty electrics left over by the last person to touch the electrics.

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Standard BF Boiler to Standard Condensing Boiler

Date: Aug 2008

Description: After British Gas broke used some interesting sales techniques to a lifelong client the jig was up. Our new client received our name from an acquaintance whom we’ve worked for in the past and we stopped by to see if we could help. Read the rest of this entry »

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Skew-Whiff Pipework By Pretzel Man

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD

Cowboy Gas Fitters

While working on a house next door I spotted this masterpiece of crappy plumbing. Back in 1970 this would have sold as modern art! So for fun let’s follow the flow of water from this condensing boiler through to the main waste pipe.

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Silicone Valley

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD

Cowboy Builders

We were called in to remove a redundant worktop unit and sink in a day care centre. After isolating the water we started to dismantle the entire system. Read the rest of this entry »

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