Drip, drip, drip, trickle, trickle ........ it's driving us nuts !


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Old 03-06-06, 05:06 AM
S
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Drip, drip, drip, trickle, trickle ........ it's driving us nuts !

Dear All

I wonder if someone can assist ?

I live in a new build (four years old) house that has a gas heated hot water system.

Not sure how long this has been going on, but over the last week or two, a dripping noise
comes from the region of our HWT. Sometimes this will turn into a trickling sound, as more water
feeds through.

Obviously I know that this is a normal sound when the HWT has emptied slightly after running the
taps for a while, and as the HWT re-fills. However, this is very noticable in the dead of night - several hours after I've put my head down (The gas central heating / radiators, are timed
to switch off at around 11.00p.m, so there is no water feeding through the pipes overnight).

The noise is not continuous. We'll start hearing trickling noises in the middle of the night and it may go on for half an hour or so and then seem to stop (or at least not be so loud) ....... before starting up again, say an hour later.

It may occur throughout the day but we just notice the noise at night because of the lack of any other everday background noises ? There is no associated noise from the radiators/pipes etc. Basically, it's just like the water-refill noise you get from a toilet cistern for a while after flushing.

There are no leaks/damp-patches anywhere that we can see, although I haven't yet ventured into
the airing cupboard.

Could it be the supply of water from the CWT in our loft to the HWT is not as it should be / some
kind of sediment blockage not allowing water to re-fill the HWT in one go ? The loft has several thin
plastic pipes leading from the CWT and shortly after we moved in one of these became displaced as the contractor for Bloor Homes had not fitted them soundly. So I'm somewhat mistrusting of the
quality of plumbing up there.

Any ideas/thoughts are welcome.

Not the most urgent of problems hopefully but this never used to occur (or at least nothing like to the extent that we actually noticed it before) and my wife is going nuts because she lies awake at night listening to it ....... chinese water torture !

Thanks

Pete
 
  #2  
Old 03-06-06, 05:25 AM
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sarah12345, Welcome to the DIY Forums.
I moved your post since it concerns a hot water heating system. The Pros here are more likely to be able to answer your questions. Good luck.
 
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Old 03-08-06, 11:32 AM
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Been there,

I can't really offer any help, but can empathize. My hot water heater started refilling for no apparent reason a couple weeks ago. There's no leak anywhere, but every few hours I can hear the water refilling the tank. I double-checked to make sure there really is water going in to it (via the meter and shutting off the intake on the tank when it's making the noise) I checked the trip valve and tried draining it. None of it solved the problem, but the noise did change a bit. Mine's more of a gushing than a dripping. Let me know if you find a solution.
 
 

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