Hot Water Issue - figured out - what next?
Hi, So we have had this hot water problem for the past year: running a hot tap anywhere in the apt stays hot for half a minute or so then goes cold. Turn off the tap for another minute, turn it back on, and the same thing. Hot water, then cold after 30 seconds or…
Hi,
So we have had this hot water problem for the past year: running a hot tap anywhere in the apt stays hot for half a minute or so then goes cold. Turn off the tap for another minute, turn it back on, and the same thing. Hot water, then cold after 30 seconds or so.
After a bit of trouble shooting, I have figured out that when we have the washing machine on the START of a cycle (i.e. when the water is filling up in the machine) I can run the hot tap in the downstairs bathroom, and I believe any other hot tap, and it stays continuously hot. As soon as the machine cycle moves to the next stage (i.e. it stops filling up and rotates), the hot water from the tap runs cold instantly.
One other thing, if I put the washing machine on a COLD cycle, hot water comes out, and on a HOT cycle, cold water comes out.
OK, thanks for staying with me so far 🙂
So, I guess what I’m wondering is, what is the fix for this? Any advice much appreciated.
Cheers so much.
Hi,
Not sure if you will see this, but I have an update. I did a test with the shower faucet upstairs. I turned it to cold and whilst that was running, put the shower faucet downstairs on hot. Turns out the behavior is identical to the washing machine. Whilst the faucet upstairs is on cold, the water coming from the one downstairs remains really hot. As soon as we turned off the faucet upstairs, the one downstairs cooled down (as with the washing machine).
I spoke to a plumber and he wasn’t sure what could be causing this. Possibly a cross connection somewhere? He is going to ‘speak to a few people’ and get back to me, potentially with the idea of opening up the walls behind each of the showers (upstairs and downstairs) to get a look at the pipes and see if there is a cross connection somewhere.
Any thoughts? Opening the walls seems pretty drastic, but does this sound like the only feasible approach?
Could be a partially clogged cold water inlet or hot water outlet on the water heater (if it’s a water heat the makes the hot water). This can mess with the pressure and flow of hot water in the building.
All washing machines are potential cross connections. To see if that’s really where the problem lies, just turn off the valves feeding water to the unit and run your fixtures. If that fixes it, you’ll need to have your washing machine repaired.
Hi MP,
Yeah, I posted about it a while back. At the time though I hadn’t narrowed it down to the exact cause, which I’m pretty sure (after hours of testing different combinations!) I think I have found.
I agree that it sounds like a cross-connection issue, but if you can bear with me for a few seconds…does the fact that when I put the washing machine on a hot cycle and the problem goes away, mean anything? I tried it today.
Ran the hot tap in the bathroom and it was hot for 30 seconds then ran warm/cold. Turned it off and on again a half a minute later and the same thing, hot then cold.
Then, I went and started a hot wash on the washing machine and tried the hot water faucet again in the bathroom. This time it stayed hot consistently and only cooled down when the washing machine went into the next cycle (i.e. finished the filling up with hot water stage).
What I don’t understand though, is how does putting the machine on a hot cycle fix the faucet problem? I’ll definitely get a plumber in, but just wondered if the troubleshooting has narrowed it down to the washing machine 🙂
One last thing, I think the hoses are on back to front on the washing machine. To do the hot wash, I have to turn the dial to COLD and vice versa.
Thanks MP.
Didn’t you post about this before?
You’ve got a cross-connection. Your hot and cold water are mixing somewhere in the plumbing system.
You’ve got to have someone find and fix the problem, which can be a daunting task sometimes.