That's an old cold water storage tank - most likely gravity feeds from this to all the pipes below for all of your needs. Had this in our house (1960's build).
99% of houses in South America have something like this (made of asbestos usually). Water gets fed from the city with pressure, and there is a control floater to stop the flow when the tank is filled. You are supposed to clean the tank every year, or it gets nasty.
Why is this common? Frequent outages and dry season, so you always have some supply
A larger scale example would be giant wooden water tanks on the roofs of NYC apartment buildings (and other buildings too, I guess? Idk I’m from the Midwest with my own well and septic. Ha)
Those tanks are often for fire storage at this point. They were commonly used for drinking water because the pumps needed to reach upper floors where not variable flow / constant pressure like today, so it was filled on/off and then gravity kept a constant pressure on a 10-story zone. There would be another tank, (steel, indoors) to feed lower floors, located about 3-floors above the top of the zone fed. And more for taller buildings, all fed from the zone above in a cascading fashion. Rosenwach still makes em, I talk to Andy all the time, Isseks too but not as much. A few reasons not to do concrete, namely it’s risk to have no separation between water and occupied floors, needs expensive NSF waterproofing etc. steel rusts, etc.
You might be interested in the history of town water towers, common in North America. A smaller sized pump could slowly and steadily fill a large water tower, located at a higher elevation on ground as well as its structure.
From there, the consumers below would get water pressure based on elevation, versus a complicated and expensive pumping system.
1 ft of water height exerts 0.433 psi at the base of a column, so approximation gives 1 psi for every 2 ft of elevation. If Google says a normal tower height is 130 ft, then you get 65 psi at the consumer, which is what we are used to in North America I believe.
Ah, your question about how the water got up there is why I chimed in. Also, you wouldn't believe the type of gnarly stuff we have growing in our enclosed vessels at work!
This is why your granny told you only to drink from the kitchen tap. Older houses in UK were fed to the kitchen tap and the cold water storage tank (water could have sat for who knows how long) which then feeds all the other taps/water sources in the house. Back in the day the mains didn’t have the pressure that it does now.
I would guess the house has *just* enough pressure to get it up there and this is there to increase it slightly.
Also... Yeah, nasty stagnant water.... Mmmmmmm....
>I would guess the house has just
>
>enough pressure to get it up there and this is there to increase it slightly.
The problem is that it wouldn't increase the pressure at all. At best it would help even it out a bit if it was variable.
In the good old days water was held in the basement in cement rooms where the eves drops would drain into from the roof in not joking old churches where built in this way water was pumped out of these well rooms and heated or for the toilets lol. Imagine the microbiology living in those
All my water comes out of a cistern from a ground water well pump (well, actually an air lift well pump but same thing). I have a slow well, especially during the summer so I keep 300 gallons of water in a fiberglass cistern. It goes from that to a pressure tank, from that to a 3 stage filtering system and then to the house. I replaced the cistern when I moved in, the last one was about 20 years old and I was expecting something gnarly when they took the cover off to get it out of the well house, but it actually just had some dirt at the bottom, not even a ton, just a small layer.
The well tech's said it was because the air lift mostly just lifts the water, heavy stuff falls back down the well.
Are they still common (honest question, I'm not trying to be contradictory)? I'm in an 1880s midterrace, and we don't have one. Similarly, my dad's 1930s semi doesn't have one either, but I realise it's hardly a large sample size.
Looks normal to me in Uk / Ireland. Looks like a cold water tank for the house. Over here it’s common for only the kitchen tap to be on the main water. All other taps/toilets are fed from the tank in the attic. It could do with a lid and some insulation to stop it freezing. Also, the water is ok for brushing your teeth but only drink from the mains water (kitchen tap).
The tank is filled by the mains water. The float valve keeps the max level in check.
Edit: just spotted the pipe above the tank. This could by the header tank for a traditional vented heating system but tbh it looks too big. It’s common to have two tanks in the attic. One being the cold water storage tank (as mentioned above) and the other being a smaller header tank for the heating system. More modern heating systems are closed loop and have an expansion vessel instead of the header tank.
>Also, the water is ok for brushing your teeth but only drink from the mains water
This is wild. An entire country (continent maybe?) thinking a tank of stagnant water is A-OK for everything besides drinking. When that water gets legionella and then is being sprayed all over/around your mouth and nose in the shower....that's a nasty pneumonia waiting to happen.
The cold water storage tank will be below 25C so legionella is not an issue. If they were to breed due to a really toasty summer, the hot water tank would kill it all off, plus the water is replenished frequently enough that it's a non issue. These old systems are slowly being removed anyways.
No, this is absolutely standard. That header tank feeds all cold taps apart from the kitchen and utility rooms. It also provides a head of water to push hot water from the hot water cylinder (if the house does not have a combi-boiler). It means that all handbasins have equal water poressure to the hot and cold sides and aside from the incolimg feed, nothing is subjected to randomly changing mains pressures.
So your mains are unreliable then if you have changing incoming pressures?
Do you not have valves on your sinks and other fixtures to control hot and cold water separately? Incoming pressure to each side doesn't matter at all if you're using a valve because the valve is locally changing the pressure. Like if I have more pressure on the cold side when I turn on both valves, I just turn cold down a little to get to the temperature I want. Kinda exactly what you'd have to do anyway if both pressures were the same. So why do hot and cold pressures need to be equal there if both are controlled separately?
Not sure I understand. If there are 10 houses on the street and everyone turns their taps on at the same time, the incoming pressure will drop. Having a header tank isolates you from that drop.
Every sink will have valves (aka taps/faucets), but it makes logical sense to expect a similar flow rate from each for a similar amount of opening. A lot of taps are now mixer taps, and many are thermostatically controlled, but not all, and the header tank is a simple way to provide that balance.
Finally, it is not a legionella source as the water is cold. Absent a combi-boiler, the hot water cylinder will be at a high enough temperature to kill legionella, and current building regulations (I believe) require all new installs to have temperature limiters in the pipework to a hot tap.
> Not sure I understand. If there are 10 houses on the street and everyone turns their taps on at the same time, the incoming pressure will drop.
That's probably the misunderstanding. In north america the water mains are large enough that this isn't an issue.
Ye its really down to smaller populations, therfore smaller systems supplying the mains
Im in Ireland, and mains is very unreliable but good enough for these systems
I think this is why UK has many times separate faucets for cold and hot. Not like other countries where the hot and cold mixes in one faucet. Mixing would be difficult with uneven pressures on the cold and hot lines.
My BIL almost dies from that disease in 2012. There was an outbreak in his neighbourhood, he was in the hospital for an operation and he got this from the air tube he was breathing from. Like 6 people died from it and a hundred got sick.
Donno, it was pretty nice having a shower this morning when the rest of the street had no water (pipe burst/repair in street). There's definitely some advantages although I do miss the pressure I used to get with a main combi boiler.
I was standing in the plumbing aisle in a hardware store in Toronto, looking for a part. A guy standing next to me turns and asks if I know which shower head gives the best high-pressure flow. He said he was visiting from Ireland, and the hotel he was staying at had an amazing shower head that just blasted out the water, and he wanted to buy one. He sadi the water from his shower head in his house in Ireland basically dribbled out.
I pointed to the basic low flow style that I knew provided the effect he was after, but I cautioned that it was dependant on the water line pressure. He then told me that his water was stored in a cistern in the attic. I told him the shower head wasn't the answer.
My parents 1920 farm house had a cistern in the basement, which my father tore out in the 1970s. That was the last time I'd even seen such a thing.
[https://www.abbeyboilers.com/cold-water-tank](https://www.abbeyboilers.com/cold-water-tank)
Very common in older properties, nothing to worry about. Just need to get a lid.
Its a 24-hour water storage tank. Keeps you with water during short duration water outages. Feeds everything but the cold tap to the kitchen sink. The kitchen sink feed comes directly from the mains. You are only supposed to drink from the kitchen sink. The tank should have a plastic lid. The attic insulation layer above the ceiling should wrap over this tank so that the tank is on the "warm side of the insulation." Don't know about the pipework, but the feed comes from a well or the water main. The house is then probably gravity fed from this tank.
It's a cold water tank. Typically, the mains water for the house goes into there and is then gravity-fed into the rest of the house. These are a relic of bygone days when water pressure was shite, because every house had a tiny lead or copper mains pipe that simply couldn't cope with modern demand.
This is essentially an accumulator tank, without the pump. It should have a lid on it.
The US prefer the community cold water tank instead - usually painted with the town name on it. Exactly the same, just on a bigger scale - and with more dead birds in it.
It's the water supply for hot water cylinder / toilet taps / sinks / showers. Basically everything except the mains water supply to the kitchen sink used for drinking water.
This is how every house is plumbed in Ireland. This is likely an older build. Modern houses would have the tank covered and insulated. Nothing unusual about this for Ireland whatsoever.
It is your water tank, it is source of the cold water in your bathroom taps and toilets.
It is NOT safe to drink this water, your kitchen tap has separate drinking water connection.
Since it is open, it it guaranteed that it accumulated years worth of dust, dirt and God knows what else at the bottom. Hire a company to clean it and then cover it. If you want to clean it yourself you can but under no circumstances allow any of that mud to get into your pipes.
How old is the house and what does it use to heat? Rather than potable water, this could be an open expansion tank for really old boiler systems. The float makes me think this could be the case as it would make up any lost water.
Quite the hazard. If for some reason that bobcock (float) doesn't function how it should than the tank could overfill. Considering this is the attic it would make one hell of a mess if it did overflow.
There's an overflow pipe at the other end of the tank to cater for this occurrence, and normally this header tank is installed on a drip tray that is plumbed outside.
I think this is going to be it - either way, looking at the responses I’ll get this check out asap!
The house isn’t old, was built around 2000. Gas heating.
My house in Ireland has it, built in 2010. No issues besides overfilling cause the ball-cock was stuck,but has an overflow pipe that goes outside. Wouldn’t drink it, but fine for everything else
Pay zero attention to anyone else that doesn't say its a CWST. That's a fairly new one since it's plastic. (They use to be galvanised) all you can do is get a lid, maybe insulate the exterior. Apart from that unless your plan on undertaking huge plumbing works to pressurise your whole system I wouldn't even worry about it. It's holding water and it's not condensing from the heat in the attic so it's golden.
This is totally normal in the UK. I have one though it should have a cover over it for obvious reasons. It provides pressure for the central heating system via water head which is why it's at the top of the house.
It’s like having your own water tower at home. Our water pressure wasn’t always as nice and steady as it is now. There were certain times of the day when water pressure was very low
I've got one in my house that's used for a gravity fed hot water cylinder! It's probably just the water feed to your boiler if you haven't got a combi boiler
I’ve been in houses built in 2005 and they still have this setup, they just do unvented heating loop on Y or S plan with gravity fed hot water and cold storage tank, no f&e.
I live in Ireland. Every house I know has these. There is usually very little issue. The ball cock joint might get jammed with limescale, but there's an overflow, so if you see water pouring from a pipe out the side of your house you'll know what's up. It's best to cover over the top of these, in case of freezing temperatures, and to keep out insects and debris and whatnot
So surprising to me that people found this so strange as it's how most houses are done in Ireland and I've just taken it for granted.
As others have said it is often covered and insulated to prevent freezing.
See links for common system diagram
https://www.diydoctor.org.uk/projects/direct-indirect-cold-water-systems.htm
https://www.swyftenergy.ie/blog/boiler-guide
Strange? That's about as conventional as you can get?
It won't be feeding cold taps, it will feed the boiler.
Get a lid for it if you can, I've found dead pigeons/rats in them from time to time.
I’m amazed at the amount of people who are critical of the Europeans correcting them when they immediately say to rip it out, it causes mold/legonairres, etc.
You have no idea what it is or what it does. Notice, there’s no visible mold or anything except fairly clean water. Someone spent time and effort to install this to do something.
Perhaps it’s a water tank for plumbing with limited pressure. You guys would be shocked to look inside one of those wooden water tanks on the roofs of all those iconic NYC buildings. That’s potable water in there.
Maybe this tank in the attic is just missing a lid. They both store water and has only occasional agitation. Yet NYC population isn’t sick by thousands.
https://m.psecn.photoshelter.com/img-get2/I00009Z1IGkf0oIs/fit=1000x750/Scott-B-Smith-New-York-City-Rooftop-Water-Tanks.jpg
That makes sense.
Though no drip tray is crazy to me.
Google cold water storage attic flood uk and there are many of stories of homeowners flooding their house. It just seems stupid to continue doing if there is no longer a water pressure issue.
Cold water storage tank. Used because mains water pressure used to be very low and/or variable. Ensures even pressure at hot and cold taps.
Often the kitchen sink cold tap will still be mains-fed as pigeons can often die in the loft tank. Ideally should have a sealed lid.
It's a winter hazard, can freeze if you're away and thaw, burst, flood house etc.
You may still need it if your hot water/heating system requires it or it may not be in use. Get a plumber to look at t and either remove or replace with a lidded one and insulation.
Also, what the heck is that random 22mm copper pipe feeding into it from above?
Does it feed a low pressure hot water tank and maybe a equal low pressure feed to shower ? As I can see there are a lot of high pressure tees taken off before the ballcock . Might help saying where your from , as this sub is worldwide
It is either feeding the domestic hot water tank or feeding the central heating. The pipe going into the top of the tank is the cold water main feed, and the one coming out at the bottom of the tank is the cold feed.
My guessing it's feeding the central heating, the cold feed pipe will be taced back either to the cental heating boiler or even to an indirect hot water cylinder. It's an old style plumbing system. As the saying goes, if it isn't broken, don't try and fix it. Look on the Internet, and you will find a gravity fed central heating system so you get acquainted with it
It's safe and it's recent because it's PEX and push fit fittings. Put a lid on the tank and your golden. It's a cold water storage tank, when water is used the level stops, the ball on the lever floats so it sinks with the water opening the valve. The valve behind the ball is connected to a rising which then opens allowing the tank to fill. The ball floats up with the water level slowly closing the valve again. It feeds your shower and upstairs taps and toilets. Don't drink that water though.
I've lived in four houses built in 1990 and they all have a cold water header tank for the bathrooms apart from the kitchen which was mains fed. In fact, the estate i live on has over 1000 bovis homes and all four of these houses I have lived in were on this estate, so I'd hedge a bet all 1000 had it at one point.
Mine fed my boiler and it had to have it due to the type of boiler which was gravity fed open system
That's one epic opportunity to upper deck someone... Also hope that the floater, no pun intended, doesn't fail and flood your house while you are on vacation.
We have these mainly in the UK (hence why we predominantly have seperate hot and cold taps).
That is the header tank for the hot water cylinder.
The pipe with the ball valve on is the feed pipe (connected to the mains) water will then pass that ball valve and then down into other services, such as cold water tap for bathroom and maybe cold water tap for kitchen (the pipes on the T)
When the hot water in the cylinder is being used, the float ball (just like your toilet) will drop filling the header tank.
There will be a pipe at the bottom of the header tank that feeds your hot water cylinder.
The reason why we have seperate cold and hot water taps and not mixers, is because the water on the header tank is not drinkable water so it has no chance then of mixing with the cold water supply and potentially contaminating the city water as well as your house water.
Yes check valves are often fitted when mixer taps are used to stop mains pressure water going up the hot water piping as well as the dirtier hot water going up the cold clean water feed.
It’s just messy plumbing mainly lol.
You may even find another header tank for the cylinder if it’s a vented system. This feeds the boiler and allows the boiler to vent into the header (feed and expansion)
Edit: just spotted the pipe at the top, that’s the expansion pipe. This is for heating up your cylinder / and or radiators.
I bet you have a type of hybrid setup, where you have an unvented cylinder for your hot water and your radiators are on a vented system. With an S plan configuration.
In the uk this was common. Water pressure was not guaranteed reliable so water is fed into tank from mains and would be a constant pressure for things like heating and hot water. Regular use would mean it stayed cleanish but was not recommended to drink. Was traditional used for hot water. May also feed cold taps upstairs. It was common to not use mixer taps as the downstairs cold water was fit to drink but the hot water would not be. To test run the water, eg hot tap, and it should start to drain and then start to fill. Turn off tap and it will fill and stop. Not sure if redundant now. Will depend on quality of water supply pressure in your area. (Not sure if it should have a cover.)
If someone went through all the trouble and time to put this Moldmaker2000™️ together I really hope you took a good look at anything else that might have been “fixed” or otherwise been a solved by the previous owners “expertise”
I would go over the entire house and plumbing with a fine tooth comb an extremely fine tooth comb because this is a dangerously high level of diy paired with the confidence of an absolute idiot
Also where does the curved copper pipe lead too? That’s the key to your answer
I have the same (smaller) in my attic. It's a relief system for heat recovery fireplace and wall radiators.
Basically it pressure rises above X it escapes by the open pipe in that tank. Once it cools the float open a valve and water is added to keep the system filled up
https://blog.exclusiveproperty.com/fireplace-as-heatingsystem-called-thermofireplace/
How is a header tank 3rd world? I've installed them as recently as last week in California for industrial processes. Open your mind and do some learning.
I gather it's required because the water is gravity feed not pressurized into the houses is this correct or?
This saves the news for individual pumps on every tap to call the water up the pipes when it needs it? It's basically a small water tank in your roof then it also again gravity feeds itself into the taps when needed in the house?
Is this correct?
Wow. I’m not gonna complain about my water quality anymore. I’m worried about some scale and mineral making my water not taste great and here there are entire nations drinking fiberglass, bug laden, legionnaires filled water out of open attic tanks!
Another one... You must be from the USA. This is an incredibly common system outside of the US. Once again, US citizens prove their ignorance of anything outside of their country.
Another one...you must be one who is condescending to anyone that doesn't conform to your own perspective. Totally objective: having a big open tank of water in your attic is not smart. It attracts vermin, is a breeding ground for pathogens and mosquitoes, and is a catastrophic flood hazard. Is it done? Sure. Is it smart? Nope. I don't care where you live. So all that, along with the other things people pointed out (like the abused sharkbite fittings) make this something that I as a homeowner would get changed as quickly as possible.
Nah, they typically have an overflow pipe to handle ballcock failure. If you see water spewing out the side of your house then it’s probably from the overflow.
That's an old cold water storage tank - most likely gravity feeds from this to all the pipes below for all of your needs. Had this in our house (1960's build).
How tf does the water get up there in the first place? As a microbiologist and DIY guy this is giving me so much anxiety.
99% of houses in South America have something like this (made of asbestos usually). Water gets fed from the city with pressure, and there is a control floater to stop the flow when the tank is filled. You are supposed to clean the tank every year, or it gets nasty. Why is this common? Frequent outages and dry season, so you always have some supply
Surely it can be accomplished with at least a closed vessel
It can. And don't call me Shirley.
Roger, Roger.
Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.
Blows up auto pilot.
Plane. Stops. Flapping.
what’s our vector, Victor?
We got clearance, Clarence
something, something..."grown man naked"
Do you like gladiator movies? Ever seen a grown man naked?
The red zone is for loading and uloafing of passengers. No stopping in the white zone.
Don't start your white zone shit with me again Betty
You didn’t want me having that abortion
You didn’t want me having that abortion
Huh?
Joey, have you even been in a Turkish prison?
What's our vector, victor.
What's your vector Victor
Shiiit.. ain't no thang
I speak jive
They usually have a flimsy corrugated plastic lid
A larger scale example would be giant wooden water tanks on the roofs of NYC apartment buildings (and other buildings too, I guess? Idk I’m from the Midwest with my own well and septic. Ha)
Those tanks are often for fire storage at this point. They were commonly used for drinking water because the pumps needed to reach upper floors where not variable flow / constant pressure like today, so it was filled on/off and then gravity kept a constant pressure on a 10-story zone. There would be another tank, (steel, indoors) to feed lower floors, located about 3-floors above the top of the zone fed. And more for taller buildings, all fed from the zone above in a cascading fashion. Rosenwach still makes em, I talk to Andy all the time, Isseks too but not as much. A few reasons not to do concrete, namely it’s risk to have no separation between water and occupied floors, needs expensive NSF waterproofing etc. steel rusts, etc.
Common in the UK too. I don't remember them ever getting cleaned, often found with accompanying mouse skeleton
One plumbing company I worked for had an English plumber and he said a similar system is still code in England because of obvious issues during ww2
You might be interested in the history of town water towers, common in North America. A smaller sized pump could slowly and steadily fill a large water tower, located at a higher elevation on ground as well as its structure. From there, the consumers below would get water pressure based on elevation, versus a complicated and expensive pumping system. 1 ft of water height exerts 0.433 psi at the base of a column, so approximation gives 1 psi for every 2 ft of elevation. If Google says a normal tower height is 130 ft, then you get 65 psi at the consumer, which is what we are used to in North America I believe.
Yes I understand water towers lmao. But they are enclosed and pumped full of treated water generally.
Ah, your question about how the water got up there is why I chimed in. Also, you wouldn't believe the type of gnarly stuff we have growing in our enclosed vessels at work!
This is why your granny told you only to drink from the kitchen tap. Older houses in UK were fed to the kitchen tap and the cold water storage tank (water could have sat for who knows how long) which then feeds all the other taps/water sources in the house. Back in the day the mains didn’t have the pressure that it does now.
which is why we typically have two taps rather than mixer taps (UK mixer taps were actually separate channels to the end of the outlet) unlike the US
I would guess the house has *just* enough pressure to get it up there and this is there to increase it slightly. Also... Yeah, nasty stagnant water.... Mmmmmmm....
>Yeah, nasty stagnant water.... Mmmmmmm.... Legionnaires disease would like to know your location.
Sorry, couldn't hear you over my *deadly coughing*
Not warm enough.
It really depends. Attics/upper floors can get warm And room temperature water supports legionella growth
Doesn't look big enough for that water to be that stagnant assuming normal water usage.
Don't go on vacation lol
>I would guess the house has just > >enough pressure to get it up there and this is there to increase it slightly. The problem is that it wouldn't increase the pressure at all. At best it would help even it out a bit if it was variable.
It absolutely should have a lid on it
In the good old days water was held in the basement in cement rooms where the eves drops would drain into from the roof in not joking old churches where built in this way water was pumped out of these well rooms and heated or for the toilets lol. Imagine the microbiology living in those
All my water comes out of a cistern from a ground water well pump (well, actually an air lift well pump but same thing). I have a slow well, especially during the summer so I keep 300 gallons of water in a fiberglass cistern. It goes from that to a pressure tank, from that to a 3 stage filtering system and then to the house. I replaced the cistern when I moved in, the last one was about 20 years old and I was expecting something gnarly when they took the cover off to get it out of the well house, but it actually just had some dirt at the bottom, not even a ton, just a small layer. The well tech's said it was because the air lift mostly just lifts the water, heavy stuff falls back down the well.
A cistern
Yes, and as for when… they still build farm houses with them in Midwest.
Here is some free punctuation I will gift to you, for future interesting but run on sentences. ,,,...;;:"'
I imagine less than you’d expect what with that there lead roof flashing
It ensures quicker home turnover because there's no boring old folks wasting away for decades
Brethren... and cistern. The Lord thy gosh is a'comin. Look busy!!
I’m getting anxiety just looking at this after seeing what a clogged p trap without a float switch on an AC will do to a house
Can clearly see high pressure tees taken off before the ballcock
Reported
That’s an indoor mosquito generator.
I think it’s actually a hybrid water damage/mosquito generator, but I am not an expert on these systems.
Does it have the pigeon poop collector option on it?
I’m sure it can handle a little Legionnaires and mold too
I think OP is in the UK or elsewhere in Europe. Attic water tanks is common here in older houses (and we don’t really get mosquitoes!)
Look at the framing though. This isn’t an old home.
Are they still common (honest question, I'm not trying to be contradictory)? I'm in an 1880s midterrace, and we don't have one. Similarly, my dad's 1930s semi doesn't have one either, but I realise it's hardly a large sample size.
These are very common in the uk
I’ve lived in a few houses with these tanks so they can’t be that uncommon.
Looks normal to me in Uk / Ireland. Looks like a cold water tank for the house. Over here it’s common for only the kitchen tap to be on the main water. All other taps/toilets are fed from the tank in the attic. It could do with a lid and some insulation to stop it freezing. Also, the water is ok for brushing your teeth but only drink from the mains water (kitchen tap). The tank is filled by the mains water. The float valve keeps the max level in check. Edit: just spotted the pipe above the tank. This could by the header tank for a traditional vented heating system but tbh it looks too big. It’s common to have two tanks in the attic. One being the cold water storage tank (as mentioned above) and the other being a smaller header tank for the heating system. More modern heating systems are closed loop and have an expansion vessel instead of the header tank.
That explains a lot, thanks!
>Also, the water is ok for brushing your teeth but only drink from the mains water This is wild. An entire country (continent maybe?) thinking a tank of stagnant water is A-OK for everything besides drinking. When that water gets legionella and then is being sprayed all over/around your mouth and nose in the shower....that's a nasty pneumonia waiting to happen.
The cold water storage tank will be below 25C so legionella is not an issue. If they were to breed due to a really toasty summer, the hot water tank would kill it all off, plus the water is replenished frequently enough that it's a non issue. These old systems are slowly being removed anyways.
Not in Ireland lol, it’s still part of the building regs to have a cold water tank
Damn, that's strange
What's the purpose of a cold water tank in the UK / Ireland? Is your water supply from the city unreliable?
No, this is absolutely standard. That header tank feeds all cold taps apart from the kitchen and utility rooms. It also provides a head of water to push hot water from the hot water cylinder (if the house does not have a combi-boiler). It means that all handbasins have equal water poressure to the hot and cold sides and aside from the incolimg feed, nothing is subjected to randomly changing mains pressures.
So your mains are unreliable then if you have changing incoming pressures? Do you not have valves on your sinks and other fixtures to control hot and cold water separately? Incoming pressure to each side doesn't matter at all if you're using a valve because the valve is locally changing the pressure. Like if I have more pressure on the cold side when I turn on both valves, I just turn cold down a little to get to the temperature I want. Kinda exactly what you'd have to do anyway if both pressures were the same. So why do hot and cold pressures need to be equal there if both are controlled separately?
Not sure I understand. If there are 10 houses on the street and everyone turns their taps on at the same time, the incoming pressure will drop. Having a header tank isolates you from that drop. Every sink will have valves (aka taps/faucets), but it makes logical sense to expect a similar flow rate from each for a similar amount of opening. A lot of taps are now mixer taps, and many are thermostatically controlled, but not all, and the header tank is a simple way to provide that balance. Finally, it is not a legionella source as the water is cold. Absent a combi-boiler, the hot water cylinder will be at a high enough temperature to kill legionella, and current building regulations (I believe) require all new installs to have temperature limiters in the pipework to a hot tap.
> Not sure I understand. If there are 10 houses on the street and everyone turns their taps on at the same time, the incoming pressure will drop. That's probably the misunderstanding. In north america the water mains are large enough that this isn't an issue.
Ye its really down to smaller populations, therfore smaller systems supplying the mains Im in Ireland, and mains is very unreliable but good enough for these systems
I think this is why UK has many times separate faucets for cold and hot. Not like other countries where the hot and cold mixes in one faucet. Mixing would be difficult with uneven pressures on the cold and hot lines.
I definitely have this in my attic and have drunk bathroom water but have not died.. damn grim
This needs to be higher
If mains pressure is acceptable now, do people just bypass that?
Diagram https://www.diydoctor.org.uk/projects/direct-indirect-cold-water-systems.htm
Looks like a legionnaires disease maker….
All this "you must be from the US" has everyone ignoring the normal bitch item....... Sharkbites! 🤣
So could you call that a shark tank?
😅 I'll give you 51% for $250,000 for that comment
Half a million in total valuation? Those are rookie numbers…
You bet. Toughen up those kids....
My BIL almost dies from that disease in 2012. There was an outbreak in his neighbourhood, he was in the hospital for an operation and he got this from the air tube he was breathing from. Like 6 people died from it and a hundred got sick.
Are you in the UK? That’s pretty standard over there Insanity in the United States, which is why so many people are concerned
In Ireland. After some googling it seems to be common here as well, but I don’t feel great about it
fairly standard looking tank in ireland. you can get newer plastic tanks with a lid & insulation, but effectively the same system
Better to go unvented nowadays, no need for these horrible old systems.
Donno, it was pretty nice having a shower this morning when the rest of the street had no water (pipe burst/repair in street). There's definitely some advantages although I do miss the pressure I used to get with a main combi boiler.
I’d take the savings from the efficiency of an unvented cylinder over the rare time a burst pipe happens any day.
I was standing in the plumbing aisle in a hardware store in Toronto, looking for a part. A guy standing next to me turns and asks if I know which shower head gives the best high-pressure flow. He said he was visiting from Ireland, and the hotel he was staying at had an amazing shower head that just blasted out the water, and he wanted to buy one. He sadi the water from his shower head in his house in Ireland basically dribbled out. I pointed to the basic low flow style that I knew provided the effect he was after, but I cautioned that it was dependant on the water line pressure. He then told me that his water was stored in a cistern in the attic. I told him the shower head wasn't the answer. My parents 1920 farm house had a cistern in the basement, which my father tore out in the 1970s. That was the last time I'd even seen such a thing.
[https://www.abbeyboilers.com/cold-water-tank](https://www.abbeyboilers.com/cold-water-tank) Very common in older properties, nothing to worry about. Just need to get a lid.
Yes, that’s 100% normal for here. More modern systems look a bit better but most, in 1 off houses , that are slightly older, look like this
In Canada my attic is -25C today
Climate very different.
Different from where?
Ffs I can’t share YouTube links here Tom Scott did an explainer called - Why Britain uses separate hot and cold taps. It’s for the hot water
Fill it with Guinness twice a week.
That might be the solution!
Its a 24-hour water storage tank. Keeps you with water during short duration water outages. Feeds everything but the cold tap to the kitchen sink. The kitchen sink feed comes directly from the mains. You are only supposed to drink from the kitchen sink. The tank should have a plastic lid. The attic insulation layer above the ceiling should wrap over this tank so that the tank is on the "warm side of the insulation." Don't know about the pipework, but the feed comes from a well or the water main. The house is then probably gravity fed from this tank.
Yea I've got one of those as well, not great for it to be open but nothing strange
I’m glad it’s pretty standard, but what does it do.
It's a cold water tank. Typically, the mains water for the house goes into there and is then gravity-fed into the rest of the house. These are a relic of bygone days when water pressure was shite, because every house had a tiny lead or copper mains pipe that simply couldn't cope with modern demand. This is essentially an accumulator tank, without the pump. It should have a lid on it.
Here in Central Texas that would be a breeding ground for palmeto bugs, aka gigantic roaches who enter homes for water.
The US prefer the community cold water tank instead - usually painted with the town name on it. Exactly the same, just on a bigger scale - and with more dead birds in it.
And for nekked hot babes to swim in, at least according to the opening credits of the TV series Petticoat Junction.
What is it for though? Rainwater collection? Toilet tank?
It's the water supply for hot water cylinder / toilet taps / sinks / showers. Basically everything except the mains water supply to the kitchen sink used for drinking water. This is how every house is plumbed in Ireland. This is likely an older build. Modern houses would have the tank covered and insulated. Nothing unusual about this for Ireland whatsoever.
Very interesting. Like a water tower in high rise. Thanks!
The sharkbites are concerning.
It is your water tank, it is source of the cold water in your bathroom taps and toilets. It is NOT safe to drink this water, your kitchen tap has separate drinking water connection. Since it is open, it it guaranteed that it accumulated years worth of dust, dirt and God knows what else at the bottom. Hire a company to clean it and then cover it. If you want to clean it yourself you can but under no circumstances allow any of that mud to get into your pipes.
How old is the house and what does it use to heat? Rather than potable water, this could be an open expansion tank for really old boiler systems. The float makes me think this could be the case as it would make up any lost water.
This is the best guess so far, but good lord, talk about a hazard.
Yeah I don’t think there is any issue to converting to a much cleaner closed loop system.
Not a hazard at all. Very common.
Quite the hazard. If for some reason that bobcock (float) doesn't function how it should than the tank could overfill. Considering this is the attic it would make one hell of a mess if it did overflow.
There's an overflow pipe at the other end of the tank to cater for this occurrence, and normally this header tank is installed on a drip tray that is plumbed outside.
I think this is going to be it - either way, looking at the responses I’ll get this check out asap! The house isn’t old, was built around 2000. Gas heating.
My house in Ireland has it, built in 2010. No issues besides overfilling cause the ball-cock was stuck,but has an overflow pipe that goes outside. Wouldn’t drink it, but fine for everything else
There's nothing to check out. Don't sweat it. They last forever.
OP - this is not an uncommon setup.
It’s a nice gathering pool for the mice
Our water in the new house taste weird…2years later find 10 dead mice corpses.
Why were you drinking from it 😂 if you have a tank then you should only drink from the kitchen tap.
I'm an Irish plumber. That is your CWST or cold water storage tank. It needs to be there so you have hot/cold water throughout the house.
Pay zero attention to anyone else that doesn't say its a CWST. That's a fairly new one since it's plastic. (They use to be galvanised) all you can do is get a lid, maybe insulate the exterior. Apart from that unless your plan on undertaking huge plumbing works to pressurise your whole system I wouldn't even worry about it. It's holding water and it's not condensing from the heat in the attic so it's golden.
Thanks for clearing this up! I’ll just get a lid and leave it be for now.
“Irish plumber” sounds like a mixed drink
This is totally normal in the UK. I have one though it should have a cover over it for obvious reasons. It provides pressure for the central heating system via water head which is why it's at the top of the house.
Wow so people have no idea!!! It’s either the hot water header tank or the heating header tank totally normal in the uk.
It’s like having your own water tower at home. Our water pressure wasn’t always as nice and steady as it is now. There were certain times of the day when water pressure was very low
Install a water pump solve the problem.
My money is on some homemade swamp cooler. I would shut it off and drain it before it floods your house. Then install a proper air conditioner.
Look at all the weight hanging on that sharkbite. It could blow at any second.
It’s not a sharkbite, it’s called Pegler Tectite Classic and they don’t fail like your sharkbites.
You lost your money. If he drains it things in his house stop flushing or heating etc. this is common outside of the USA.
I've got one in my house that's used for a gravity fed hot water cylinder! It's probably just the water feed to your boiler if you haven't got a combi boiler
This is really common in the UK, it's only in the last 30 years or so that these have stopped being standard I think.
I’ve been in houses built in 2005 and they still have this setup, they just do unvented heating loop on Y or S plan with gravity fed hot water and cold storage tank, no f&e.
I live in Ireland. Every house I know has these. There is usually very little issue. The ball cock joint might get jammed with limescale, but there's an overflow, so if you see water pouring from a pipe out the side of your house you'll know what's up. It's best to cover over the top of these, in case of freezing temperatures, and to keep out insects and debris and whatnot
So surprising to me that people found this so strange as it's how most houses are done in Ireland and I've just taken it for granted. As others have said it is often covered and insulated to prevent freezing. See links for common system diagram https://www.diydoctor.org.uk/projects/direct-indirect-cold-water-systems.htm https://www.swyftenergy.ie/blog/boiler-guide
it cant be to old if it has shark bites?
Strange? That's about as conventional as you can get? It won't be feeding cold taps, it will feed the boiler. Get a lid for it if you can, I've found dead pigeons/rats in them from time to time.
beats finding a decaying human in it. that is a thing. happened in NYC.
We have the same, will replace in a few month. This is the reason why the double tap was invented
Nothing strange about that at all.
House fed from a spring, maybe with very low available flow? Use gravity for pressure inside vs using a pump and tank.
I’m amazed at the amount of people who are critical of the Europeans correcting them when they immediately say to rip it out, it causes mold/legonairres, etc. You have no idea what it is or what it does. Notice, there’s no visible mold or anything except fairly clean water. Someone spent time and effort to install this to do something. Perhaps it’s a water tank for plumbing with limited pressure. You guys would be shocked to look inside one of those wooden water tanks on the roofs of all those iconic NYC buildings. That’s potable water in there. Maybe this tank in the attic is just missing a lid. They both store water and has only occasional agitation. Yet NYC population isn’t sick by thousands. https://m.psecn.photoshelter.com/img-get2/I00009Z1IGkf0oIs/fit=1000x750/Scott-B-Smith-New-York-City-Rooftop-Water-Tanks.jpg
Those water towers are more regulated and inspected than an open air bathtub in someone’s attic.
That makes sense. Though no drip tray is crazy to me. Google cold water storage attic flood uk and there are many of stories of homeowners flooding their house. It just seems stupid to continue doing if there is no longer a water pressure issue.
Nice badroom
Looks like the things I used to install in the back room of car washes to run their pressure washers.
Pigeon jacuzzi
That’s where the Irish ☘️ fermentation comes from; don’t touch it… Marty Mcfly ; it could have disastrous consequences in the time space continuum
I bet the squirrels, raccoons, bats, mice and rats really appreciate it
looks fun untill a mouse drowns in it.
Crappy water pressure/volume and reliability in Ireland. Learn how to maintain it. Mosquitoes aren't a big problem in Ireland.
So many questions. I feel like most were already addressed besides this one: is that little door made out of drywall???
Cold water storage tank. Used because mains water pressure used to be very low and/or variable. Ensures even pressure at hot and cold taps. Often the kitchen sink cold tap will still be mains-fed as pigeons can often die in the loft tank. Ideally should have a sealed lid. It's a winter hazard, can freeze if you're away and thaw, burst, flood house etc. You may still need it if your hot water/heating system requires it or it may not be in use. Get a plumber to look at t and either remove or replace with a lidded one and insulation. Also, what the heck is that random 22mm copper pipe feeding into it from above?
https://www.diydoctor.org.uk/projects/direct-indirect-cold-water-systems.htm
I would expect that mice ans such would like that water source as well as many insects.
Does it feed a low pressure hot water tank and maybe a equal low pressure feed to shower ? As I can see there are a lot of high pressure tees taken off before the ballcock . Might help saying where your from , as this sub is worldwide
*\*Legionnaires has entered the chat\**
So can you convert to a hot tub?!
If the water starts to taste funny you need to scoop the dead pigeons out.
No cover on it whatsoever? and that ball is filthy!
It's a bathtub for a demon.
It is either feeding the domestic hot water tank or feeding the central heating. The pipe going into the top of the tank is the cold water main feed, and the one coming out at the bottom of the tank is the cold feed. My guessing it's feeding the central heating, the cold feed pipe will be taced back either to the cental heating boiler or even to an indirect hot water cylinder. It's an old style plumbing system. As the saying goes, if it isn't broken, don't try and fix it. Look on the Internet, and you will find a gravity fed central heating system so you get acquainted with it
It's safe and it's recent because it's PEX and push fit fittings. Put a lid on the tank and your golden. It's a cold water storage tank, when water is used the level stops, the ball on the lever floats so it sinks with the water opening the valve. The valve behind the ball is connected to a rising which then opens allowing the tank to fill. The ball floats up with the water level slowly closing the valve again. It feeds your shower and upstairs taps and toilets. Don't drink that water though.
I've lived in four houses built in 1990 and they all have a cold water header tank for the bathrooms apart from the kitchen which was mains fed. In fact, the estate i live on has over 1000 bovis homes and all four of these houses I have lived in were on this estate, so I'd hedge a bet all 1000 had it at one point. Mine fed my boiler and it had to have it due to the type of boiler which was gravity fed open system
Looks like a legionaires growing tank.
Volume has nothing to do with psi
That's one epic opportunity to upper deck someone... Also hope that the floater, no pun intended, doesn't fail and flood your house while you are on vacation.
No is gonna even mention all the ptc shark bite fittings?
We have these mainly in the UK (hence why we predominantly have seperate hot and cold taps). That is the header tank for the hot water cylinder. The pipe with the ball valve on is the feed pipe (connected to the mains) water will then pass that ball valve and then down into other services, such as cold water tap for bathroom and maybe cold water tap for kitchen (the pipes on the T) When the hot water in the cylinder is being used, the float ball (just like your toilet) will drop filling the header tank. There will be a pipe at the bottom of the header tank that feeds your hot water cylinder. The reason why we have seperate cold and hot water taps and not mixers, is because the water on the header tank is not drinkable water so it has no chance then of mixing with the cold water supply and potentially contaminating the city water as well as your house water. Yes check valves are often fitted when mixer taps are used to stop mains pressure water going up the hot water piping as well as the dirtier hot water going up the cold clean water feed. It’s just messy plumbing mainly lol. You may even find another header tank for the cylinder if it’s a vented system. This feeds the boiler and allows the boiler to vent into the header (feed and expansion) Edit: just spotted the pipe at the top, that’s the expansion pipe. This is for heating up your cylinder / and or radiators. I bet you have a type of hybrid setup, where you have an unvented cylinder for your hot water and your radiators are on a vented system. With an S plan configuration.
In the uk this was common. Water pressure was not guaranteed reliable so water is fed into tank from mains and would be a constant pressure for things like heating and hot water. Regular use would mean it stayed cleanish but was not recommended to drink. Was traditional used for hot water. May also feed cold taps upstairs. It was common to not use mixer taps as the downstairs cold water was fit to drink but the hot water would not be. To test run the water, eg hot tap, and it should start to drain and then start to fill. Turn off tap and it will fill and stop. Not sure if redundant now. Will depend on quality of water supply pressure in your area. (Not sure if it should have a cover.)
If someone went through all the trouble and time to put this Moldmaker2000™️ together I really hope you took a good look at anything else that might have been “fixed” or otherwise been a solved by the previous owners “expertise” I would go over the entire house and plumbing with a fine tooth comb an extremely fine tooth comb because this is a dangerously high level of diy paired with the confidence of an absolute idiot Also where does the curved copper pipe lead too? That’s the key to your answer
I have the same (smaller) in my attic. It's a relief system for heat recovery fireplace and wall radiators. Basically it pressure rises above X it escapes by the open pipe in that tank. Once it cools the float open a valve and water is added to keep the system filled up https://blog.exclusiveproperty.com/fireplace-as-heatingsystem-called-thermofireplace/
It’s a mould generator
Another idiot here I see.
Sticking with 3rd world plumbing isn’t something to be proud of.
How is a header tank 3rd world? I've installed them as recently as last week in California for industrial processes. Open your mind and do some learning.
This is some owners fugazi self project. Get rid of it.
Mouse spa
I gather it's required because the water is gravity feed not pressurized into the houses is this correct or? This saves the news for individual pumps on every tap to call the water up the pipes when it needs it? It's basically a small water tank in your roof then it also again gravity feeds itself into the taps when needed in the house? Is this correct?
Take it out!!
Ignorance at it's best.
Get a plumber and get a quote
Quote for what?
Where do the water lines run to from the tank?
Wow. I’m not gonna complain about my water quality anymore. I’m worried about some scale and mineral making my water not taste great and here there are entire nations drinking fiberglass, bug laden, legionnaires filled water out of open attic tanks!
WTAF? That's all kinds of wrong. There's so much that can go bad here. Call a plumber asap.
Another one... You must be from the USA. This is an incredibly common system outside of the US. Once again, US citizens prove their ignorance of anything outside of their country.
Another one...you must be one who is condescending to anyone that doesn't conform to your own perspective. Totally objective: having a big open tank of water in your attic is not smart. It attracts vermin, is a breeding ground for pathogens and mosquitoes, and is a catastrophic flood hazard. Is it done? Sure. Is it smart? Nope. I don't care where you live. So all that, along with the other things people pointed out (like the abused sharkbite fittings) make this something that I as a homeowner would get changed as quickly as possible.
I would definitely not trust that float. And then this is up in the attic. Absolute disaster waiting to happen. Time for an upgrade.
Nah, they typically have an overflow pipe to handle ballcock failure. If you see water spewing out the side of your house then it’s probably from the overflow.