Stopcock broken...

the stopcock in the road IS their responsibility not yours, and you will be breaking the lay by replacing it. i think that they have miss understood you and think you mean your internal stopcock...
if you realy have to replace the street stopcock, do it about 3am or mid working day
like i said its not your responsibility and i beleve the only way to repair it it to dig arround it...

either that or you could phone em to say that there is a leak outside your house and then go out and give the stopcock a few whacks.....thattal get em' out!

SS

 

so you dont have one on the public footpath?
i suppose you will have to get someone in to freze the pipe just before the tap outside, then replace it with a new one, if its in your back garden it wont be so much of a problem digging arround it so uncover it and get someone in....you could always do it with one of the wickes kits that freeze the pipe.....but i would be worrid about the whole not being able to keep it frozen like you would with a machine....you can rent the machines though i think......

ss

 

Must be someones responsibility! If its off your property it's not yours and, as SS states, you are not allowed to touch it. Is / was the road private? My house was originally ex RAF and the road covering about 50 houses is under some sort of joint responsibility. SO any probs all 50 houses could "theoretically" get a bill. Try your local council. It should also have been mentyyioned in the deeds when you bought the house. (Tho' mine wasn't!!)

 

This sounds like the 'not our responsibility' problem some of my neighbours had 20 months after moving into new houses. There is a brook forming our bottom boundary and the land between was raised by the builders. That was their way of getting rid of all the clay bulldozed when building the roads.
In July 1968 there was a 100 year storm with 5½" of rain in 24 hours half of wich fell in one hour. The brook rose 15' & overflowed. The garden being 18" higher than the houses caused a waterfall effect outside the back doors, many houses were flooded & a number had the tarmac drives lifted. They claimed off the insurers who said the drives were the councils responsibility. The council said it was the homeowners. Nothing was done until the road was being handed over to the council who then insisted the builder repaired the drives before they would take responsibility. The insurers found that the council had responsibility for the drives as they insisted on tarmac because it formed part of the pavement & the dustmen wouldn't collect the bins because they would not be covered for injury if the drives were private.
This seems to have been forgotten as many have now paved the drives & the dustmen only collect from the curbside. It was part of a covenent that lasted 10 years after the houses were built.

 

This diagram, from a United Utilities web page, shows common supply pipe responsibilities: http://www.unitedutilities.com/images/contentimages/commonsupplypipes.gif

To replace the leaking stopcock, without turning of the supply, you could use a pipe freezer. Electric pipe freezers can be hired for about £30 - £40, or Screwfix do a small aerosol kit for £8.99: http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro.jsp;jsessionid=10YWTDIHGZDC1CJO2C3CKTQ?id=13369&ts=43656

 

Naw - what you do is wait until about 3 am, having got everything you can done with the water on.
Then nip out and switch off the water supply to the street.
Fix your stop tap.
Then first thing next morning, ring the water company and tell them you seem to have no water this morning and wondered why! IF someone else hasn't already done that!

 

I have just taken advantage of a free water meter install offer. If your local water company is also making the same offer, then you might want to take advantage of this, as the new meter comes with a new plastic stopcock.

Of course, you may not want to change to metered supply depending on your circumstances, but with the offer in my area, I can revert to non-metered supply within the first 12 months.

 

Talking of responsibility, whilst the supplier is responsible for the meter outside your property are you allowed to turn off the water to your house from the valve at the meter?

Dr Who

 

Don't give up.

Ask your water suppliers for a list of households supplied by that tap. You are entitled to know. Ask for more details, anything you can think of, ask for plans of supplies, make a niusance of yourself. Keep at them. These organisations make huge profits and don't like doing too much work. Chances are you'll exhaust them and they'll do the job to keep you quiet.

I believe also (this is only allegedly - without prejudice) it is not unknown for large organisations such as water companies to lie about such matters in order to save money.( After all, the directors are obliged by law to maximise the return to the shareholders)

 

Hi bootlace,

just another thought. Are you sure that the handle has broken off. Maybe it never had one. The old style stopcocks just exposed a square nut at the top. You need a stopcock key to turn them off.

 

Why don't you freeze the pipe just below the valve that is leaking and replace the valve, as long as you have an isolating valve at the entry to your property why worry about the external valve, it would be an easier job than digging up

 

I agree - or if it's poly pipe, get hold of some poly crimps to cut off the flow.

 

Try a ajustable basin wrench. you can reach down the hole and grip the spigot with it and should be able to turn the tap off.

 

freeze the supply pipe at the most convenient spot where it enters your property, and install a new stopcock/valve there.
much easier.