Lady plumbers...hands in tight spaces...

 

 

On a serious note I've taken the liberty of firing off a couple of these images to toiletspares.co.uk Does to me look like an early Siamp fill valve. I've waded through every image on the site and Siamp looks the nearest.

 

They may come back of course and say the only way to be sure is to whip it out for a proper look... 

My nails are sharp. You wouldn’t be smiling ?

 

Thank you so much for that. I was frantically googling for the flush thing too but couldn’t find one like it. 

 

 

Next problem. It’s attached to this plastic thing at the front. I’ve unscrewed it from the unit but can’t get the plastic collar thing to let go unless anyone has any ideas. 

 

Then I thought I would just unscrew the nut. Never used a spanner before so went in search of one. Found one that says 13/16 one end and I think it says 11/16 the other end but one is too big and the other too small. Looks like I may need to buy one the right size if I can work out what it needs. 

 

 

11/16" & 13/16" equate to a 17 & 21mm spanner. See then if you have an 18/19 or 20mm spanner or small adjustable.

Just now, Onoff said:

11/16" & 13/16" equate to a 17 & 21mm spanner. See then if you have an 18/19 or 20mm spanner or small adjustable.

 

Thanks. The hubby had sets and sets of the damn things. Christ knows where they all are. There are 2 adjustables but they look huge. I will go back into the cavern of hell  garage and have another look. Another cheap and cheerful Amazon purchase seems appropriate to ensure that I have full sets of these things going forward. Would this be any good for once in a blue moon stuff? 

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Amtech-K0400-Combination-Spanner-11-Piece/dp/B008G0HWX4/ref=sr_1_6?s=diy&ie=UTF8&qid=1532166433&sr=1-6&keywords=spanner+set

 

 

 

You could always try unscrewing the white collar to the left of the silver nut/ clippy bit and see if the floatvalve will lift out then.

8 hours ago, Ferdinand said:

 

And I look so young because I use Oil of Ulay.

 

 

 

Shows your age because it has been Oil of Olay for about 20 years! 

2 hours ago, newhome said:

 

Thanks. The hubby had sets and sets of the damn things. Christ knows where they all are. There are 2 adjustables but they look huge. I will go back into the cavern of hell  garage and have another look. Another cheap and cheerful Amazon purchase seems appropriate to ensure that I have full sets of these things going forward. Would this be any good for once in a blue moon stuff? 

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Amtech-K0400-Combination-Spanner-11-Piece/dp/B008G0HWX4/ref=sr_1_6?s=diy&ie=UTF8&qid=1532166433&sr=1-6&keywords=spanner+set

 

 

 

 

 

Best bet is to sort out and photograph your late husbands tools, post them here in another thread, and we will look at them, name them for you and you can then label them so you know what they are.  I suspect you already have all the tools you could possibly need, and all you really need is a way of identifying them.

 

If you want to be really professional, then see if you can stick up a board in the garage to put all the tools on, with names written by the peg or hook for each.  I have a bit of cheap MDF on my old garage wall, with loads of nails driven in to hold tools.  I pencilled around every tool when it was on the board, then took all the tools off and painted inside the outlines of every tool with some left over paint and a small brush.  Took about an hour to do, but now I can glance at that big board and see if any tool is missing.  I didn't bother with labels, but you might find it easier to label the "shadow" of every tool on the board, so you can find it easily.  It's a tremendous help just being able to look at a board to find any tool.  There's also a great deal of satisfaction in fixing things yourself, especially the first time you do it.  I find it's not really about the money saved, it's about the personal achievement,

2 hours ago, newhome said:

Next problem. It’s attached to this plastic thing at the front. I’ve unscrewed it from the unit but can’t get the plastic collar thing to let go unless anyone has any ideas. 

 

Then I thought I would just unscrew the nut. Never used a spanner before so went in search of one. Found one that says 13/16 one end and I think it says 11/16 the other end but one is too big and the other too small. Looks like I may need to buy one the right size if I can work out what it needs. 

 

 

 

Lever it up and it will unclip from that

 

and that is a 17mm nut...

1 hour ago, newhome said:

 

Shows your age because it has been Oil of Olay for about 20 years! 

 

I look so young anyway that I am still on the same bottle !

 

5 minutes ago, PeterW said:

and that is a 17mm nut...

 

11/16" in old money!

18 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

I suspect you already have all the tools you could possibly need

 

I’ve got rid of quite a lot of stuff TBH. There are still bits and pieces left but not as much as there was to start with for sure. I didn’t find the right size spanner but cleared out 4 more crates of crap. New mantra, if it’s rusty then bin it lol. 

Success! Couldn’t find a spanner but managed to improvise with some grippers. What now please? 

 

 

23 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

Best bet is to sort out and photograph your late husbands tools, post them here in another thread,

 

I may well do that as there are some things in there that I don’t know whether to keep or bin. 

1 minute ago, newhome said:

if it’s rusty then bin it

 

That's a shame. Surface rust on tools can generally be restored. In the right hands of course. My father, as a minor hobby, buys boxes full of rusty tools and takes pride in restoring them to as-new condition.

Cheap spanners are ok unless you're really giving them some grunt - nasty if they break! Ditto cheap chrome plating, flakes of that in your fingers are evil! For the use you'll give them that set will probably be fine. For a lot of plumbing stuff you'll need bigger like 24mm and even 32mm.

 

A cheap vernier caliper would be useful to you, something like this:

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Silverline-675037-Vernier-Caliper-150/dp/B000LFXQQO/ref=mp_s_a_1_7?

 

I've linked a manual/analogue one. You can get a digital one for the same money - great until it packs up or the watch battery dies.

 

I wouldn't be without my Mauser st/st one. As used by the British Army EOD bods! 

1 minute ago, Dreadnaught said:

 

That's a shame. Surface rust on tools can generally be restored. In the right hands of course. My father, as a minor hobby, buys boxes full of rusty tools and takes pride in restoring them to as-new condition.

 

I know but I don't think I can be bothered. In fairness most of the stuff I just binned seemed to be mountains of fixings and electrical bits and bobs rather than proper tools. Did chuck a load of drill bits though but they should be easy to replace if I need some later on. I still have some anyway and I don't see me turning into a DIY fiend in truth . 

 

 

2 hours ago, newhome said:

Success! Couldn’t find a spanner but managed to improvise with some grippers. What now please? 

 

 

 

Do I need to search for a replacement one of these or do I need to do something to fix it? 

 

I've unscrewed everything and rinsed it although nothing looked dirty inside in truth. 

Pretty sure it's this one (swap the bracket over from your existing one) : https://www.toiletspareparts.com/collections/siamp-toilet-spares/products/siamp-95l-side-entry-inlet-float-valve-1-2-15mm-plastic-30950607

 

 

Hopefully one of the experts will confirm or otherwise if this is the part before you splash some cash (although it's only £12).

Are they fairly standalone things? So if it fits on the side inlet pipe it should work regardless of make? Wondering if I should get a more reliable make? 

They all vary a bit, and one problem with built in cisterns is that there often isn't much room inside to fit the fill valve without the float touching something and perhaps jamming.  You can repair the valve you have, as the chances are the diaphragm has a small hole or split in it, but a new diaphragm is around £3 and you really need to take the fill valve out to gain access to it, anyway.  By the time you've done that it's easier to just fit a new valve.

 

One of the plumbing experts here will know whether there's a more reliable side entry fill valve that will fit in the same space as that Siamp one, perhaps.  If not I'd just replace it with the same one - they usually seem to last for around 5 years before failing, from what I can gather.

Just now, JSHarris said:

 

One of the plumbing experts here will know whether there's a more reliable side entry fill valve that will fit in the same space as that Siamp one, perhaps.  If not I'd just replace it with the same one - they usually seem to last for around 5 years before failing, from what I can gather.

 

Thanks. It's been in 8 years and is the one that has had the most use being the downstairs loo, and also the only loo that worked when we moved in, so I guess that's not too bad. The others have various issues but given my experience with the one upstairs I think that's due to the rods etc not being fitted correctly or still pressing down after a flush as the one upstairs doesn't leak or do anything strange with all of the rods and clips taken off. I have the joy of putting that back together and trying to avoid the issue yet to come  . 

 

 

There are millions of Siamp ones in use - unless you’re up for buying Geberit and doing some sort of Frankenstein’s inlet on it, as the main nut where the pipe is I would expect is pretty non standard ... 

 

 

It is worth a price on the check of the entire mechanism. If one thing has worn out, so might another piece.

 

The last leakyloo problem I had, we just replaced the entire mechanism for very little money.