Burst pipe?
I have just been to an empty flat (owned by my gran) to check for letters and blah blah. When I opened the front door, I was surprised to feel some warmth coming from the flat.
The heating was turned off two weeks ago (I visited every two weeks to warm up the flat for 24 hour during winter, but every two days when bitter cold) so the flat shouldn't be warm.
I checked around the flat and found some kind of heat / hot air coming from a cupboard under the kitchen sink. Same with another cupboard under the counter, next to the kitchen-sink cupboard. A lot of condensation around cupboard doors. That's when I noticed condensation on kitchen windows and wooden doors around the flat.
No leak anywhere. Not in the kitchen, bathroom or living room. No leak in those kitchen cupboards, either. Just condensation on doors. And a lot of warm air in those cupboards. The floor area in front of the kitchen-sink cupboard feels warm.
Does it sound like a burst pipe?
I'm trying to determine whether it's an emergency, e.g. call a plumber out now, or better to make an appointment for one to come tomorrow or the day after. Thanks in advance.
The heating was turned off two weeks ago (I visited every two weeks to warm up the flat for 24 hour during winter, but every two days when bitter cold) so the flat shouldn't be warm.
I checked around the flat and found some kind of heat / hot air coming from a cupboard under the kitchen sink. Same with another cupboard under the counter, next to the kitchen-sink cupboard. A lot of condensation around cupboard doors. That's when I noticed condensation on kitchen windows and wooden doors around the flat.
No leak anywhere. Not in the kitchen, bathroom or living room. No leak in those kitchen cupboards, either. Just condensation on doors. And a lot of warm air in those cupboards. The floor area in front of the kitchen-sink cupboard feels warm.
Does it sound like a burst pipe?
I'm trying to determine whether it's an emergency, e.g. call a plumber out now, or better to make an appointment for one to come tomorrow or the day after. Thanks in advance.
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Comments
Anyway you can just turn off the main stop-cock to avoid any flooding, but it hasn't really been cold enough for burst pipes.
Any warmth is likely to come from other flats or from hot water or CH pipes belonging to those flats, or maybe there's damp air from them finding its way into this flat. It's not usually a symptom of a burst pipe!
Have you found anything actually wrong? You will get condensation in a cold property, but it needs source of moist warm that usually comes from people living in it. You should investigate where the warm, presumably moist air is coming from, most likely from a neighbouring flat.
Thank you. I think there's been a leak because I found faint traces of a possible leak in the bathroom floor (carpeted). It's dry now, though. With this in mind, thanks for suggesting turning off the mains stop-cock, which I will do after this.
The source of the moist warmth seems to be in the cupboard under the sink, which makes the kitchen the warmest room. The rest of the flat is cool when comparing with the kitchen. When I ran the kitchen hot-water tap, the water is boiling hot.
Again, thanks for your help.
Edited:
Turning off the stopcock makes the difference. The warmed floor in front of the kitchen-sink cupboard is already cooling.
That's puzzling. Even if there was a hot water tank being heated nearby, and some of the heat was being conducted along the pipes and under the floor, turning off a tap wouldn't make any difference, if the hot water wasn't being run off.
Unless this tap somehow supplies the neighbouring flats' mains water, or their hot water.
Perhaps best to also turn off both mains power and the gas to the property. (But with the gas, bear in mind this will affect any pilot lights in the gas boiler and/or fire, which will later need reigniting.)
That still doesn't explain the condensation, but I couldn't tell you exactly how much to expect in an empty, presumably unheated flat. Just ensure there's some ventilation.
Thank you. I don't know how the hot water is heated, I'm afraid. I thought it was already off as the gas/heating boiler wasn't switched on last two weeks.
I've already left the flat, but will check to see if they're indeed turned off when I return this Wednesday for the plumber's visit. Thank you for your help and suggestion.
Thank you. I was hoping it was something straightforward, but seems it isn't.
Perhaps. The flat is on ground floor and part of a small factory/workshop conversion (very similar to this building). My gran owns this place for 70-odd years (her grandfather was a provisions merchant). As far as I know, it was converted as a residential building during the 1960s, and modernised twice since then. The last modernisation was done in 1999.
With that set-up, I'm fairly certain that the flats share the main water system, but I contacted the people upstairs to see if they were having problems with heating and water. Nope. All's fine. So it's this flat that's having a problem. Curse. Why does this have to happen on my watch?
Hopefully, the plumber this Wednesday can explain what's happening. Thank you so much for your help. I really appreciate it.