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On 7/8/2010 1:50 AM, scott wrote:
>> Every car I've ever seen has hinges which try to force the door fully
>> open or fully closed. Now you can see why fully closed would be a good
>> idea. But if you're parked in a tight space, it's really irritating
>> that you can't let go of the door because you'll either get a door in
>> your face, or the door will spring open and scratch up the car next to
>> you.
>>
>> Such a simple problem, yet nobody has solved it. WHY?!! >_<
>
> Huh? Every car I've had for decades has a soft "stop" half way where the
> door is quite stable. You can then push it a bit harder and it locks all
> the way out. Try it!
>
Yep, mine has a detent about half way, which is usually just a bit too
much for a cramped parking lot. This makes the task of wrangling a
squirming toddler into the car ever so enjoyable while you
simultaneously are trying to keep the door from contacting the car next
to you, which seems to have been parked by someone who insists on
parking with their tire touching the line. :)
>> Why are the downstairs taps connected to the mains, but the upstairs
>> ones connected to a tank?
>
> To stop you having mains pressure cold (~1-5 bar) next to tank pressure
> hot (~0.2 bar) in the bath. Imagine what happens when you connect one of
> those old-fashioned shower adapters to the bath taps, turn hot and cold
> to full and then turn *off* the shower head. Fortunately now we have
> taps with back-flow prevention valves and fancy mixer taps to avoid this
> problem. Many houses don't have a cold tank, and some won't have a hot
> tank either (the hot is heated on-demand by the boiler).
>
Hmm, that makes sense... Though a thermostatic valve eliminates that
need entirely.
--
~Mike
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Mike Raiford wrote:
> Is this everywhere, though? I imagine in Andrew's Building's case that
> it could be that his building was on a hill, while the building gets
> reasonable pressure on the lower floor, the upper floor might not get
> enough. Where I live, there's plenty of water pressure. But, if your
> building is taller than the water tower, it'll need a tank to get
> pressure to the upper floors.
Is water actually that damned heavy?
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>> It's different in the UK, the mains pressure usually equates to about
>> 10-50 metres plus of head. Any water from a tank in the roof is usually
>> *way* lower pressure than mains. For example you can easily block off a
>> fully open hot tap with your thumb with very little force, but it is
>> tricky, if not impossible to do the same on a mains pressure cold tap.
>
> Is this everywhere, though?
Pretty much, water companies are required to supply at a minimum of 1 bar,
which means upstairs you'd get a guaranteed ~0.7 bar. Unless you are able
to put a tank 7 metres higher than upstairs it's not going to give any
improvement over the worst mains pressure.
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On 7/8/2010 7:18 AM, Invisible wrote:
> Is water actually that damned heavy?
It's heavier than air, isn't it? ;)
Pick up a 5 gallon bucket of water. it gets pretty heavy pretty quick.
The towers are there to create pressure to service an area. It's a
rather efficient system, so long as the demand doesn't drain the tower
you get very good pressure.
--
~Mike
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On 7/8/2010 7:20 AM, scott wrote:
>>> It's different in the UK, the mains pressure usually equates to about
>>> 10-50 metres plus of head. Any water from a tank in the roof is usually
>>> *way* lower pressure than mains. For example you can easily block off a
>>> fully open hot tap with your thumb with very little force, but it is
>>> tricky, if not impossible to do the same on a mains pressure cold tap.
>>
>> Is this everywhere, though?
>
> Pretty much, water companies are required to supply at a minimum of 1
> bar, which means upstairs you'd get a guaranteed ~0.7 bar. Unless you
> are able to put a tank 7 metres higher than upstairs it's not going to
> give any improvement over the worst mains pressure.
>
I figured in some rural areas this may not be the case, though. If, for
instance, the water were coming from a well...
... But by virtue of what you said the tank seems completely
unnecessary. I'm going to go out on a limb and say it was a vestige of
an earlier time back when the house was built. Probably to equalize the
pressure of cold and hot, as you said.
How do the on-demand hot water systems work, btw? It seems like here in
the States tanks are by far the norm. It seems like it would be a heck
of a lot more efficient to have the on-demand heating system, and a tad
less annoying... .I really, really despise it when the hot water runs out.
--
~Mike
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> I figured in some rural areas this may not be the case, though. If, for
> instance, the water were coming from a well...
In rural areas there will usually be a water reservoir on or inside a hill
somewhere nearby. If you water pressure is really so low that adding a tank
in the roof helps, then you are going to have other problems with washing
machines and boilers, I've seen some of them that demand a minimum water
pressure of 1 bar.
> How do the on-demand hot water systems work, btw?
A pipe off from the mains cold supply goes into the boiler, gets heated, and
then goes to all the hot taps. A flow-rate sensor detects when a hot tap is
turned on and fires up the boiler. It is the same boiler that does the
central heating, usually a smallish wall mounted unit like this:
http://www.petesheating.co.uk/images/examples/boiler_in_cupboard_2.jpg
(You can see in that photo there probably used to be a hot water tank there)
Advantages are higher efficiency, more space (no hot or cold tanks needed)
and unlimited hot water. The disadvantage is that unless you have a really
beefy boiler and gas supply, the hot water isn't going to come out as fast
as if you had a tank. For a shower this is usually not noticed because the
pressure is much higher, but you'll notice when it takes 2x longer to fill
the bath!
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On Thu, 08 Jul 2010 07:47:24 +0100, Stephen wrote:
> On 07/07/2010 10:50 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Wed, 07 Jul 2010 19:14:37 +0100, Stephen wrote:
>>
>>> On 07/07/2010 6:52 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>>> The water that goes to the upper floor is full of flouride and other
>>>> chemicals that give it an excess of anti-gravitrons, allowing it to
>>>> easily get up.
>>>
>>> LOL
>>
>> It's all a conspiracy, I tell ya... ;-)
>>
>>
> Mercy buckets, its true. :-)
LOL
>>>> The bigger question is why doesn't the tank fly off into space?;-)
>>>>
>>>>
>>> The ball cock holds it down. All those chemicals stop it from lifting.
>>> ;-)
>>
>> Well, that would explain it. ;-)
>>
>>
> Some chemicals inhibit rising, whilst others actively promote it. O_o
So it's a balancing act, then? That makes sense. ;-)
Jim
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Invisible wrote:
> Is water actually that damned heavy?
10 meters of water weighs as much as all the air over your head all the way
out to outer space. We've been to the moon. We can't manage to get down to
the base of the Gulf of Mexico.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
C# - a language whose greatest drawback
is that its best implementation comes
from a company that doesn't hate Microsoft.
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Invisible wrote:
> (The other fun thing is that if you swing it open, it hits the end and
> immediately bounces back in your face.)
That's broken. There's a spring that holds the clamp (for want of a better
word) against the bar with the notch in it. Sounds like that spring is screwed.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
C# - a language whose greatest drawback
is that its best implementation comes
from a company that doesn't hate Microsoft.
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On 08/07/2010 4:14 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> Some chemicals inhibit rising, whilst others actively promote it. O_o
> So it's a balancing act, then? That makes sense.;-)
>
So is just standing when you've taken chemicals. ;-)
--
Best Regards,
Stephen
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