Scalding or frigid - never in between
April 27, 2013 11:24 PM   Subscribe

Moving away from the UK after a stay of about 9 months. One thing I will NOT miss is English plumbing. What is the deal with taps / faucets? Even in new construction, in bathrooms and kitchens you will often find one tap for hot water and one for cold, mixing taps seem to be rare. Why? Economy? Tradition? No one I've met here has a good explanation, so thought I'd try the green.
posted by Expat to Home & Garden (25 answers total) 10 users marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: Cold water is potable (you can drink it straight from the tap), hot water is not. Better not mix the two!

(Though I do agree the tap situation is bonkers.)
posted by fix at 11:53 PM on April 27, 2013


Best answer: fix: Cold water is potable (you can drink it straight from the tap), hot water is not. Better not mix the two!

But in the UK, water in upstairs bathrooms of older houses is often not potable (this was discussed in a previous AskMeFi), yet there are typically still separate taps.
posted by James Scott-Brown at 12:32 AM on April 28, 2013 [1 favorite]


I've read that in the UK, gravity-fed hot water (from an unpressurized tank in the attic) was the norm until relatively recently, compared to the US. Mixer taps presumably don't work with that much difference in pressure.

Also, according to urban legend, there's always a dead rat in the unpressurized hot water tank.
posted by hattifattener at 12:38 AM on April 28, 2013


Yeah, we have recently had mixer taps installed in our bathroom, with a hot water tank. There is such an imbalance in pressure that the only way you can get hot water is to turn the tap all the way in the hot direction. Move it slightly around from there and it's cold again because so much cold immediately mixes in, and now it takes forever to fill a bath with hot water.
posted by kadia_a at 1:03 AM on April 28, 2013


Living in the UK my experience is that it's to do with the age of the house. Newer houses have mixer taps as a rule, doing a quick mental straw poll of all the houses I'm in. I'm not sure why but I assumed it was because the norm was to put the plug in the sink and fill it for use, so the water got mixed that way, rather than having running taps. Which come to think of it was probably more Eco sound.
posted by billiebee at 2:12 AM on April 28, 2013 [1 favorite]


The imbalance of pressure has definitely got something to do with it, both due to gravity hot water tanks but also because cold water pressure from the mains can also be terrible based on where you live (and how many pipes burst in your area in the winter etc). And depending on the system, the pressure of each can change mid-flow, which is obviously visible with two taps but results in an unnoticed change in temperature with one.

Overall though, personally I don't like mixer taps at all. I guess its an aesthetic choice, but two smaller taps just looks much neater than one larger mixer tap, especially in traditional styled bathrooms. It's no big deal just to mix the water in the sink or the bath.
posted by iivix at 2:22 AM on April 28, 2013 [1 favorite]


Also, the hot water shouldn't really come out of the tap scalding hot, it should be hot enough to be provide hot water for a bath or washing up, but cool enough that you can put your hand under it directly.
posted by iivix at 2:24 AM on April 28, 2013 [1 favorite]


I suppose Brits and many (most?) other Europeans are used to mixing the water in the sink or bath. Americans presumably are used to being able to mix the desired temperature out of a single tap. I'm with livix, I think our solution is aesthetically superior.

Historically, we had bathtubs much earlier than we had showers and, unless you have an unsightly huge bore pipe, two taps allow a greater filling rate for a bath than one. Easier to have the same arrangement everywhere I suppose.
posted by epo at 2:33 AM on April 28, 2013


Best answer: A lot of modern boilers are combi boilers, heating both tap water and the central heating system. The hot water is (or should be) adjusted on the boiler to make it just hot enough for a bath or to do the dishes. The pressure usually isn't very high compared to the cold mains.

Older boilers are the immersion type usually. You heat the water on the cheaper tariff (in the night) and then the hot taps are gravity-fed from the boiler. Gravity-fed cold water tanks are getting rarer; people generally replace them with a mains feed when they have the heating system updated.

UK systems are almost never pumped. The exception is in mains-fed showers where the pressure from the hot water supply is insufficient.

Everywhere I've lived in the UK has had pretty high mains pressure, although I'd imagine that this is less the case in cities and some other places.

The pressure imbalance makes mixer taps less practical (although valves can be adjusted to equalise the pressure if necessary).

Also tradition - plumbing isn't an area where a nation's taste changes very rapidly. Also the lower cost and easier maintenance of single taps.

Potability isn't really an issue with combi boilers, as they're mains-fed. The only place in my house that we have a mixer is on one of the showers, where it's a thermostatic mixer, which seems to be able to handle the different pressures just fine.
posted by pipeski at 2:41 AM on April 28, 2013


It must be only tradition at this point.

I say this because in the last two, relatively modern, places I've lived in the UK there were separate taps on the bathtub and most sinks. But, also in both cases, the kitchen sink had a mixer.

It is all from the same source so I assume if it is done in the kitchen, it could be done everywhere.

We recently installed a mixer in our guest bathroom which only has a tub with two taps. We did this so our guests could take showers.
posted by vacapinta at 3:15 AM on April 28, 2013


I live in a house in England constructed in 1812 and we have mixer taps in all but one bath. I really think it's about the volume of the water heater. We have a wall unit doing an excellent job. Hot and cold potable water we can wait for.
posted by parmanparman at 3:25 AM on April 28, 2013


Best answer: The odd nexus of tradition and water pressure.

The majority of it seems to be tradition. Even in new build with reasonable water pressure, two taps seem to the be norm. That's just how it's done. It's like a lot of things in the UK I suppose. Based on tradition rather than technology. The hallmark of a once-great economy, always looking backward, clinging onto how things were, as if to let go of two taps and go mixed is somehow another death nail in the coffin of the decline of a great world empire to a leading European state.

It's a subtle difference, but the reciprocal is mentioned by Brits who go to the States. "One tap, always with the mixer tap. It's annoying, trying to find the right setting."

Also, plumbing. You can put mixer taps on existing build, but often the result is that you have to turn the hot eight rotations to get it all the way open, and the cold one half rotation to get warm water. Mixer taps are only fun when the water pressure is balanced, otherwise one ends up with the mix set to either "scalding" (no cold water), "warm" (a little cold water), or "lukewarm" (lots of cold water").

If you look at consumer behaviour, if one were to install a mixer tap on an unbalanced line, the experience would be poor, and reinforce the belief of the user in the double-tap system.
posted by nickrussell at 3:35 AM on April 28, 2013 [2 favorites]


Best answer: I don't know if it helps, but a few years ago, the Wall Street Journal investigated this very question, and came up with a number of potential answers but no definitive one.

The fact that (a) everybody has a different rationale for it, and (b) it is less common in newer buildings (but still more common than in American buildings) makes me think it's just tradition. Bathrooms are places for private comfort, and private comfort often seems linked to the things you grew up with.
posted by yankeefog at 3:49 AM on April 28, 2013 [3 favorites]


Best answer: Oops-- that Wall Street Journal link might be hidden behind a paywall. Here is a mirror of the article, with the added bonus of blog comments discussing the two-tap issue.
posted by yankeefog at 3:52 AM on April 28, 2013


Response by poster: Lots of great answers - @yankeefog, thanks especially for posting the WSJ article. One of the commenters mentions the same situation I have in my current kitchen - one tap that gives a stream of scalding water from the front, cold from the back. Almost, but not quite a mixing tap.

Seems like the answer is a mix of the practical and the traditional as with so many other things in the UK. Still, will look forward to getting to Switzerland where they do seem to believe in mixing taps.
posted by Expat at 5:21 AM on April 28, 2013


Hot and cold; two totally different piping systems, kept as far as possible apart so that the hot water you've paid money to make hot, stays hot. Why would you mix them?

After more than a decade living in North America, I still can't work out which way taps are supposed to go; there's seemingly no logic, and often no labelling. I think I've finally got to an uneasy detente with American wrong-way-up light switches, but the wispy power sockets? Never.
posted by scruss at 6:00 AM on April 28, 2013


I still can't work out which way taps are supposed to go; there's seemingly no logic, and often no labelling.

Everywhere I’ve been in the U.S., left is hot and right is cold, for both two‐knob and single‐knob arrangements.

Exceptions are rare enough that I’m sure they are mistakes, not intentional disagreements, like, say, the over/under toilet tissue issue.

I’ll agree that U.S. mains sockets/plugs are comically bad. British plugs may double as caltrops, but they stay put when plugged in, and at least some of them have insulated pins.
posted by Fongotskilernie at 7:10 AM on April 28, 2013


Hot and cold; two totally different piping systems, kept as far as possible apart so that the hot water you've paid money to make hot, stays hot. Why would you mix them?

Ok, that is nutty, how much money do you really feel this mixing is costing you?

After more than a decade living in North America, I still can't work out which way taps are supposed to go; there's seemingly no logic, and often no labelling.

They are all the same, hot on the right, cold on the left, everywhere, any deviation is a mistake.

I think I've finally got to an uneasy detente with American wrong-way-up light switches

Higher=More, this is just logical, for so many reasons, in so many situations and is the standard amoung all other electrical equipment.

As for the plugs, yeah, they have always sucked, improved in the last decades for sure, but still surprisingly crap.
posted by Cosine at 10:09 AM on April 28, 2013 [1 favorite]


> everywhere

Not quite everywhere; a couple of photo examples from older installations: History on Tap, and So Happy Together: Hot and Cold Taps. I grew up in older houses in Scotland. We definitely had at least one sink that had cold on the left. My parents' house might still.
posted by scruss at 11:01 AM on April 28, 2013


Separate hot/cold taps are a madness that's mostly British. In Sweden for example, there's pretty much mixer taps, and that's that. But plumbing is driven by tradition and legacy parts/expertise everywhere... French plumbing anyone? I have asked locals plumbing questions, and while the rationalizations differ, it really comes down to "that's the way it is". Also, figure that you already have the parts and expertise infrastructure all built around these designs, so out of inertia, things get built in the old system - if you install new types of plumbing, where are you going to turn when things go wrong? Of course, now that everything is moving to large multinational manufacturers, this is less of an issue. I've noticed that things are slowly becoming more uniform across Europe, even though differences definitely remain. I predict mixer taps will prevail all over the world.
posted by VikingSword at 12:40 PM on April 28, 2013


My grandfather, who worked in industrial management in the 1950s, claimed that the separate hot/cold taps in factory and office washrooms were a way for companies to save money. Having the hot water at a scalding temperature ensured that workers would always rinse their hands with cold water. This was cheaper than keeping the hot water at a temperature that people might actually be able to use.
posted by verstegan at 3:49 PM on April 28, 2013


Separate hot/cold taps are a madness that's mostly British.

This. I grew up in Germany and we always had mixer taps. Moved to the UK and was somewhat bemused, and still am, by the plumbing madness. Having lived in a range of properties, some newly built, some older there seems to be little rhyme or reason. In my last flat in the UK I had a mixer taps in the kitchen, over my bathtub and the shower was not a powershower so there was mixing going on there. But the bathroom sink had separate taps...go figure.

Now in Switzerland and it's mixer taps everywhere. Although there's madness here as well because they fix showerheads over the middle of the 'long' wall of the bathtub, that was definitely a new (to me) way of doing it.
posted by koahiatamadl at 3:55 PM on April 28, 2013


Also, the hot water shouldn't really come out of the tap scalding hot, it should be hot enough to be provide hot water for a bath or washing up, but cool enough that you can put your hand under it directly.

You don't always want hot water to be at bath or washing up temperature. Having lived in an old house with 7 other guys the only way to make sure that the showers would stay hot for everyone was to crank the boiler right up.

Also, I'm English, and staying in Switzerland at the moment, and every single mixer tap seems to be out to get me. The one in the shower doesn't go hot enough, the one in the kitchen goes the opposite way to how I expect (I'm writing this sipping lukewarm water as a combination of this and the fact I cant be bothered to stand up - I'm sure it will get cold eventually), and they're all so damn sensitive I can never get the temperature I want. And everyone's driving on the wrong side of the road.

Screw this.
posted by Ned G at 5:14 AM on April 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


After more than a decade living in North America, I still can't work out which way taps are supposed to go; there's seemingly no logic, and often no labelling.

Fongotskilernie: Everywhere I’ve been in the U.S., left is hot and right is cold, for both two‐knob and single‐knob arrangements.
Exceptions are rare enough that I’m sure they are mistakes, not intentional disagreements, like, say, the over/under toilet tissue issue.


Cosine: They are all the same, hot on the right, cold on the left, everywhere, any deviation is a mistake.

Point proven?
posted by talitha_kumi at 5:19 AM on April 29, 2013 [2 favorites]


Also, plumbing. You can put mixer taps on existing build, but often the result is that you have to turn the hot eight rotations to get it all the way open, and the cold one half rotation to get warm water. Mixer taps are only fun when the water pressure is balanced, otherwise one ends up with the mix set to either "scalding" (no cold water), "warm" (a little cold water), or "lukewarm" (lots of cold water").

Ah, this explains the miserably frustrating experience I had with two separate mixer taps at a flat in Brixton. The shower never got hot, the bathtub fluctuated wildly between lukewarm and scalding. In spite of the skylight and towel warmer, bathing was never a soothing experience.

They are all the same, hot on the right, cold on the left, everywhere, any deviation is a mistake.

I'm pretty sure it's the other way around, generally.
posted by oneirodynia at 3:56 PM on April 29, 2013


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