Leaking shower head

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chez

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#295595 8-Apr-2022 17:03

I had a plumber installed a brand new Methven shower mixer and Greens rail shower in December 2021. Two and a half weeks ago, I noticed an on and off drip from the shower head. After a few days, it began to drip every night. I start to collect 150 mls overnight every night. Then, last week, it's 250-350 pls overnight. These past few days, it is dripping more and consistently which means it drips all the time. I tried contacting the plumber but I got no reply. I couldn't reach him.

Any ideas what could this be? Faulty shower rail? Faulty shower mixer? Both were all perfectly working for three months until this happened. We use the shower everyday.

jonherries

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#2898698 8-Apr-2022 17:25

Had an issue where the head cracked - took it back to Plumbing World as it had a five year warranty.

It may also be missing a rubber gasket inside the threaded connector.

Wasnt for us the mixer but the hose and head hold a fair bit of water. A way to check is lower the head to the floor after the last shower to drain what is left in the hose then see if it drips overnight.

lchiu7

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#2899054 9-Apr-2022 14:28

Just a random thought based on very little details you have provided. It's possible that it's not the shower head that is leaking since the shower head normally does not control on/off of the water. That would be the mixer. So it's possible the washer/ceramic disc or whatever in the mixer has failed. Pictures would help people provide some advice.

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

gzt

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#2899057 9-Apr-2022 14:39

Is it the rain head or the handheld head leaking?

neb

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#2899191 9-Apr-2022 21:33

lchiu7:
Just a random thought based on very little details you have provided. It's possible that it's not the shower head that is leaking since the shower head normally does not control on/off of the water. That would be the mixer. So it's possible the washer/ceramic disc or whatever in the mixer has failed. Pictures would help people provide some advice.

Had exactly this problem, one of many, at the Casa, and it was the mixer not the shower head. Plumber also mentioned that whoever had installed it had never adjusted the cold flow properly, which is why you got a deluge of cold when you turned it on and then less and less as you added in more hot.

One day I hope to find something in this house that's actually been done right.

lchiu7

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#2899292 10-Apr-2022 09:23

I had a very lucky experience in this area recently. My shower head was also leaking and it was clear to me it was the mixer valve. So I called a plumbing supply store to find out how much the internal cartridge was going to cost and that was like 50 bucks. So I parked it for the moment since the leak wasn't too bad. Then on a subsequent trip I happened to go into a Mitre 10 store and I saw what looked like the similar model mixer in a sales bin for ten bucks so I bought tha for the valve only.

But when I try to get the shower handle off the screw with an allen key head got stripped so I couldn't remove it. I ended up calling a plumber who drilled it out and then replaced the whole mixer handle itself. That worked out pretty well in the end.

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

chez

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#2900223 12-Apr-2022 10:16

Thank you for all your replies. The shower units (shower head, shower mixer and shower hose,etc) are all brand new. The plumber came yesterday and checked. My water pressure turns out suddenly become very high, 1000kpa. Take note that I normally have a low water pressure. I wonder if this is because there are many housing constructions around my neighbourhood lately (4 housing constructions). Plumber said that max is 500kpa although I saw on watercare website that residential pressure is normally 200kpa. Since, he's fully booked, he's gonna come and install pressure reducing valve (PRV) to reduce the pressure of the water overall. The idea is it should stop the leaking. If it still persists, then the new shower mixer might have at fault. I am guessing that it's the high pressure that is causing the leak.